{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_11068/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_11068","id":"gutenberg_11068","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/11068","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","English literature -- 19th century -- History and criticism","Great Britain -- Biography","Great Britain -- Intellectual life -- 19th century"],"text":"THE\n\nSPIRIT OF THE AGE:\n\n\nOR\n\n\nCONTEMPORARY PORTRAITS.\n\n\n\n\n\"To know another well were to know one's self.\"\n\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\nJEREMY BENTHAM\n\nWILLIAM GODWIN\n\nMR. COLERIDGE\n\nREV. MR. IRVING\n\nTHE LATE MR. HORNE TOOKE\n\nSIR WALTER SCOTT\n\nLORD BYRON\n\nMR. CAMPBELL--MR. CRABBE\n\nSIR JAMES MACKINTOSH\n\nMR. WORDSWORTH\n\nMR. MALTHUS\n\nMR. GIFFORD\n\nMR. JEFFREY\n\nMR. BROUGHAM--SIR F. BURDETT\n\nLORD ELDON--MR. WILBERFORCE\n\nMR. SOUTHEY\n\nMR. T. MOORE--MR. LEIGH HUNT\n\nELIA--GEOFFREY CRAYON\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nSPIRIT OF THE AGE.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nJEREMY BENTHAM.\n\n\n\nMr. Bentham is one of those persons who verify the old adage, that \"A\nprophet has no honour, except out of his own country.\" His reputation\nlies at the circumference; and the lights of his understanding are\nreflected, with increasing lustre, on the other side of the globe. His\nname is little known in England, better in Europe, best of all in the\nplains of Chili and the mines of Mexico. He has offered constitutions\nfor the New World, and legislated for future times. The people of\nWestminster, where he lives, hardly know of such a person; but the\nSiberian savage has received cold comfort from his lunar aspect, and may\nsay to him with Caliban--\"I know thee, and thy dog and thy bush!\" The\ntawny Indian may hold out the hand of fellowship to him across the GREAT\nPACIFIC. We believe that the Empress Catherine corresponded with him;\nand we know that the Emperor Alexander called upon him, and presented\nhim with his miniature in a gold snuff-box, which the philosopher, to\nhis eternal honour, returned. Mr. Hobhouse is a greater man at the\nhustings, Lord Rolle at Plymouth Dock; but Mr. Bentham would carry it\nhollow, on the score of popularity, at Paris or Pegu. The reason is,\nthat our author's influence is purely intellectual. He has devoted\nhis life to the pursuit of abstract and general truths, and to those\nstudies--\n\n  \"That waft a _thought_ from Indus to the Pole\"--\n\nand has never mixed himself up with personal intrigues or party\npolitics. He once, indeed, stuck up a hand-bill to say that he (Jeremy\nBentham) being of sound mind, was of opinion that Sir Samuel Romilly was\nthe most proper person to represent Westminster; but this was the whim\nof the moment. Otherwise, his reasonings, if true at all, are true\neverywhere alike: his speculations concern humanity at large, and are\nnot confined to the hundred or the bills of mortality. It is in moral as\nin physical magnitude. The little is seen best near: the great appears\nin its proper dimensions, only from a more commanding point of view, and\ngains strength with time, and elevation from distance!\n\nMr. Bentham is very much among philosophers what La Fontaine was among\npoets:--in general habits and in all but his professional pursuits, he\nis a mere child. He has lived for the last forty years in a house\nin Westminster, overlooking the Park, like an anchoret in his cell,\nreducing law to a system, and the mind of man to a machine. He scarcely\never goes out, and sees very little company. The favoured few, who have\nthe privilege of the _entr\u00e9e_, are always admitted one by one. He does\nnot like to have witnesses to his conversation. He talks a great deal,\nand listens to nothing but facts. When any one calls upon him, he\ninvites them to take a turn round his garden with him (Mr. Bentham is\nan economist of his time, and sets apart this portion of it to air and\nexercise)--and there you may see the lively old man, his mind still\nbuoyant with thought and with the prospect of futurity, in eager\nconversation with some Opposition Member, some expatriated Patriot, or\nTransatlantic Adventurer, urging the extinction of Close Boroughs, or\nplanning a code of laws for some \"lone island in the watery waste,\"\nhis walk almost amounting to a run, his tongue keeping pace with it in\nshrill, cluttering accents, negligent of his person, his dress, and his\nmanner, intent only on his grand theme of UTILITY--or pausing, perhaps,\nfor want of breath and with lack-lustre eye to point out to the stranger\na stone in the wall at the end of his garden (overarched by two\nbeautiful cotton-trees) _Inscribed to the Prince of Poets_, which\nmarks the house where Milton formerly lived. To shew how little the\nrefinements of taste or fancy enter into our author's system, he\nproposed at one time to cut down these beautiful trees, to convert the\ngarden where he had breathed the air of Truth and Heaven for near half\na century into a paltry _Chreistomathic School_, and to make Milton's\nhouse (the cradle of Paradise Lost) a thoroughfare, like a three-stalled\nstable, for the idle rabble of Westminster to pass backwards and\nforwards to it with their cloven hoofs. Let us not, however, be getting\non too fast--Milton himself taught school! There is something not\naltogether dissimilar between Mr. Bentham's appearance, and the\nportraits of Milton, the same silvery tone, a few dishevelled hairs, a\npeevish, yet puritanical expression, an irritable temperament corrected\nby habit and discipline. Or in modern times, he is something between\nFranklin and Charles Fox, with the comfortable double-chin and sleek\nthriving look of the one, and the quivering lip, the restless eye, and\nanimated acuteness of the other. His eye is quick and lively; but it\nglances not from object to object, but from thought to thought. He is\nevidently a man occupied with some train of fine and inward association.\nHe regards the people about him no more than the flies of a summer. He\nmeditates the coming age. He hears and sees only what suits his purpose,\nor some \"foregone conclusion;\" and looks out for facts and passing\noccurrences in order to put them into his logical machinery and grind\nthem into the dust and powder of some subtle theory, as the miller looks\nout for grist to his mill! Add to this physiognomical sketch the minor\npoints of costume, the open shirt-collar, the single-breasted coat, the\nold-fashioned half-boots and ribbed stockings; and you will find in Mr.\nBentham's general appearance a singular mixture of boyish simplicity and\nof the venerableness of age. In a word, our celebrated jurist presents a\nstriking illustration of the difference between the _philosophical_ and\nthe _regal_ look; that is, between the merely abstracted and the merely\npersonal. There is a lackadaisical _bonhommie_ about his whole aspect,\nnone of the fierceness of pride or power; an unconscious neglect of\nhis own person, instead of a stately assumption of superiority; a\ngood-humoured, placid intelligence, instead of a lynx-eyed watchfulness,\nas if it wished to make others its prey, or was afraid they might turn\nand rend him; he is a beneficent spirit, prying into the universe, not\nlording it over it; a thoughtful spectator of the scenes of life, or\nruminator on the fate of mankind, not a painted pageant, a stupid idol\nset up on its pedestal of pride for men to fall down and worship with\nidiot fear and wonder at the thing themselves have made, and which,\nwithout that fear and wonder, would in itself be nothing!\n\nMr. Bentham, perhaps, over-rates the importance of his own theories. He\nhas been heard to say (without any appearance of pride or affectation)\nthat \"he should like to live the remaining years of his life, a year at\na time at the end of the next six or eight centuries, to see the effect\nwhich his writings would by that time have had upon the world.\" Alas!\nhis name will hardly live so long! Nor do we think, in point of fact,\nthat Mr. Bentham has given any new or decided impulse to the human mind.\nHe cannot be looked upon in the light of a discoverer in legislation\nor morals. He has not struck out any great leading principle or\nparent-truth, from which a number of others might be deduced; nor has he\nenriched the common and established stock of intelligence with original\nobservations, like pearls thrown into wine. One truth discovered is\nimmortal, and entitles its author to be so: for, like a new substance\nin nature, it cannot be destroyed. But Mr. Bentham's _forte_ is\narrangement; and the form of truth, though not its essence, varies with\ntime and circumstance. He has methodised, collated, and condensed all\nthe materials prepared to his hand on the subjects of which he treats,\nin a masterly and scientific manner; but we should find a difficulty\nin adducing from his different works (however elaborate or closely\nreasoned) any new element of thought, or even a new fact or\nillustration. His writings are, therefore, chiefly valuable as _books of\nreference_, as bringing down the account of intellectual inquiry to the\npresent period, and disposing the results in a compendious, connected,\nand tangible shape; but books of reference are chiefly serviceable for\nfacilitating the acquisition of knowledge, and are constantly liable\nto be superseded and to grow out of fashion with its progress, as the\nscaffolding is thrown down as soon as the building is completed. Mr.\nBentham is not the first writer (by a great many) who has assumed the\nprinciple of UTILITY as the foundation of just laws, and of all moral\nand political reasoning:--his merit is, that he has applied this\nprinciple more closely and literally; that he has brought all the\nobjections and arguments, more distinctly labelled and ticketted, under\nthis one head, and made a more constant and explicit reference to it at\nevery step of his progress, than any other writer. Perhaps the weak side\nof his conclusions also is, that he has carried this single view of his\nsubject too far, and not made sufficient allowance for the varieties of\nhuman nature, and the caprices and irregularities of the human will. \"He\nhas not allowed for the _wind_.\" It is not that you can be said to see\nhis favourite doctrine of Utility glittering everywhere through his\nsystem, like a vein of rich, shining ore (that is not the nature of the\nmaterial)--but it might be plausibly objected that he had struck the\nwhole mass of fancy, prejudice, passion, sense, whim, with his petrific,\nleaden mace, that he had \"bound volatile Hermes,\" and reduced the theory\nand practice of human life to a _caput mortuum_ of reason, and dull,\nplodding, technical calculation. The gentleman is himself a capital\nlogician; and he has been led by this circumstance to consider man as a\nlogical animal. We fear this view of the matter will hardly hold water.\nIf we attend to the _moral_ man, the constitution of his mind will\nscarcely be found to be built up of pure reason and a regard to\nconsequences: if we consider the _criminal_ man (with whom the\nlegislator has chiefly to do) it will be found to be still less so.\n\nEvery pleasure, says Mr. Bentham, is equally a good, and is to be taken\ninto the account as such in a moral estimate, whether it be the pleasure\nof sense or of conscience, whether it arise from the exercise of virtue\nor the perpetration of crime. We are afraid the human mind does not\nreadily come into this doctrine, this _ultima ratio philosophorum_,\ninterpreted according to the letter. Our moral sentiments are made up of\nsympathies and antipathies, of sense and imagination, of understanding\nand prejudice. The soul, by reason of its weakness, is an aggregating\nand an exclusive principle; it clings obstinately to some things, and\nviolently rejects others. And it must do so, in a great measure, or it\nwould act contrary to its own nature. It needs helps and stages in its\nprogress, and \"all appliances and means to boot,\" which can raise it to\na partial conformity to truth and good (the utmost it is capable of) and\nbring it into a tolerable harmony with the universe. By aiming at too\nmuch, by dismissing collateral aids, by extending itself to the farthest\nverge of the conceivable and possible, it loses its elasticity and\nvigour, its impulse and its direction. The moralist can no more do\nwithout the intermediate use of rules and principles, without the\n'vantage ground of habit, without the levers of the understanding, than\nthe mechanist can discard the use of wheels and pulleys, and perform\nevery thing by simple motion. If the mind of man were competent to\ncomprehend the whole of truth and good, and act upon it at once, and\nindependently of all other considerations, Mr. Bentham's plan would be\na feasible one, and _the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the\ntruth_ would be the best possible ground to place morality upon. But\nit is not so. In ascertaining the rules of moral conduct, we must have\nregard not merely to the nature of the object, but to the capacity of\nthe agent, and to his fitness for apprehending or attaining it. Pleasure\nis that which is so in itself: good is that which approves itself as\nsuch on reflection, or the idea of which is a source of satisfaction.\nAll pleasure is not, therefore (morally speaking) equally a good; for\nall pleasure does not equally bear reflecting on. There are some tastes\nthat are sweet in the mouth and bitter in the belly; and there is a\nsimilar contradiction and anomaly in the mind and heart of man. Again,\nwhat would become of the _Posthaec meminisse juvabit_ of the poet, if\na principle of fluctuation and reaction is not inherent in the very\nconstitution of our nature, or if all moral truth is a mere literal\ntruism? We are not, then, so much to inquire what certain things are\nabstractedly or in themselves, as how they affect the mind, and to\napprove or condemn them accordingly. The same object seen near strikes\nus more powerfully than at a distance: things thrown into masses give\na greater blow to the imagination than when scattered and divided into\ntheir component parts. A number of mole-hills do not make a mountain,\nthough a mountain is actually made up of atoms: so moral truth must\npresent itself under a certain aspect and from a certain point of view,\nin order to produce its full and proper effect upon the mind. The laws\nof the affections are as necessary as those of optics. A calculation of\nconsequences is no more equivalent to a sentiment, than a _seriatim_\nenumeration of square yards or feet touches the fancy like the sight of\nthe Alps or Andes!\n\nTo give an instance or two of what we mean. Those who on pure\ncosmopolite principles, or on the ground of abstract humanity affect an\nextraordinary regard for the Turks and Tartars, have been accused of\nneglecting their duties to their friends and next-door neighbours. Well,\nthen, what is the state of the question here? One human being is, no\ndoubt, as much worth in himself, independently of the circumstances of\ntime or place, as another; but he is not of so much value to us and\nour affections. Could our imagination take wing (with our speculative\nfaculties) to the other side of the globe or to the ends of the\nuniverse, could our eyes behold whatever our reason teaches us to be\npossible, could our hands reach as far as our thoughts or wishes, we\nmight then busy ourselves to advantage with the Hottentots, or hold\nintimate converse with the inhabitants of the Moon; but being as we are,\nour feelings evaporate in so large a space--we must draw the circle of\nour affections and duties somewhat closer--the heart hovers and fixes\nnearer home. It is true, the bands of private, or of local and natural\naffection are often, nay in general, too tightly strained, so as\nfrequently to do harm instead of good: but the present question is\nwhether we can, with safety and effect, be wholly emancipated from them?\nWhether we should shake them off at pleasure and without mercy, as the\nonly bar to the triumph of truth and justice? Or whether benevolence,\nconstructed upon a logical scale, would not be merely _nominal_, whether\nduty, raised to too lofty a pitch of refinement, might not sink into\ncallous indifference or hollow selfishness? Again, is it not to exact\ntoo high a strain from humanity, to ask us to qualify the degree\nof abhorrence we feel against a murderer by taking into our cool\nconsideration the pleasure he may have in committing the deed, and in\nthe prospect of gratifying his avarice or his revenge? We are hardly so\nformed as to sympathise at the same moment with the assassin and\nhis victim. The degree of pleasure the former may feel, instead of\nextenuating, aggravates his guilt, and shews the depth of his malignity.\nNow the mind revolts against this by mere natural antipathy, if it is\nitself well-disposed; or the slow process of reason would afford but a\nfeeble resistance to violence and wrong. The will, which is necessary to\ngive consistency and promptness to our good intentions, cannot extend so\nmuch candour and courtesy to the antagonist principle of evil: virtue,\nto be sincere and practical, cannot be divested entirely of the\nblindness and impetuosity of passion! It has been made a plea (half\njest, half earnest) for the horrors of war, that they promote trade\nand manufactures. It has been said, as a set-off for the atrocities\npractised upon the negro slaves in the West Indies, that without their\nblood and sweat, so many millions of people could not have sugar to\nsweeten their tea. Fires and murders have been argued to be beneficial,\nas they serve to fill the newspapers, and for a subject to talk of--\nthis is a sort of sophistry that it might be difficult to disprove on\nthe bare scheme of contingent utility; but on the ground that we have\nstated, it must pass for a mere irony. What the proportion between the\ngood and the evil will really be found in any of the supposed cases,\nmay be a question to the understanding; but to the imagination and the\nheart, that is, to the natural feelings of mankind, it admits of none!\n\nMr. Bentham, in adjusting the provisions of a penal code, lays too\nlittle stress on the cooperation of the natural prejudices of mankind,\nand the habitual feelings of that class of persons for whom they are\nmore particularly designed. Legislators (we mean writers on legislation)\nare philosophers, and governed by their reason: criminals, for whose\ncontroul laws are made, are a set of desperadoes, governed only by their\npassions. What wonder that so little progress has been made towards a\nmutual understanding between the two parties! They are quite a different\nspecies, and speak a different language, and are sadly at a loss for a\ncommon interpreter between them. Perhaps the Ordinary of Newgate bids\nas fair for this office as any one. What should Mr. Bentham, sitting at\nease in his arm-chair, composing his mind before he begins to write by a\nprelude on the organ, and looking out at a beautiful prospect when he\nis at a loss for an idea, know of the principles of action of rogues,\noutlaws, and vagabonds? No more than Montaigne of the motions of his\ncat! If sanguine and tender-hearted philanthropists have set on foot an\ninquiry into the barbarity and the defects of penal laws, the practical\nimprovements have been mostly suggested by reformed cut-throats,\nturnkeys, and thief-takers. What even can the Honourable House, who when\nthe Speaker has pronounced the well-known, wished-for sounds \"That this\nhouse do now adjourn,\" retire, after voting a royal crusade or a loan of\nmillions, to lie on down, and feed on plate in spacious palaces, know\nof what passes in the hearts of wretches in garrets and night-cellars,\npetty pilferers and marauders, who cut throats and pick pockets with\ntheir own hands? The thing is impossible. The laws of the country are,\ntherefore, ineffectual and abortive, because they are made by the rich\nfor the poor, by the wise for the ignorant, by the respectable and\nexalted in station for the very scum and refuse of the community. If\nNewgate would resolve itself into a committee of the whole Press-yard,\nwith Jack Ketch at its head, aided by confidential persons from the\ncounty prisons or the Hulks, and would make a clear breast, some _data_\nmight be found out to proceed upon; but as it is, the _criminal mind_ of\nthe country is a book sealed, no one has been able to penetrate to the\ninside! Mr. Bentham, in his attempts to revise and amend our criminal\njurisprudence, proceeds entirely on his favourite principle of Utility.\nConvince highwaymen and house-breakers that it will be for their\ninterest to reform, and they will reform and lead honest lives;\naccording to Mr. Bentham. He says, \"All men act from calculation, even\nmadmen reason.\" And, in our opinion, he might as well carry this maxim\nto Bedlam or St. Luke's, and apply it to the inhabitants, as think to\ncoerce or overawe the inmates of a gaol, or those whose practices\nmake them candidates for that distinction, by the mere dry, detailed\nconvictions of the understanding. Criminals are not to be influenced by\nreason; for it is of the very essence of crime to disregard consequences\nboth to ourselves and others. You may as well preach philosophy to a\ndrunken man, or to the dead, as to those who are under the instigation\nof any mischievous passion. A man is a drunkard, and you tell him he\nought to be sober; he is debauched, and you ask him to reform; he\nis idle, and you recommend industry to him as his wisest course; he\ngambles, and you remind him that he may be ruined by this foible; he\nhas lost his character, and you advise him to get into some reputable\nservice or lucrative situation; vice becomes a habit with him, and you\nrequest him to rouse himself and shake it off; he is starving, and you\nwarn him that if he breaks the law, he will be hanged. None of this\nreasoning reaches the mark it aims at. The culprit, who violates and\nsuffers the vengeance of the laws, is not the dupe of ignorance, but the\nslave of passion, the victim of habit or necessity. To argue with strong\npassion, with inveterate habit, with desperate circumstances, is to talk\nto the winds. Clownish ignorance may indeed be dispelled, and\ntaught better; but it is seldom that a criminal is not aware of the\nconsequences of his act, or has not made up his mind to the alternative.\nThey are, in general, _too knowing by half_. You tell a person of this\nstamp what is his interest; he says he does not care about his interest,\nor the world and he differ on that particular. But there is one point on\nwhich he must agree with them, namely, what _they_ think of his conduct,\nand that is the only hold you have of him. A man may be callous and\nindifferent to what happens to himself; but he is never indifferent to\npublic opinion, or proof against open scorn and infamy. Shame, then,\nnot fear, is the sheet-anchor of the law. He who is not afraid of being\npointed at as a _thief_, will not mind a month's hard labour. He who is\nprepared to take the life of another, is already reckless of his own.\nBut every one makes a sorry figure in the pillory; and the being\nlaunched from the New Drop lowers a man in his own opinion. The lawless\nand violent spirit, who is hurried by headstrong self-will to break the\nlaws, does not like to have the ground of pride and obstinacy struck\nfrom under his feet. This is what gives the _swells_ of the metropolis\nsuch a dread of the _tread-mill_--it makes them ridiculous. It must be\nconfessed, that this very circumstance renders the reform of criminals\nnearly hopeless. It is the apprehension of being stigmatized by public\nopinion, the fear of what will be thought and said of them, that deters\nmen from the violation of the laws, while their character remains\nunimpeached; but honour once lost, all is lost. The man can never be\nhimself again! A citizen is like a soldier, a part of a machine, who\nsubmits to certain hardships, privations, and dangers, not for his own\nease, pleasure, profit, or even conscience, but--_for shame_. What is\nit that keeps the machine together in either case? Not punishment or\ndiscipline, but sympathy. The soldier mounts the breach or stands in\nthe trenches, the peasant hedges and ditches, or the mechanic plies his\nceaseless task, because the one will not be called a _coward_, the other\na _rogue_: but let the one turn deserter and the other vagabond, and\nthere is an end of him. The grinding law of necessity, which is no other\nthan a name, a breath, loses its force; he is no longer sustained by\nthe good opinion of others, and he drops out of his place in society,\na useless clog! Mr. Bentham takes a culprit, and puts him into what he\ncalls a _Panopticon_, that is, a sort of circular prison, with open\ncells, like a glass bee-hive. He sits in the middle, and sees all the\nother does. He gives him work to do, and lectures him if he does not do\nit. He takes liquor from him, and society, and liberty; but he feeds and\nclothes him, and keeps him out of mischief; and when he has convinced\nhim, by force and reason together, that this life is for his good, he\nturns him out upon the world a reformed man, and as confident of the\nsuccess of his handy-work, as the shoemaker of that which he has just\ntaken off the last, or the Parisian barber in Sterne, of the buckle\nof his wig. \"Dip it in the ocean,\" said the perruquier, \"and it will\nstand!\" But we doubt the durability of our projector's patchwork. Will\nour convert to the great principle of Utility work when he is from under\nMr. Bentham's eye, because he was forced to work when under it? Will he\nkeep sober, because he has been kept from liquor so long? Will he not\nreturn to loose company, because he has had the pleasure of sitting\nvis-a-vis with a philosopher of late? Will he not steal, now that his hands\nare untied? Will he not take the road, now that it is free to him? Will\nhe not call his benefactor all the names he can set his tongue to, the\nmoment his back is turned? All this is more than to be feared. The charm\nof criminal life, like that of savage life, consists in liberty, in\nhardship, in danger, and in the contempt of death, in one word, in\nextraordinary excitement; and he who has tasted of it, will no more\nreturn to regular habits of life, than a man will take to water after\ndrinking brandy, or than a wild beast will give over hunting its prey.\nMiracles never cease, to be sure; but they are not to be had wholesale,\nor _to order_. Mr. Owen, who is another of these proprietors and\npatentees of reform, has lately got an American savage with him, whom he\ncarries about in great triumph and complacency, as an antithesis to his\n_New View of Society_, and as winding up his reasoning to what it mainly\nwanted, an epigrammatic point. Does the benevolent visionary of the\nLanark cotton-mills really think this _natural man_ will act as a foil\nto his _artificial man_? Does he for a moment imagine that his _Address\nto the higher and middle classes_, with all its advantages of fiction,\nmakes any thing like so interesting a romance as _Hunter's Captivity\namong the North American Indians?_ Has he any thing to shew, in all the\napparatus of New Lanark and its desolate monotony, to excite the thrill\nof imagination like the blankets made of wreaths of snow under which the\nwild wood-rovers bury themselves for weeks in winter? Or the skin of a\nleopard, which our hardy adventurer slew, and which served him for great\ncoat and bedding? Or the rattle-snake that he found by his side as a\nbedfellow? Or his rolling himself into a ball to escape from him? Or his\nsuddenly placing himself against a tree to avoid being trampled to death\nby the herd of wild buffaloes, that came rushing on like the sound of\nthunder? Or his account of the huge spiders that prey on bluebottles and\ngilded flies in green pathless forests; or of the great Pacific Ocean,\nthat the natives look upon as the gulf that parts time from eternity,\nand that is to waft them to the spirits of their fathers? After all\nthis, Mr. Hunter must find Mr. Owen and his parallellograms trite and\nflat, and will, we suspect, take an opportunity to escape from them!\n\nMr. Bentham's method of reasoning, though comprehensive and exact,\nlabours under the defect of most systems--it is too _topical_. It\nincludes every thing; but it includes every thing alike. It is rather\nlike an inventory, than a valuation of different arguments. Every\npossible suggestion finds a place, so that the mind is distracted as\nmuch as enlightened by this perplexing accuracy. The exceptions seem\nas important as the rule. By attending to the minute, we overlook the\ngreat; and in summing up an account, it will not do merely to insist on\nthe number of items without considering their amount. Our author's\npage presents a very nicely dove-tailed mosaic pavement of legal\ncommon-places. We slip and slide over its even surface without being\narrested any where. Or his view of the human mind resembles a map,\nrather than a picture: the outline, the disposition is correct, but it\nwants colouring and relief. There is a technicality of manner, which\nrenders his writings of more value to the professional inquirer than\nto the general reader. Again, his style is unpopular, not to say\nunintelligible. He writes a language of his own, that _darkens\nknowledge_. His works have been translated into French--they ought to\nbe translated into English. People wonder that Mr. Bentham has not been\nprosecuted for the boldness and severity of some of his invectives. He\nmight wrap up high treason in one of his inextricable periods, and\nit would never find its way into Westminster-Hall. He is a kind of\nManuscript author--he writes a cypher-hand, which the vulgar have no key\nto. The construction of his sentences is a curious framework with pegs\nand hooks to hang his thoughts upon, for his own use and guidance,\nbut almost out of the reach of every body else. It is a barbarous\nphilosophical jargon, with all the repetitions, parentheses,\nformalities, uncouth nomenclature and verbiage of law-Latin; and what\nmakes it worse, it is not mere verbiage, but has a great deal of\nacuteness and meaning in it, which you would be glad to pick out if you\ncould. In short, Mr. Bentham writes as if he was allowed but a single\nsentence to express his whole view of a subject in, and as if, should he\nomit a single circumstance or step of the argument, it would be lost to\nthe world for ever, like an estate by a flaw in the title-deeds. This\nis over-rating the importance of our own discoveries, and mistaking the\nnature and object of language altogether. Mr. Bentham has _acquired_\nthis disability--it is not natural to him. His admirable little work _On\nUsury_, published forty years ago, is clear, easy, and vigorous. But Mr.\nBentham has shut himself up since then \"in nook monastic,\" conversing\nonly with followers of his own, or with \"men of Ind,\" and has\nendeavoured to overlay his natural humour, sense, spirit, and style\nwith the dust and cobwebs of an obscure solitude. The best of it is, he\nthinks his present mode of expressing himself perfect, and that whatever\nmay be objected to his law or logic, no one can find the least fault\nwith the purity, simplicity, and perspicuity of his style.\n\nMr. Bentham, in private life, is an amiable and exemplary character.\nHe is a little romantic, or so; and has dissipated part of a handsome\nfortune in practical speculations. He lends an ear to plausible\nprojectors, and, if he cannot prove them to be wrong in their premises\nor their conclusions, thinks himself bound _in reason_ to stake his\nmoney on the venture. Strict logicians are licensed visionaries. Mr.\nBentham is half-brother to the late Mr. Speaker Abbott[A]--_Proh pudor_!\nHe was educated at Eton, and still takes our novices to task about\na passage in Homer, or a metre in Virgil. He was afterwards at the\nUniversity, and he has described the scruples of an ingenuous\nyouthful mind about subscribing the articles, in a passage in his\n_Church-of-Englandism_, which smacks of truth and honour both, and does\none good to read it in an age, when \"to be honest\" (or not to laugh at\nthe very idea of honesty) \"is to be one man picked out of ten thousand!\"\nMr. Bentham relieves his mind sometimes, after the fatigue of study, by\nplaying on a fine old organ, and has a relish for Hogarth's prints. He\nturns wooden utensils in a lathe for exercise, and fancies he can turn\nmen in the same manner. He has no great fondness for poetry, and can\nhardly extract a moral out of Shakespear. His house is warmed and\nlighted by steam. He is one of those who prefer the artificial to the\nnatural in most things, and think the mind of man omnipotent. He has a\ngreat contempt for out-of-door prospects, for green fields and\ntrees, and is for referring every thing to Utility. There is a little\nnarrowness in this; for if all the sources of satisfaction are taken\naway, what is to become of utility itself? It is, indeed, the great\nfault of this able and extraordinary man, that he has concentrated his\nfaculties and feelings too entirely on one subject and pursuit, and has\nnot \"looked enough abroad into universality.\"[B]\n\n\n[Footnote A: Now Lord Colchester.]\n\n[Footnote B: Lord Bacon's Advancement of Learning.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nWILLIAM GODWIN\n\n\n\nThe Spirit of the Age was never more fully-shewn than in its treatment\nof this writer--its love of paradox and change, its dastard submission\nto prejudice and to the fashion of the day. Five-and-twenty years ago he\nwas in the very zenith of a sultry and unwholesome popularity; he blazed\nas a sun in the firmament of reputation; no one was more talked of, more\nlooked up to, more sought after, and wherever liberty, truth, justice\nwas the theme, his name was not far off:--now he has sunk below the\nhorizon, and enjoys the serene twilight of a doubtful immortality. Mr.\nGodwin, during his lifetime, has secured to himself the triumphs and the\nmortifications of an extreme notoriety and of a sort of posthumous fame.\n\nHis bark, after being tossed in the revolutionary tempest, now raised to\nheaven by all the fury of popular breath, now almost dashed in pieces,\nand buried in the quicksands of ignorance, or scorched with the\nlightning of momentary indignation, at length floats on the calm wave\nthat is to bear it down the stream of time. Mr. Godwin's person is not\nknown, he is not pointed out in the street, his conversation is not\ncourted, his opinions are not asked, he is at the head of no cabal, he\nbelongs to no party in the State, he has no train of admirers, no\none thinks it worth his while even to traduce and vilify him, he has\nscarcely friend or foe, the world make a point (as Goldsmith used to\nsay) of taking no more notice of him than if such an individual had\nnever existed; he is to all ordinary intents and purposes dead and\nburied; but the author of _Political Justice_ and of _Caleb Williams_\ncan never die, his name is an abstraction in letters, his works are\nstandard in the history of intellect. He is thought of now like any\neminent writer a hundred-and-fifty years ago, or just as he will be\na hundred-and-fifty years hence. He knows this, and smiles in silent\nmockery of himself, reposing on the monument of his fame--\n\n  \"Sedet, in eternumque sedebit infelix Theseus.\"\n\nNo work in our time gave such a blow to the philosophical mind of the\ncountry as the celebrated _Enquiry concerning Political Justice_. Tom\nPaine was considered for the time as a Tom Fool to him; Paley an old\nwoman; Edmund Burke a flashy sophist. Truth, moral truth, it was\nsupposed, had here taken up its abode; and these were the oracles of\nthought. \"Throw aside your books of chemistry,\" said Wordsworth to a\nyoung man, a student in the Temple, \"and read Godwin on Necessity.\" Sad\nnecessity! Fatal reverse! Is truth then so variable? Is it one thing at\ntwenty, and another at forty? Is it at a burning heat in 1793, and below\n_zero_ in 1814? Not so, in the name of manhood and of common sense! Let\nus pause here a little.--Mr. Godwin indulged in extreme opinions, and\ncarried with him all the most sanguine and fearless understandings of\nthe time. What then? Because those opinions were overcharged, were they\ntherefore altogether groundless? Is the very God of our idolatry all of\na sudden to become an abomination and an anathema? Could so many young\nmen of talent, of education, and of principle have been hurried away by\nwhat had neither truth, nor nature, not one particle of honest feeling\nnor the least shew of reason in it? Is the _Modern Philosophy_ (as it\nhas been called) at one moment a youthful bride, and the next a withered\nbeldame, like the false Duessa in Spenser? Or is the vaunted edifice\nof Reason, like his House of Pride, gorgeous in front, and dazzling to\napproach, while \"its hinder parts are ruinous, decayed, and old?\" Has\nthe main prop, which supported the mighty fabric, been shaken and given\nway under the strong grasp of some Samson; or has it not rather been\nundermined by rats and vermin? At one time, it almost seemed, that \"if\nthis failed,\n\n  \"The pillar'd firmament was rottenness,\n  And earth's base built of stubble:\"\n\nnow scarce a shadow of it remains, it is crumbled to dust, nor is it\neven talked of! \"What then, went ye forth for to see, a reed shaken\nwith the wind?\" Was it for this that our young gownsmen of the greatest\nexpectation and promise, versed in classic lore, steeped in dialectics,\narmed at all points for the foe, well read, well nurtured, well provided\nfor, left the University and the prospect of lawn sleeves, tearing\nasunder the shackles of the free born spirit, and the cobwebs of\nschool-divinity, to throw themselves at the feet of the new Gamaliel,\nand learn wisdom from him? Was it for this, that students at the bar,\nacute, inquisitive, sceptical (here only wild enthusiasts) neglected for\na while the paths of preferment and the law as too narrow, tortuous, and\nunseemly to bear the pure and broad light of reason? Was it for this,\nthat students in medicine missed their way to Lecturerships and the top\nof their profession, deeming lightly of the health of the body, and\ndreaming only of the renovation of society and the march of mind? Was\nit to this that Mr. Southey's _Inscriptions_ pointed? to this that Mr.\nColeridge's _Religious Musings_ tended? Was it for this, that Mr. Godwin\nhimself sat with arms folded, and, \"like Cato, gave his little senate\nlaws?\" Or rather, like another Prospero, uttered syllables that with\ntheir enchanted breath were to change the world, and might almost stop\nthe stars in their courses? Oh! and is all forgot? Is this sun of\nintellect blotted from the sky? Or has it suffered total eclipse? Or is\nit we who make the fancied gloom, by looking at it through the paltry,\nbroken, stained fragments of our own interests and prejudices? Were we\nfools then, or are we dishonest now? Or was the impulse of the mind less\nlikely to be true and sound when it arose from high thought and warm\nfeeling, than afterwards, when it was warped and debased by the example,\nthe vices, and follies of the world?\n\nThe fault, then, of Mr. Godwin's philosophy, in one word, was too much\nambition--\"by that sin fell the angels!\" He conceived too nobly of his\nfellows (the most unpardonable crime against them, for there is nothing\nthat annoys our self-love so much as being complimented on imaginary\nachievements, to which we are wholly unequal)--he raised the standard\nof morality above the reach of humanity, and by directing virtue to the\nmost airy and romantic heights, made her path dangerous, solitary, and\nimpracticable. The author of the _Political Justice_ took abstract\nreason for the rule of conduct, and abstract good for its end. He places\nthe human mind on an elevation, from which it commands a view of the\nwhole line of moral consequences; and requires it to conform its acts to\nthe larger and more enlightened conscience which it has thus acquired.\nHe absolves man from the gross and narrow ties of sense, custom,\nauthority, private and local attachment, in order that he may devote\nhimself to the boundless pursuit of universal benevolence. Mr. Godwin\ngives no quarter to the amiable weaknesses of our nature, nor does he\nstoop to avail himself of the supplementary aids of an imperfect virtue.\nGratitude, promises, friendship, family affection give way, not that\nthey may be merged in the opposite vices or in want of principle; but\nthat the void may be filled up by the disinterested love of good, and\nthe dictates of inflexible justice, which is \"the law of laws, and\nsovereign of sovereigns.\" All minor considerations yield, in his system,\nto the stern sense of duty, as they do, in the ordinary and established\nones, to the voice of necessity. Mr. Godwin's theory and that of more\napproved reasoners differ only in this, that what are with them the\nexceptions, the extreme cases, he makes the every-day rule. No one\ndenies that on great occasions, in moments of fearful excitement, or\nwhen a mighty object is at stake, the lesser and merely instrumental\npoints of duty are to be sacrificed without remorse at the shrine of\npatriotism, of honour, and of conscience. But the disciple of the _New\nSchool_ (no wonder it found so many impugners, even in its own bosom!)\nis to be always the hero of duty; the law to which he has bound himself\nnever swerves nor relaxes; his feeling of what is right is to be at\nall times wrought up to a pitch of enthusiastic self-devotion; he must\nbecome the unshrinking martyr and confessor of the public good. If it\nbe said that this scheme is chimerical and impracticable on ordinary\noccasions, and to the generality of mankind, well and good; but those\nwho accuse the author of having trampled on the common feelings and\nprejudices of mankind in wantonness or insult, or without wishing to\nsubstitute something better (and only unattainable, because it is\nbetter) in their stead, accuse him wrongfully. We may not be able to\nlaunch the bark of our affections on the ocean-tide of humanity, we\nmay be forced to paddle along its shores, or shelter in its creeks and\nrivulets: but we have no right to reproach the bold and adventurous\npilot, who dared us to tempt the uncertain abyss, with our own want of\ncourage or of skill, or with the jealousies and impatience, which deter\nus from undertaking, or might prevent us from accomplishing the voyage!\n\nThe _Enquiry concerning Political Justice_ (it was urged by its\nfavourers and defenders at the time, and may still be so, without either\nprofaneness or levity) is a metaphysical and logical commentary on some\nof the most beautiful and striking texts of Scripture. Mr. Godwin is\na mixture of the Stoic and of the Christian philosopher. To break the\nforce of the vulgar objections and outcry that have been raised against\nthe Modern Philosophy, as if it were a new and monstrous birth in\nmorals, it may be worth noticing, that volumes of sermons have been\nwritten to excuse the founder of Christianity for not including\nfriendship and private affection among its golden rules, but rather\nexcluding them.[A] Moreover, the answer to the question, \"Who is thy\nneighbour?\" added to the divine precept, \"Thou shalt love thy neighbour\nas thyself,\" is the same as in the exploded pages of our author,--\"He to\nwhom we can do most good.\" In determining this point, we were not to be\ninfluenced by any extrinsic or collateral considerations, by our own\npredilections, or the expectations of others, by our obligations to them\nor any services they might be able to render us, by the climate they\nwere born in, by the house they lived in, by rank or religion, or party,\nor personal ties, but by the abstract merits, the pure and unbiassed\njustice of the case. The artificial helps and checks to moral conduct\nwere set aside as spurious and unnecessary, and we came at once to the\ngrand and simple question--\"In what manner we could best contribute to\nthe greatest possible good?\" This was the paramount obligation in all\ncases whatever, from which we had no right to free ourselves upon any\nidle or formal pretext, and of which each person was to judge for\nhimself, under the infallible authority of his own opinion and the\ninviolable sanction of his self-approbation. \"There was the rub that\nmade _philosophy_ of so short life!\" Mr. Godwin's definition of morals\nwas the same as the admired one of law, _reason without passion_; but\nwith the unlimited scope of private opinion, and in a boundless field of\nspeculation (for nothing less would satisfy the pretensions of the New\nSchool), there was danger that the unseasoned novice might substitute\nsome pragmatical conceit of his own for the rule of right reason, and\nmistake a heartless indifference for a superiority to more natural and\ngenerous feelings. Our ardent and dauntless reformer followed out the\nmoral of the parable of the Good Samaritan into its most rigid and\nrepulsive consequences with a pen of steel, and let fall his \"trenchant\nblade\" on every vulnerable point of human infirmity; but there is a want\nin his system of the mild and persuasive tone of the Gospel, where \"all\nis conscience and tender heart.\" Man was indeed screwed up, by mood and\nfigure, into a logical machine, that was to forward the public good with\nthe utmost punctuality and effect, and it might go very well on smooth\nground and under favourable circumstances; but would it work up-hill\nor _against the grain_? It was to be feared that the proud Temple of\nReason, which at a distance and in stately supposition shone like the\npalaces of the New Jerusalem, might (when placed on actual ground) be\nbroken up into the sordid styes of sensuality, and the petty huckster's\nshops of self-interest! Every man (it was proposed--\"so ran the tenour\nof the bond\") was to be a Regulus, a Codrus, a Cato, or a Brutus--every\nwoman a Mother of the Gracchi.\n\n  \"------------It was well said,\n  And 'tis a kind of good deed to say well.\"\n\nBut heroes on paper might degenerate into vagabonds in practice,\nCorinnas into courtezans. Thus a refined and permanent individual\nattachment is intended to supply the place and avoid the inconveniences\nof marriage; but vows of eternal constancy, without church security, are\nfound to be fragile. A member of the _ideal_ and perfect commonwealth of\nletters lends another a hundred pounds for immediate and pressing use;\nand when he applies for it again, the borrower has still more need of it\nthan he, and retains it for his own especial, which is tantamount to the\npublic good. The Exchequer of pure reason, like that of the State, never\nrefunds. The political as well as the religious fanatic appeals from\nthe over-weening opinion and claims of others to the highest and most\nimpartial tribunal, namely, his own breast. Two persons agree to\nlive together in Chambers on principles of pure equality and mutual\nassistance--but when it comes to the push, one of them finds that the\nother always insists on his fetching water from the pump in Hare-court,\nand cleaning his shoes for him. A modest assurance was not the least\nindispensable virtue in the new perfectibility code; and it was hence\ndiscovered to be a scheme, like other schemes where there are all prizes\nand no blanks, for the accommodation of the enterprizing and cunning, at\nthe expence of the credulous and honest. This broke up the system, and\nleft no good odour behind it! Reason has become a sort of bye-word, and\nphilosophy has \"fallen first into a fasting, then into a sadness,\nthen into a decline, and last, into the dissolution of which we all\ncomplain!\" This is a worse error than the former: we may be said to have\n\"lost the immortal part of ourselves, and what remains is beastly!\"\nThe point of view from which this matter may be fairly considered, is\ntwo-fold, and may be stated thus:--In the first place, it by no means\nfollows, because reason is found not to be the only infallible or safe\nrule of conduct, that it is no rule at all; or that we are to discard it\naltogether with derision and ignominy. On the contrary, if not the sole,\nit is the principal ground of action; it is \"the guide, the stay and\nanchor of our purest thoughts, and soul of all our moral being.\" In\nproportion as we strengthen and expand this principle, and bring our\naffections and subordinate, but perhaps more powerful motives of action\ninto harmony with it, it will not admit of a doubt that we advance to\nthe goal of perfection, and answer the ends of our creation, those ends\nwhich not only morality enjoins, but which religion sanctions. If with\nthe utmost stretch of reason, man cannot (as some seemed inclined to\nsuppose) soar up to the God, and quit the ground of human frailty, yet,\nstripped wholly of it, he sinks at once into the brute. If it cannot\nstand alone, in its naked simplicity, but requires other props to\nbuttress it up, or ornaments to set it off; yet without it the moral\nstructure would fall flat and dishonoured to the ground. Private reason\nis that which raises the individual above his mere animal instincts,\nappetites and passions: public reason in its gradual progress separates\nthe savage from the civilized state. Without the one, men would resemble\nwild beasts in their dens; without the other, they would be speedily\nconverted into hordes of barbarians or banditti. Sir Walter Scott, in\nhis zeal to restore the spirit of loyalty, of passive obedience and\nnon-resistance as an acknowledgment for his having been created a\nBaronet by a Prince of the House of Brunswick, may think it a fine thing\nto return in imagination to the good old times, \"when in Auvergne\nalone, there were three hundred nobles whose most ordinary actions were\nrobbery, rape, and murder,\" when the castle of each Norman baron was\na strong hold from which the lordly proprietor issued to oppress and\nplunder the neighbouring districts, and when the Saxon peasantry\nwere treated by their gay and gallant tyrants as a herd of loathsome\nswine--but for our own parts we beg to be excused; we had rather live\nin the same age with the author of Waverley and Blackwood's Magazine.\nReason is the meter and alnager in civil intercourse, by which each\nperson's upstart and contradictory pretensions are weighed and approved\nor found wanting, and without which it could not subsist, any more than\ntraffic or the exchange of commodities could be carried on without\nweights and measures. It is the medium of knowledge, and the polisher of\nmanners, by creating common interests and ideas. Or in the words of a\ncontemporary writer, \"Reason is the queen of the moral world, the soul\nof the universe, the lamp of human life, the pillar of society, the\nfoundation of law, the beacon of nations, the golden chain let down from\nheaven, which links all accountable and all intelligent natures in one\ncommon system--and in the vain strife between fanatic innovation and\nfanatic prejudice, we are exhorted to dethrone this queen of the world,\nto blot out this light of the mind, to deface this fair column, to break\nin pieces this golden chain! We are to discard and throw from us with\nloud taunts and bitter execrations that reason, which has been the lofty\ntheme of the philosopher, the poet, the moralist, and the divine, whose\nname was not first named to be abused by the enthusiasts of the French\nRevolution, or to be blasphemed by the madder enthusiasts, the advocates\nof Divine Right, but which is coeval with, and inseparable from the\nnature and faculties of man--is the image of his Maker stamped upon him\nat his birth, the understanding breathed into him with the breath of\nlife, and in the participation and improvement of which alone he is\nraised above the brute creation and his own physical nature!\"--The\noverstrained and ridiculous pretensions of monks and ascetics were never\nthought to justify a return to unbridled licence of manners, or the\nthrowing aside of all decency. The hypocrisy, cruelty, and fanaticism,\noften attendant on peculiar professions of sanctity, have not banished\nthe name of religion from the world. Neither can \"the unreasonableness\nof the reason\" of some modern sciolists \"so unreason our reason,\" as to\ndebar us of the benefit of this principle in future, or to disfranchise\nus of the highest privilege of our nature. In the second place, if it is\nadmitted that Reason alone is not the sole and self-sufficient ground of\nmorals, it is to Mr. Godwin that we are indebted for having settled the\npoint. No one denied or distrusted this principle (before his time) as\nthe absolute judge and interpreter in all questions of difficulty;\nand if this is no longer the case, it is because he has taken this\nprinciple, and followed it into its remotest consequences with more\nkeenness of eye and steadiness of hand than any other expounder of\nethics. His grand work is (at least) an _experimentum crucis_ to shew\nthe weak sides and imperfections of human reason as the sole law of\nhuman action. By overshooting the mark, or by \"flying an eagle flight,\nforth and right on,\" he has pointed out the limit or line of separation,\nbetween what is practicable and what is barely conceivable--by imposing\nimpossible tasks on the naked strength of the will, he has discovered\nhow far it is or is not in our power to dispense with the illusions of\nsense, to resist the calls of affection, to emancipate ourselves from\nthe force of habit; and thus, though he has not said it himself, has\nenabled others to say to the towering aspirations after good, and to the\nover-bearing pride of human intellect--\"Thus far shalt thou come, and no\nfarther!\" Captain Parry would be thought to have rendered a service\nto navigation and his country, no less by proving that there is no\nNorth-West Passage, than if he had ascertained that there is one: so Mr.\nGodwin has rendered an essential service to moral science, by attempting\n(in vain) to pass the Arctic Circle and Frozen Regions, where the\nunderstanding is no longer warmed by the affections, nor fanned by the\nbreeze of fancy! This is the effect of all bold, original, and powerful\nthinking, that it either discovers the truth, or detects where error\nlies; and the only crime with which Mr. Godwin can be charged as a\npolitical and moral reasoner is, that he has displayed a more ardent\nspirit, and a more independent activity of thought than others, in\nestablishing the fallacy (if fallacy it be) of an old popular prejudice\nthat _the Just and True were one_, by \"championing it to the Outrance,\"\nand in the final result placing the Gothic structure of human virtue\non an humbler, but a wider and safer foundation than it had hitherto\noccupied in the volumes and systems of the learned. Mr. Godwin is an\ninventor in the regions of romance, as well as a skilful and hardy\nexplorer of those of moral truth. _Caleb Williams_ and _St. Leon_ are\ntwo of the most splendid and impressive works of the imagination that\nhave appeared in our times. It is not merely that these novels are very\nwell for a philosopher to have produced--they are admirable and complete\nin themselves, and would not lead you to suppose that the author, who is\nso entirely at home in human character and dramatic situation, had ever\ndabbled in logic or metaphysics. The first of these, particularly, is\na master-piece, both as to invention and execution. The romantic and\nchivalrous principle of the love of personal fame is embodied in the\nfinest possible manner in the character of Falkland;[B] as in Caleb\nWilliams (who is not the first, but the second character in the piece)\nwe see the very demon of curiosity personified. Perhaps the art with\nwhich these two characters are contrived to relieve and set off each\nother, has never been surpassed in any work of fiction, with the\nexception of the immortal satire of Cervantes. The restless and\ninquisitive spirit of Caleb Williams, in search and in possession of\nhis patron's fatal secret, haunts the latter like a second conscience,\nplants stings in his tortured mind, fans the flame of his jealous\nambition, struggling with agonized remorse; and the hapless but\nnoble-minded Falkland at length falls a martyr to the persecution of\nthat morbid and overpowering interest, of which his mingled virtues and\nvices have rendered him the object. We conceive no one ever began Caleb\nWilliams that did not read it through: no one that ever read it could\npossibly forget it, or speak of it after any length of time, but with an\nimpression as if the events and feelings had been personal to himself.\nThis is the case also with the story of St. Leon, which, with less\ndramatic interest and intensity of purpose, is set off by a more\ngorgeous and flowing eloquence, and by a crown of preternatural imagery,\nthat waves over it like a palm-tree! It is the beauty and the charm of\nMr. Godwin's descriptions that the reader identifies himself with the\nauthor; and the secret of this is, that the author has identified\nhimself with his personages. Indeed, he has created them. They are the\nproper issue of his brain, lawfully begot, not foundlings, nor the\n\"bastards of his art.\" He is not an indifferent, callous spectator of\nthe scenes which he himself pourtrays, but without seeming to feel them.\nThere is no look of patch-work and plagiarism, the beggarly copiousness\nof borrowed wealth; no tracery-work from worm-eaten manuscripts, from\nforgotten chronicles, nor piecing out of vague traditions with fragments\nand snatches of old ballads, so that the result resembles a gaudy,\nstaring transparency, in which you cannot distinguish the daubing of the\npainter from the light that shines through the flimsy colours and gives\nthem brilliancy. Here all is clearly made out with strokes of the\npencil, by fair, not by factitious means. Our author takes a given\nsubject from nature or from books, and then fills it up with the ardent\nworkings of his own mind, with the teeming and audible pulses of his own\nheart. The effect is entire and satisfactory in proportion. The work\n(so to speak) and the author are one. We are not puzzled to decide upon\ntheir respective pretensions. In reading Mr. Godwin's novels, we know\nwhat share of merit the author has in them. In reading the _Scotch\nNovels_, we are perpetually embarrassed in asking ourselves this\nquestion; and perhaps it is not altogether a false modesty that prevents\nthe editor from putting his name in the title-page--he is (for any thing\nwe know to the contrary) only a more voluminous sort of Allen-a-Dale.\nAt least, we may claim this advantage for the English author, that the\nchains with which he rivets our attention are forged out of his own\nthoughts, link by link, blow for blow, with glowing enthusiasm: we see\nthe genuine ore melted in the furnace of fervid feeling, and moulded\ninto stately and _ideal_ forms; and this is so far better than peeping\ninto an old iron shop, or pilfering from a dealer in marine stores!\nThere is one drawback, however, attending this mode of proceeding, which\nattaches generally, indeed, to all originality of composition; namely,\nthat it has a tendency to a certain degree of monotony. He who draws\nupon his own resources, easily comes to an end of his wealth. Mr.\nGodwin, in all his writings, dwells upon one idea or exclusive view of a\nsubject, aggrandises a sentiment, exaggerates a character, or pushes an\nargument to extremes, and makes up by the force of style and continuity\nof feeling for what he wants in variety of incident or ease of manner.\nThis necessary defect is observable in his best works, and is still more\nso in Fleetwood and Mandeville; the one of which, compared with his more\nadmired performances, is mawkish, and the other morbid. Mr. Godwin is\nalso an essayist, an historian--in short, what is he not, that belongs\nto the character of an indefatigable and accomplished author? His _Life\nof Chaucer_ would have given celebrity to any man of letters possessed\nof three thousand a year, with leisure to write quartos: as the legal\nacuteness displayed in his _Remarks on Judge Eyre's Charge to the\nJury_ would have raised any briefless barrister to the height of his\nprofession. This temporary effusion did more--it gave a turn to the\ntrials for high treason in the year 1794, and possibly saved the lives\nof twelve innocent individuals, marked out as political victims to the\nMoloch of Legitimacy, which then skulked behind a British throne,\nand had not yet dared to stalk forth (as it has done since) from its\nlurking-place, in the face of day, to brave the opinion of the world. If\nit had then glutted its maw with its intended prey (the sharpness of Mr.\nGodwin's pen cut the legal cords with which it was attempted to bind\nthem), it might have done so sooner, and with more lasting effect. The\nworld do not know (and we are not sure but the intelligence may startle\nMr. Godwin himself), that he is the author of a volume of Sermons, and\nof a Life of Chatham.[C]\n\nMr. Fawcett (an old friend and fellow-student of our author, and who\nalways spoke of his writings with admiration, tinctured with wonder)\nused to mention a circumstance with respect to the last-mentioned work,\nwhich may throw some light on the history and progress of Mr. Godwin's\nmind. He was anxious to make his biographical account as complete as\nhe could, and applied for this purpose to many of his acquaintance to\nfurnish him with anecdotes or to suggest criticisms. Amongst others Mr.\nFawcett repeated to him what he thought a striking passage in a speech\non _General Warrants_ delivered by Lord Chatham, at which he (Mr.\nFawcett) had been present. \"Every man's house\" (said this emphatic\nthinker and speaker) \"has been called his castle. And why is it called\nhis castle? Is it because it is defended by a wall, because it is\nsurrounded with a moat? No, it may be nothing more than a straw-built\nshed. It may be open to all the elements: the wind may enter in, the\nrain may enter in--but the king _cannot_ enter in!\" His friend thought\nthat the point was here palpable enough: but when he came to read the\nprinted volume, he found it thus _transposed_: \"Every man's house is his\ncastle. And why is it called so? Is it because it is defended by a wall,\nbecause it is surrounded with a moat? No, it may be nothing more than a\nstraw-built shed. It may be exposed to all the elements: the rain may\nenter into it, _all the winds of Heaven may whistle round it_, but the\nking cannot, &c.\" This was what Fawcett called a defect of _natural\nimagination_. He at the same time admitted that Mr. Godwin had improved\nhis native sterility in this respect; or atoned for it by incessant\nactivity of mind and by accumulated stores of thought and powers of\nlanguage. In fact, his _forte_ is not the spontaneous, but the voluntary\nexercise of talent. He fixes his ambition on a high point of excellence,\nand spares no pains or time in attaining it. He has less of the\nappearance of a man of genius, than any one who has given such decided\nand ample proofs of it. He is ready only on reflection: dangerous only\nat the rebound. He gathers himself up, and strains every nerve and\nfaculty with deliberate aim to some heroic and dazzling atchievement of\nintellect: but he must make a career before he flings himself, armed,\nupon the enemy, or he is sure to be unhorsed. Or he resembles an\neight-day clock that must be wound up long before it can strike.\nTherefore, his powers of conversation are but limited. He has neither\nacuteness of remark, nor a flow of language, both which might be\nexpected from his writings, as these are no less distinguished by a\nsustained and impassioned tone of declamation than by novelty of opinion\nor brilliant tracks of invention. In company, Horne Tooke used to make\na mere child of him--or of any man! Mr. Godwin liked this treatment[D],\nand indeed it is his foible to fawn on those who use him _cavalierly_,\nand to be cavalier to those who express an undue or unqualified\nadmiration of him. He looks up with unfeigned respect to acknowledged\nreputation (but then it must be very well ascertained before he admits\nit)--and has a favourite hypothesis that Understanding and Virtue are\nthe same thing. Mr. Godwin possesses a high degree of philosophical\ncandour, and studiously paid the homage of his pen and person to Mr.\nMalthus, Sir James Macintosh, and Dr. Parr, for their unsparing attacks\non him; but woe to any poor devil who had the hardihood to defend him\nagainst them! In private, the author of _Political Justice_ at one\ntime reminded those who knew him of the metaphysician engrafted on\nthe Dissenting Minister. There was a dictatorial, captious, quibbling\npettiness of manner. He lost this with the first blush and awkwardness\nof popularity, which surprised him in the retirement of his study;\nand he has since, with the wear and tear of society, from being too\npragmatical, become somewhat too careless. He is, at present, as easy as\nan old glove. Perhaps there is a little attention to effect in this,\nand he wishes to appear a foil to himself. His best moments are with an\nintimate acquaintance or two, when he gossips in a fine vein about old\nauthors, Clarendon's _History of the Rebellion_, or Burnet's _History of\nhis own Times_; and you perceive by your host's talk, as by the taste\nof seasoned wine, that he has a _cellarage_ in his understanding! Mr.\nGodwin also has a correct _acquired_ taste in poetry and the drama. He\nrelishes Donne and Ben Jonson, and recites a passage from either with an\nagreeable mixture of pedantry and _bonhommie_. He is not one of those\nwho do not grow wiser with opportunity and reflection: he changes his\nopinions, and changes them for the better. The alteration of his taste\nin poetry, from an exclusive admiration of the age of Queen Anne to an\nalmost equally exclusive one of that of Elizabeth, is, we suspect, owing\nto Mr. Coleridge, who some twenty years ago, threw a great stone into\nthe standing pool of criticism, which splashed some persons with the\nmud, but which gave a motion to the surface and a reverberation to the\nneighbouring echoes, which has not since subsided. In common company,\nMr. Godwin either goes to sleep himself, or sets others to sleep. He is\nat present engaged in a History of the Commonwealth of England.--_Esto\nperpetua!_ In size Mr. Godwin is below the common stature, nor is his\ndeportment graceful or animated. His face is, however, fine, with an\nexpression of placid temper and recondite thought. He is not unlike the\ncommon portraits of Locke. There is a very admirable likeness of him by\nMr. Northcote, which with a more heroic and dignified air, only does\njustice to the profound sagacity and benevolent aspirations of our\nauthor's mind. Mr. Godwin has kept the best company of his time, but he\nhas survived most of the celebrated persons with whom he lived in habits\nof intimacy. He speaks of them with enthusiasm and with discrimination;\nand sometimes dwells with peculiar delight on a day passed at John\nKemble's in company with Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Curran, Mrs. Wolstonecraft\nand Mrs. Inchbald, when the conversation took a most animated turn\nand the subject was of Love. Of all these our author is the only one\nremaining. Frail tenure, on which human life and genius are lent us for\na while to improve or to enjoy!\n\n\n[Footnote A: Shaftesbury made this an objection to Christianity, which\nwas answered by Foster, Leland, and other eminent divines, on the\nground that Christianity had a higher object in view, namely, general\nphilanthropy.]\n\n[Footnote B: Mr. Fuseli used to object to this striking delineation a\nwant of historical correctness, inasmuch as the animating principle of\nthe true chivalrous character was the sense of honour, not the mere\nregard to, or saving of, appearances. This, we think, must be an\nhypercriticism, from all we remember of books of chivalry and heroes of\nromance.]\n\n[Footnote C: We had forgotten the tragedies of Antonio and Ferdinand.\nPeace be with their _manes_!]\n\n[Footnote D: To be sure, it was redeemed by a high respect, and by some\nmagnificent compliments. Once in particular, at his own table, after a\ngood deal of _badinage_ and cross-questioning about his being the author\nof the Reply to Judge Eyre's Charge, on Mr. Godwin's acknowledging that\nhe was, Mr. Tooke said, \"Come here then,\"--and when his guest went round\nto his chair, he took his hand, and pressed it to his lips, saying--\"I\ncan do no less for the hand that saved my life!\"]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. COLERIDGE.\n\n\n\nThe present is an age of talkers, and not of doers; and the reason is,\nthat the world is growing old. We are so far advanced in the Arts and\nSciences, that we live in retrospect, and doat on past atchievements.\nThe accumulation of knowledge has been so great, that we are lost in\nwonder at the height it has reached, instead of attempting to climb\nor add to it; while the variety of objects distracts and dazzles the\nlooker-on. What _niche_ remains unoccupied? What path untried? What is\nthe use of doing anything, unless we could do better than all those who\nhave gone before us? What hope is there of this? We are like those who\nhave been to see some noble monument of art, who are content to admire\nwithout thinking of rivalling it; or like guests after a feast,\nwho praise the hospitality of the donor \"and thank the bounteous\nPan\"--perhaps carrying away some trifling fragments; or like the\nspectators of a mighty battle, who still hear its sound afar off, and\nthe clashing of armour and the neighing of the war-horse and the shout\nof victory is in their ears, like the rushing of innumerable waters!\n\nMr. Coleridge has \"a mind reflecting ages past:\" his voice is like\nthe echo of the congregated roar of the \"dark rearward and abyss\" of\nthought. He who has seen a mouldering tower by the side of a chrystal\nlake, hid by the mist, but glittering in the wave below, may conceive\nthe dim, gleaming, uncertain intelligence of his eye: he who has marked\nthe evening clouds uprolled (a world of vapours), has seen the picture\nof his mind, unearthly, unsubstantial, with gorgeous tints and\never-varying forms--\n\n  \"That which was now a horse, even with a thought\n  The rack dislimns, and makes it indistinct\n  As water is in water.\"\n\nOur author's mind is (as he himself might express it) _tangential_.\nThere is no subject on which he has not touched, none on which he has\nrested. With an understanding fertile, subtle, expansive, \"quick,\nforgetive, apprehensive,\" beyond all living precedent, few traces of it\nwill perhaps remain. He lends himself to all impressions alike; he gives\nup his mind and liberty of thought to none. He is a general lover of art\nand science, and wedded to no one in particular. He pursues knowledge as\na mistress, with outstretched hands and winged speed; but as he is\nabout to embrace her, his Daphne turns--alas! not to a laurel! Hardly a\nspeculation has been left on record from the earliest time, but it is\nloosely folded up in Mr. Coleridge's memory, like a rich, but somewhat\ntattered piece of tapestry; we might add (with more seeming than real\nextravagance), that scarce a thought can pass through the mind of man,\nbut its sound has at some time or other passed over his head with\nrustling pinions. On whatever question or author you speak, he is\nprepared to take up the theme with advantage--from Peter Abelard down\nto Thomas Moore, from the subtlest metaphysics to the politics of the\n_Courier_. There is no man of genius, in whose praise he descants, but\nthe critic seems to stand above the author, and \"what in him is weak, to\nstrengthen, what is low, to raise and support:\" nor is there any work of\ngenius that does not come out of his hands like an Illuminated Missal,\nsparkling even in its defects. If Mr. Coleridge had not been the most\nimpressive talker of his age, he would probably have been the finest\nwriter; but he lays down his pen to make sure of an auditor, and\nmortgages the admiration of posterity for the stare of an idler. If he\nhad not been a poet, he would have been a powerful logician; if he had\nnot dipped his wing in the Unitarian controversy, he might have soared\nto the very summit of fancy. But in writing verse, he is trying\nto subject the Muse to _transcendental_ theories: in his abstract\nreasoning, he misses his way by strewing it with flowers. All that he\nhas done of moment, he had done twenty years ago: since then, he may be\nsaid to have lived on the sound of his own voice. Mr. Coleridge is too\nrich in intellectual wealth, to need to task himself to any drudgery: he\nhas only to draw the sliders of his imagination, and a thousand subjects\nexpand before him, startling him with their brilliancy, or losing\nthemselves in endless obscurity--\n\n  \"And by the force of blear illusion,\n  They draw him on to his confusion.\"\n\nWhat is the little he could add to the stock, compared with the\ncountless stores that lie about him, that he should stoop to pick up a\nname, or to polish an idle fancy? He walks abroad in the majesty of an\nuniversal understanding, eyeing the \"rich strond,\" or golden sky above\nhim, and \"goes sounding on his way,\" in eloquent accents, uncompelled\nand free!\n\nPersons of the greatest capacity are often those, who for this reason\ndo the least; for surveying themselves from the highest point of view,\namidst the infinite variety of the universe, their own share in it seems\ntrifling, and scarce worth a thought, and they prefer the contemplation\nof all that is, or has been, or can be, to the making a coil about doing\nwhat, when done, is no better than vanity. It is hard to concentrate\nall our attention and efforts on one pursuit, except from ignorance\nof others; and without this concentration of our faculties, no great\nprogress can be made in any one thing. It is not merely that the mind is\nnot capable of the effort; it does not think the effort worth making.\nAction is one; but thought is manifold. He whose restless eye glances\nthrough the wide compass of nature and art, will not consent to have\n\"his own nothings monstered:\" but he must do this, before he can give\nhis whole soul to them. The mind, after \"letting contemplation have its\nfill,\" or\n\n  \"Sailing with supreme dominion\n  Through the azure deep of air,\"\n\nsinks down on the ground, breathless, exhausted, powerless, inactive;\nor if it must have some vent to its feelings, seeks the most easy and\nobvious; is soothed by friendly flattery, lulled by the murmur of\nimmediate applause, thinks as it were aloud, and babbles in its dreams!\nA scholar (so to speak) is a more disinterested and abstracted character\nthan a mere author. The first looks at the numberless volumes of a\nlibrary, and says, \"All these are mine:\" the other points to a single\nvolume (perhaps it may be an immortal one) and says, \"My name is written\non the back of it.\" This is a puny and groveling ambition, beneath the\nlofty amplitude of Mr. Coleridge's mind. No, he revolves in his wayward\nsoul, or utters to the passing wind, or discourses to his own shadow,\nthings mightier and more various!--Let us draw the curtain, and unlock\nthe shrine. Learning rocked him in his cradle, and, while yet a child,\n\n  \"He lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.\"\n\nAt sixteen he wrote his _Ode on Chatterton_, and he still reverts to\nthat period with delight, not so much as it relates to himself (for that\nstring of his own early promise of fame rather jars than otherwise) but\nas exemplifying the youth of a poet. Mr. Coleridge talks of himself,\nwithout being an egotist, for in him the individual is always merged in\nthe abstract and general. He distinguished himself at school and at the\nUniversity by his knowledge of the classics, and gained several prizes\nfor Greek epigrams. How many men are there (great scholars, celebrated\nnames in literature) who having done the same thing in their youth, have\nno other idea all the rest of their lives but of this achievement, of\na fellowship and dinner, and who, installed in academic honours, would\nlook down on our author as a mere strolling bard! At Christ's\nHospital, where he was brought up, he was the idol of those among his\nschoolfellows, who mingled with their bookish studies the music of\nthought and of humanity; and he was usually attended round the cloisters\nby a group of these (inspiring and inspired) whose hearts, even then,\nburnt within them as he talked, and where the sounds yet linger to mock\nELIA on his way, still turning pensive to the past! One of the finest\nand rarest parts of Mr. Coleridge's conversation, is when he expatiates\non the Greek tragedians (not that he is not well acquainted, when he\npleases, with the epic poets, or the philosophers, or orators, or\nhistorians of antiquity)--on the subtle reasonings and melting pathos\nof Euripides, on the harmonious gracefulness of Sophocles, tuning his\nlove-laboured song, like sweetest warblings from a sacred grove; on the\nhigh-wrought trumpet-tongued eloquence of Aeschylus, whose Prometheus,\nabove all, is like an Ode to Fate, and a pleading with Providence, his\nthoughts being let loose as his body is chained on his solitary rock,\nand his afflicted will (the emblem of mortality)\n\n  \"Struggling in vain with ruthless destiny.\"\n\nAs the impassioned critic speaks and rises in his theme, you would think\nyou heard the voice of the Man hated by the Gods, contending with\nthe wild winds as they roar, and his eye glitters with the spirit of\nAntiquity!\n\nNext, he was engaged with Hartley's tribes of mind, \"etherial braid,\nthought-woven,\"--and he busied himself for a year or two with\nvibrations and vibratiuncles and the great law of association that binds\nall things in its mystic chain, and the doctrine of Necessity (the\nmild teacher of Charity) and the Millennium, anticipative of a life to\ncome--and he plunged deep into the controversy on Matter and Spirit,\nand, as an escape from Dr. Priestley's Materialism, where he felt\nhimself imprisoned by the logician's spell, like Ariel in the\ncloven pine-tree, he became suddenly enamoured of Bishop Berkeley's\nfairy-world,[A] and used in all companies to build the universe, like\na brave poetical fiction, of fine words--and he was deep-read in\nMalebranche, and in Cudworth's Intellectual System (a huge pile of\nlearning, unwieldy, enormous) and in Lord Brook's hieroglyphic theories,\nand in Bishop Butler's Sermons, and in the Duchess of Newcastle's\nfantastic folios, and in Clarke and South and Tillotson, and all the\nfine thinkers and masculine reasoners of that age--and Leibnitz's\n_Pre-established Harmony_ reared its arch above his head, like the\nrainbow in the cloud, covenanting with the hopes of man--and then he\nfell plump, ten thousand fathoms down (but his wings saved him harmless)\ninto the _hortus siccus_ of Dissent, where he pared religion down to the\nstandard of reason and stripped faith of mystery, and preached Christ\ncrucified and the Unity of the Godhead, and so dwelt for a while in the\nspirit with John Huss and Jerome of Prague and Socinus and old John\nZisca, and ran through Neal's History of the Puritans, and Calamy's\nNon-Conformists' Memorial, having like thoughts and passions with\nthem--but then Spinoza became his God, and he took up the vast chain of\nbeing in his hand, and the round world became the centre and the soul of\nall things in some shadowy sense, forlorn of meaning, and around him he\nbeheld the living traces and the sky-pointing proportions of the mighty\nPan--but poetry redeemed him from this spectral philosophy, and he\nbathed his heart in beauty, and gazed at the golden light of heaven, and\ndrank of the spirit of the universe, and wandered at eve by fairy-stream\nor fountain,\n\n  \"------When he saw nought but beauty,\n  When he heard the voice of that Almighty One\n  In every breeze that blew, or wave that murmured\"--\n\nand wedded with truth in Plato's shade, and in the writings of Proclus\nand Plotinus saw the ideas of things in the eternal mind, and unfolded\nall mysteries with the Schoolmen and fathomed the depths of Duns Scotus\nand Thomas Aquinas, and entered the third heaven with Jacob Behmen, and\nwalked hand in hand with Swedenborg through the pavilions of the New\nJerusalem, and sung his faith in the promise and in the word in his\n_Religious Musings_--and lowering himself from that dizzy height, poised\nhimself on Milton's wings, and spread out his thoughts in charity with\nthe glad prose of Jeremy Taylor, and wept over Bowles's Sonnets, and\nstudied Cowper's blankverse, and betook himself to Thomson's Castle of\nIndolence, and sported with the wits of Charles the Second's days and\nof Queen Anne, and relished Swift's style and that of the John Bull\n(Arbuthnot's we mean, not Mr. Croker's) and dallied with the British\nEssayists and Novelists, and knew all qualities of more modern writers\nwith a learned spirit, Johnson, and Goldsmith, and Junius, and Burke,\nand Godwin, and the Sorrows of Werter, and Jean Jacques Rousseau, and\nVoltaire, and Marivaux, and Crebillon, and thousands more--now \"laughed\nwith Rabelais in his easy chair\" or pointed to Hogarth, or afterwards\ndwelt on Claude's classic scenes or spoke with rapture of Raphael,\nand compared the women at Rome to figures that had walked out of his\npictures, or visited the Oratory of Pisa, and described the works of\nGiotto and Ghirlandaio and Massaccio, and gave the moral of the picture\nof the Triumph of Death, where the beggars and the wretched invoke his\ndreadful dart, but the rich and mighty of the earth quail and shrink\nbefore it; and in that land of siren sights and sounds, saw a dance of\npeasant girls, and was charmed with lutes and gondolas,--or wandered\ninto Germany and lost himself in the labyrinths of the Hartz Forest and\nof the Kantean philosophy, and amongst the cabalistic names of Ficht\u00e8\nand Schelling and Lessing, and God knows who--this was long after, but\nall the former while, he had nerved his heart and filled his eyes\nwith tears, as he hailed the rising orb of liberty, since quenched in\ndarkness and in blood, and had kindled his affections at the blaze of\nthe French Revolution, and sang for joy when the towers of the Bastile\nand the proud places of the insolent and the oppressor fell, and would\nhave floated his bark, freighted with fondest fancies, across the\nAtlantic wave with Southey and others to seek for peace and freedom--\n\n  \"In Philarmonia's undivided dale!\"\n\nAlas! \"Frailty, thy name is _Genius_!\"--What is become of all this\nmighty heap of hope, of thought, of learning, and humanity? It has\nended in swallowing doses of oblivion and in writing paragraphs in the\n_Courier_.--Such, and so little is the mind of man!\n\nIt was not to be supposed that Mr. Coleridge could keep on at the rate\nhe set off; he could not realize all he knew or thought, and less could\nnot fix his desultory ambition; other stimulants supplied the place, and\nkept up the intoxicating dream, the fever and the madness of his early\nimpressions. Liberty (the philosopher's and the poet's bride) had fallen\na victim, meanwhile, to the murderous practices of the hag, Legitimacy.\nProscribed by court-hirelings, too romantic for the herd of vulgar\npoliticians, our enthusiast stood at bay, and at last turned on the\npivot of a subtle casuistry to the _unclean side:_ but his discursive\nreason would not let him trammel himself into a poet-laureate or\nstamp-distributor, and he stopped, ere he had quite passed that\nwell-known \"bourne from whence no traveller returns\"--and so has sunk\ninto torpid, uneasy repose, tantalized by useless resources, haunted by\nvain imaginings, his lips idly moving, but his heart forever still, or,\nas the shattered chords vibrate of themselves, making melancholy music\nto the ear of memory! Such is the fate of genius in an age, when in the\nunequal contest with sovereign wrong, every man is ground to powder who\nis not either a born slave, or who does not willingly and at once offer\nup the yearnings of humanity and the dictates of reason as a welcome\nsacrifice to besotted prejudice and loathsome power.\n\nOf all Mr. Coleridge's productions, the _Ancient Mariner_ is the only\none that we could with confidence put into any person's hands, on whom\nwe wished to impress a favourable idea of his extraordinary powers. Let\nwhatever other objections be made to it, it is unquestionably a work of\ngenius--of wild, irregular, overwhelming imagination, and has that rich,\nvaried movement in the verse, which gives a distant idea of the lofty or\nchangeful tones of Mr. Coleridge's voice. In the _Christobel_, there\nis one splendid passage on divided friendship. The _Translation of\nSchiller's Wallenstein_ is also a masterly production in its kind,\nfaithful and spirited. Among his smaller pieces there are occasional\nbursts of pathos and fancy, equal to what we might expect from him; but\nthese form the exception, and not the rule. Such, for instance, is his\naffecting Sonnet to the author of the Robbers.\n\n  Schiller! that hour I would have wish'd to die,\n  If through the shudd'ring midnight I had sent\n  From the dark dungeon of the tower time-rent,\n  That fearful voice, a famish'd father's cry--\n\n  That in no after-moment aught less vast\n  Might stamp me mortal! A triumphant shout\n  Black horror scream'd, and all her goblin rout\n  From the more with'ring scene diminish'd pass'd.\n\n  Ah! Bard tremendous in sublimity!\n  Could I behold thee in thy loftier mood,\n  Wand'ring at eve, with finely frenzied eye,\n  Beneath some vast old tempest-swinging wood!\n  Awhile, with mute awe gazing, I would brood,\n  Then weep aloud in a wild ecstasy.\n\nHis Tragedy, entitled _Remorse_, is full of beautiful and striking\npassages, but it does not place the author in the first rank of dramatic\nwriters. But if Mr. Coleridge's works do not place him in that rank,\nthey injure instead of conveying a just idea of the man, for he himself\nis certainly in the first class of general intellect.\n\nIf our author's poetry is inferior to his conversation, his prose is\nutterly abortive. Hardly a gleam is to be found in it of the brilliancy\nand richness of those stores of thought and language that he pours out\nincessantly, when they are lost like drops of water in the ground. The\nprincipal work, in which he has attempted to embody his general views of\nthings, is the FRIEND, of which, though it contains some noble passages\nand fine trains of thought, prolixity and obscurity are the most\nfrequent characteristics.\n\nNo two persons can be conceived more opposite in character or genius\nthan the subject of the present and of the preceding sketch. Mr. Godwin,\nwith less natural capacity, and with fewer acquired advantages, by\nconcentrating his mind on some given object, and doing what he had to do\nwith all his might, has accomplished much, and will leave more than\none monument of a powerful intellect behind him; Mr. Coleridge, by\ndissipating his, and dallying with every subject by turns, has done\nlittle or nothing to justify to the world or to posterity, the high\nopinion which all who have ever heard him converse, or known him\nintimately, with one accord entertain of him. Mr. Godwin's faculties\nhave kept house, and plied their task in the work-shop of the brain,\ndiligently and effectually: Mr. Coleridge's have gossipped away their\ntime, and gadded about from house to house, as if life's business were\nto melt the hours in listless talk. Mr. Godwin is intent on a subject,\nonly as it concerns himself and his reputation; he works it out as a\nmatter of duty, and discards from his mind whatever does not forward his\nmain object as impertinent and vain. Mr. Coleridge, on the other hand,\ndelights in nothing but episodes and digressions, neglects whatever he\nundertakes to perform, and can act only on spontaneous impulses, without\nobject or method. \"He cannot be constrained by mastery.\" While he should\nbe occupied with a given pursuit, he is thinking of a thousand other\nthings; a thousand tastes, a thousand objects tempt him, and distract\nhis mind, which keeps open house, and entertains all comers; and after\nbeing fatigued and amused with morning calls from idle visitors, finds\nthe day consumed and its business unconcluded. Mr. Godwin, on the\ncontrary, is somewhat exclusive and unsocial in his habits of mind,\nentertains no company but what he gives his whole time and attention to,\nand wisely writes over the doors of his understanding, his fancy, and\nhis senses--\"No admittance except on business.\" He has none of that\nfastidious refinement and false delicacy, which might lead him to\nbalance between the endless variety of modern attainments. He does not\nthrow away his life (nor a single half-hour of it) in adjusting the\nclaims of different accomplishments, and in choosing between them or\nmaking himself master of them all. He sets about his task, (whatever\nit may be) and goes through it with spirit and fortitude. He has the\nhappiness to think an author the greatest character in the world,\nand himself the greatest author in it. Mr. Coleridge, in writing an\nharmonious stanza, would stop to consider whether there was not more\ngrace and beauty in a _Pas de trois_, and would not proceed till he had\nresolved this question by a chain of metaphysical reasoning without end.\nNot so Mr. Godwin. That is best to him, which he can do best. He does\nnot waste himself in vain aspirations and effeminate sympathies. He is\nblind, deaf, insensible to all but the trump of Fame. Plays, operas,\npainting, music, ball-rooms, wealth, fashion, titles, lords, ladies,\ntouch him not--all these are no more to him than to the magician in his\ncell, and he writes on to the end of the chapter, through good report\nand evil report. _Pingo in eternitatem_--is his motto. He neither envies\nnor admires what others are, but is contented to be what he is, and\nstrives to do the utmost he can. Mr. Coleridge has flirted with the\nMuses as with a set of mistresses: Mr. Godwin has been married twice, to\nReason and to Fancy, and has to boast no short-lived progeny by each.\nSo to speak, he has _valves_ belonging to his mind, to regulate the\nquantity of gas admitted into it, so that like the bare, unsightly, but\nwell-compacted steam-vessel, it cuts its liquid way, and arrives at\nits promised end: while Mr. Coleridge's bark, \"taught with the little\nnautilus to sail,\" the sport of every breath, dancing to every wave,\n\n  \"Youth at its prow, and Pleasure at its helm,\"\n\nflutters its gaudy pennons in the air, glitters in the sun, but we wait\nin vain to hear of its arrival in the destined harbour. Mr. Godwin, with\nless variety and vividness, with less subtlety and susceptibility\nboth of thought and feeling, has had firmer nerves, a more determined\npurpose, a more comprehensive grasp of his subject, and the results are\nas we find them. Each has met with his reward: for justice has, after\nall, been done to the pretensions of each; and we must, in all cases,\nuse means to ends!\n\n\n[Footnote A: Mr. Coleridge named his eldest son (the writer of some\nbeautiful Sonnets) after Hartley, and the second after Berkeley. The\nthird was called Derwent, after the river of that name. Nothing can be\nmore characteristic of his mind than this circumstance. All his ideas\nindeed are like a river, flowing on for ever, and still murmuring as it\nflows, discharging its waters and still replenished--\n\n  \"And so by many winding nooks it strays,\n  With willing sport to the wild ocean!\"]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nREV. MR. IRVING.\n\n\n\nThis gentleman has gained an almost unprecedented, and not an altogether\nunmerited popularity as a preacher. As he is, perhaps, though a burning\nand a shining light, not \"one of the fixed,\" we shall take this\nopportunity of discussing his merits, while he is at his meridian\nheight; and in doing so, shall \"nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in\nmalice.\"\n\nFew circumstances shew the prevailing and preposterous rage for novelty\nin a more striking point of view, than the success of Mr. Irving's\noratory. People go to hear him in crowds, and come away with a mixture\nof delight and astonishment--they go again to see if the effect will\ncontinue, and send others to try to find out the mystery--and in the\nnoisy conflict between extravagant encomiums and splenetic objections,\nthe true secret escapes observation, which is, that the whole thing is,\nnearly from beginning to end, a _transposition of ideas_. If the subject\nof these remarks had come out as a player, with all his advantages of\nfigure, voice, and action, we think he would have failed: if, as a\npreacher, he had kept within the strict bounds of pulpit-oratory, he\nwould scarcely have been much distinguished among his Calvinistic\nbrethren: as a mere author, he would have excited attention rather\nby his quaintness and affectation of an obsolete style and mode of\nthinking, than by any thing else. But he has contrived to jumble these\nseveral characters together in an unheard-of and unwarranted manner, and\nthe fascination is altogether irresistible. Our Caledonian divine is\nequally an anomaly in religion, in literature, in personal appearance,\nand in public speaking. To hear a person spout Shakspeare on the stage\nis nothing--the charm is nearly worn out--but to hear any one spout\nShakspeare (and that not in a sneaking under-tone, but at the top of\nhis voice, and with the full breadth of his chest) from a Calvinistic\npulpit, is new and wonderful. The _Fancy_ have lately lost something of\ntheir gloss in public estimation, and after the last fight, few would go\nfar to see a Neat or a Spring set-to;--but to see a man who is able to\nenter the ring with either of them, or brandish a quarter-staff with\nFriar Tuck, or a broad-sword with Shaw the Lifeguards' man, stand up in\na strait-laced old-fashioned pulpit, and bandy dialectics with modern\nphilosophers or give a _cross-buttock_ to a cabinet minister, there is\nsomething in a sight like this also, that is a cure for sore eyes. It\nis as if Crib or Molyneux had turned Methodist parson, or as if\na Patagonian savage were to come forward as the patron-saint of\nEvangelical religion. Again, the doctrine of eternal punishment was one\nof the staple arguments with which, everlastingly drawled out, the old\nschool of Presbyterian divines used to keep their audiences awake, or\nlull them to sleep; but to which people of taste and fashion paid\nlittle attention, as inelegant and barbarous, till Mr. Irving, with his\ncast-iron features and sledge-hammer blows, puffing like a grim Vulcan,\nset to work to forge more classic thunderbolts, and kindle the expiring\nflames anew with the very sweepings of sceptical and infidel\nlibraries, so as to excite a pleasing horror in the female part of his\ncongregation. In short, our popular declaimer has, contrary to the\nScripture-caution, put new wine into old bottles, or new cloth on old\ngarments. He has, with an unlimited and daring licence, mixed the\nsacred and the profane together, the carnal and the spiritual man, the\npetulance of the bar with the dogmatism of the pulpit, the theatrical\nand theological, the modern and the obsolete;--what wonder that this\nsplendid piece of patchwork, splendid by contradiction and contrast,\nhas delighted some and confounded others? The more serious part of his\ncongregation indeed complain, though not bitterly, that their pastor\nhas converted their meeting-house into a play-house: but when a lady of\nquality, introducing herself and her three daughters to the preacher,\nassures him that they have been to all the most fashionable places of\nresort, the opera, the theatre, assemblies, Miss Macauley's readings,\nand Exeter-Change, and have been equally entertained no where else, we\napprehend that no remonstrances of a committee of ruling-elders will be\nable to bring him to his senses again, or make him forego such sweet,\nbut ill-assorted praise. What we mean to insist upon is, that Mr. Irving\nowes his triumphant success, not to any one quality for which he has\nbeen extolled, but to a combination of qualities, the more striking\nin their immediate effect, in proportion as they are unlooked-for and\nheterogeneous, like the violent opposition of light and shade in a\npicture. We shall endeavour to explain this view of the subject more at\nlarge.\n\nMr. Irving, then, is no common or mean man. He has four or five\nqualities, possessed in a moderate or in a paramount degree, which,\nadded or multiplied together, fill up the important space he occupies in\nthe public eye. Mr. Irving's intellect itself is of a superior order; he\nhas undoubtedly both talents and acquirements beyond the ordinary run of\nevery-day preachers. These alone, however, we hold, would not account\nfor a twentieth part of the effect he has produced: they would have\nlifted him perhaps out of the mire and slough of sordid obscurity, but\nwould never have launched him into the ocean-stream of popularity, in\nwhich he \"lies floating many a rood;\"--but to these he adds uncommon\nheight, a graceful figure and action, a clear and powerful voice, a\nstriking, if not a fine face, a bold and fiery spirit, and a most\nportentous obliquity of vision, which throw him to an immeasurable\ndistance beyond all competition, and effectually relieve whatever there\nmight be of common-place or bombast in his style of composition. Put the\ncase that Mr. Irving had been five feet high--Would he ever have been\nheard of, or, as he does now, have \"bestrode the world like a Colossus?\"\nNo, the thing speaks for itself. He would in vain have lifted\nhis Lilliputian arm to Heaven, people would have laughed at his\nmonkey-tricks. Again, had he been as tall as he is, but had wanted other\nrecommendations, he would have been nothing.\n\n  \"The player's province they but vainly try,\n  Who want these powers, deportment, voice, and eye.\"\n\nConceive a rough, ugly, shock-headed Scotchman, standing up in the\nCaledonian chapel, and dealing \"damnation round the land\" in a broad\nnorthern dialect, and with a harsh, screaking voice, what ear polite,\nwhat smile serene would have hailed the barbarous prodigy, or not\nconsigned him to utter neglect and derision? But the Rev. Edward Irving,\nwith all his native wildness, \"hath a smooth aspect framed to make\nwomen\" saints; his very unusual size and height are carried off and\nmoulded into elegance by the most admirable symmetry of form and ease of\ngesture; his sable locks, his clear iron-grey complexion, and firm-set\nfeatures, turn the raw, uncouth Scotchman into the likeness of a noble\nItalian picture; and even his distortion of sight only redeems the\notherwise \"faultless monster\" within the bounds of humanity, and, when\nadmiration is exhausted and curiosity ceases, excites a new interest by\nleading to the idle question whether it is an advantage to the preacher\nor not. Farther, give him all his actual and remarkable advantages of\nbody and mind, let him be as tall, as strait, as dark and clear of skin,\nas much at his ease, as silver-tongued, as eloquent and as argumentative\nas he is, yet with all these, and without a little charlatanery to set\nthem off, he had been nothing. He might, keeping within the rigid line\nof his duty and professed calling, have preached on for ever; he\nmight have divided the old-fashioned doctrines of election, grace,\nreprobation, predestination, into his sixteenth, seventeenth,\nand eighteenth heads, and his _lastly_ have been looked for as a\n\"consummation devoutly to be wished;\" he might have defied the devil and\nall his works, and by the help of a loud voice and strong-set person--\n\n  \"A lusty man to ben an Abbot able;\"--\n\nhave increased his own congregation, and been quoted among the godly as\na powerful preacher of the word; but in addition to this, he went out of\nhis way to attack Jeremy Bentham, and the town was up in arms. The thing\nwas new. He thus wiped the stain of musty ignorance and formal bigotry\nout of his style. Mr. Irving must have something superior in him, to\nlook over the shining close-packed heads of his congregation to have a\nhit at the _Great Jurisconsult_ in his study. He next, ere the report of\nthe former blow had subsided, made a lunge at Mr. Brougham, and glanced\nan eye at Mr. Canning; _mystified_ Mr. Coleridge, and _stultified_ Lord\nLiverpool in his place--in the Gallery. It was rare sport to see him,\n\"like an eagle in a dovecote, flutter the Volscians in Corioli.\" He has\nfound out the secret of attracting by repelling. Those whom he is likely\nto attack are curious to hear what he says of them: they go again,\nto show that they do not mind it. It is no less interesting to the\nby-standers, who like to witness this sort of _onslaught_--like a charge\nof cavalry, the shock, and the resistance. Mr. Irving has, in fact,\nwithout leave asked or a licence granted, converted the Caledonian\nChapel into a Westminster Forum or Debating Society, with the sanctity\nof religion added to it. Our spirited polemic is not contented to defend\nthe citadel of orthodoxy against all impugners, and shut himself up\nin texts of Scripture and huge volumes of the Commentators as an\nimpregnable fortress;--he merely makes use of the stronghold of religion\nas a resting-place, from which he sallies forth, armed with modern\ntopics and with penal fire, like Achilles of old rushing from the\nGrecian tents, against the adversaries of God and man. Peter Aretine is\nsaid to have laid the Princes of Europe under contribution by penning\nsatires against them: so Mr. Irving keeps the public in awe by insulting\nall their favourite idols. He does not spare their politicians, their\nrulers, their moralists, their poets, their players, their critics,\ntheir reviewers, their magazine-writers; he levels their resorts of\nbusiness, their places of amusement, at a blow--their cities, churches,\npalaces, ranks and professions, refinements, and elegances--and leaves\nnothing standing but himself, a mighty landmark in a degenerate age,\noverlooking the wide havoc he has made! He makes war upon all arts and\nsciences, upon the faculties and nature of man, on his vices and his\nvirtues, on all existing institutions, and all possible improvements,\nthat nothing may be left but the Kirk of Scotland, and that he may be\nthe head of it. He literally sends a challenge to all London in the\nname of the KING of HEAVEN, to evacuate its streets, to disperse its\npopulation, to lay aside its employments, to burn its wealth, to\nrenounce its vanities and pomp; and for what?--that he may enter in\nas the _King of Glory_; or after enforcing his threat with the\nbattering-ram of logic, the grape-shot of rhetoric, and the crossfire of\nhis double vision, reduce the British metropolis to a Scottish heath,\nwith a few miserable hovels upon it, where they may worship God\naccording to _the root of the matter_, and an old man with a blue\nbonnet, a fair-haired girl, and a little child would form the flower of\nhis flock! Such is the pretension and the boast of this new Peter the\nHermit, who would get rid of all we have done in the way of improvement\non a state of barbarous ignorance, or still more barbarous prejudice, in\norder to begin again on a _tabula rasa_ of Calvinism, and have a world\nof his own making. It is not very surprising that when nearly the\nwhole mass and texture of civil society is indicted as a nuisance, and\nthreatened to be pulled down as a rotten building ready to fall on the\nheads of the inhabitants, that all classes of people run to hear the\ncrash, and to see the engines and levers at work which are to effect\nthis laudable purpose. What else can be the meaning of our preacher's\ntaking upon himself to denounce the sentiments of the most serious\nprofessors in great cities, as vitiated and stark-naught, of relegating\nreligion to his native glens, and pretending that the hymn of praise or\nthe sigh of contrition cannot ascend acceptably to the throne of grace\nfrom the crowded street as well as from the barren rock or silent\nvalley? Why put this affront upon his hearers? Why belie his own\naspirations?\n\n  \"God made the country, and man made the town.\"\n\nSo says the poet; does Mr. Irving say so? If he does, and finds the air\nof the city death to his piety, why does he not return home again? But\nif he can breathe it with impunity, and still retain the fervour of his\nearly enthusiasm, and the simplicity and purity of the faith that was\nonce delivered to the saints, why not extend the benefit of his own\nexperience to others, instead of taunting them with a vapid pastoral\ntheory? Or, if our popular and eloquent divine finds a change in\nhimself, that flattery prevents the growth of grace, that he is becoming\nthe God of his own idolatry by being that of others, that the glittering\nof coronet-coaches rolling down Holborn-Hill to Hatton Garden, that\ntitled beauty, that the parliamentary complexion of his audience, the\ncompliments of poets, and the stare of peers discompose his wandering\nthoughts a little; and yet that he cannot give up these strong\ntemptations tugging at his heart; why not extend more charity to others,\nand shew more candour in speaking of himself? There is either a good\ndeal of bigoted intolerance with a deplorable want of self-knowledge in\nall this; or at least an equal degree of cant and quackery.\n\nTo whichever cause we are to attribute this hyperbolical tone, we hold\nit certain he could not have adopted it, if he had been _a little man_.\nBut his imposing figure and dignified manner enable him to hazard\nsentiments or assertions that would be fatal to others. His\ncontroversial daring is _backed_ by his bodily prowess; and by bringing\nhis intellectual pretensions boldly into a line with his physical\naccomplishments, he, indeed, presents a very formidable front to the\nsceptic or the scoffer. Take a cubit from his stature, and his whole\nmanner resolves itself into an impertinence. But with that addition, he\n_overcrows_ the town, browbeats their prejudices, and bullies them out\nof their senses, and is not afraid of being contradicted by any one\n_less than himself_. It may be said, that individuals with great\npersonal defects have made a considerable figure as public speakers; and\nMr. Wilberforce, among others, may be held out as an instance. Nothing\ncan be more insignificant as to mere outward appearance, and yet he is\nlistened to in the House of Commons. But he does not wield it, he does\nnot insult or bully it. He leads by following opinion, he trims, he\nshifts, he glides on the silvery sounds of his undulating, flexible,\ncautiously modulated voice, winding his way betwixt heaven and earth,\nnow courting popularity, now calling servility to his aid, and with a\nlarge estate, the \"saints,\" and the population of Yorkshire to swell his\ninfluence, never venturing on the forlorn hope, or doing any thing more\nthan \"hitting the house between wind and water.\" Yet he is probably a\ncleverer man than Mr. Irving.\n\nThere is a Mr. Fox, a Dissenting Minister, as fluent a speaker, with a\nsweeter voice and a more animated and beneficent countenance than Mr.\nIrving, who expresses himself with manly spirit at a public meeting,\ntakes a hand at whist, and is the darling of his congregation; but he is\nno more, because he is diminutive in person. His head is not seen above\nthe crowd the length of a street off. He is the Duke of Sussex in\nminiature, but the Duke of Sussex does not go to hear him preach, as he\nattends Mr. Irving, who rises up against him like a martello tower,\nand is nothing loth to confront the spirit of a man of genius with\nthe blood-royal. We allow there are, or may be, talents sufficient to\nproduce this equality without a single personal advantage; but we deny\nthat this would be the effect of any that our great preacher possesses.\nWe conceive it not improbable that the consciousness of muscular power,\nthat the admiration of his person by strangers might first have inspired\nMr. Irving with an ambition to be something, intellectually speaking,\nand have given him confidence to attempt the greatest things. He has not\nfailed for want of courage. The public, as well as the fair, are won\nby a show of gallantry. Mr. Irving has shrunk from no opinion, however\nparadoxical. He has scrupled to avow no sentiment, however obnoxious. He\nhas revived exploded prejudices, he has scouted prevailing fashions.\nHe has opposed the spirit of the age, and not consulted the _esprit de\ncorps_. He has brought back the doctrines of Calvinism in all their\ninveteracy, and relaxed the inveteracy of his northern accents. He has\nturned religion and the Caledonian Chapel topsy-turvy. He has held a\nplay-book in one hand, and a Bible in the other, and quoted Shakspeare\nand Melancthon in the same breath. The tree of the knowledge of good and\nevil is no longer, with his grafting, a dry withered stump; it shoots\nits branches to the skies, and hangs out its blossoms to the gale--\n\n  \"Miraturque novos fructus, et non sua poma.\"\n\nHe has taken the thorns and briars of scholastic divinity, and garlanded\nthem with the flowers of modern literature. He has done all this,\nrelying on the strength of a remarkably fine person and manner, and\nthrough that he has succeeded--otherwise he would have perished\nmiserably.\n\nDr. Chalmers is not by any means so good a looking man, nor so\naccomplished a speaker as Mr. Irving; yet he at one time almost equalled\nhis oratorical celebrity, and certainly paved the way for him. He has\ntherefore more merit than his admired pupil, as he has done as much\nwith fewer means. He has more scope of intellect and more intensity of\npurpose. Both his matter and his manner, setting aside his face and\nfigure, are more impressive. Take the volume of \"Sermons on Astronomy,\"\nby Dr. Chalmers, and the \"Four Orations for the Oracles of God\" which\nMr. Irving lately published, and we apprehend there can be no comparison\nas to their success. The first ran like wild-fire through the country,\nwere the darlings of watering-places, were laid in the windows of\ninns,[A] and were to be met with in all places of public resort; while\nthe \"Orations\" get on but slowly, on Milton's stilts, and are pompously\nannounced as in a Third Edition. We believe the fairest and fondest of\nhis admirers would rather see and hear Mr. Irving than read him. The\nreason is, that the groundwork of his compositions is trashy and\nhackneyed, though set off by extravagant metaphors and an affected\nphraseology; that without the turn of his head and wave of his hand, his\nperiods have nothing in them; and that he himself is the only _idea_\nwith which he has yet enriched the public mind! He must play off\nhis person, as Orator Henley used to dazzle his hearers with his\ndiamond-ring. The small frontispiece prefixed to the \"Orations\" does not\nserve to convey an adequate idea of the magnitude of the man, nor of\nthe ease and freedom of his motions in the pulpit. How different is Dr.\nChalmers! He is like \"a monkey-preacher\" to the other. He cannot boast\nof personal appearance to set him off. But then he is like the very\ngenius or demon of theological controversy personified. He has neither\nairs nor graces at command; he thinks nothing of himself; he has nothing\ntheatrical about him (which cannot be said of his successor and\nrival); but you see a man in mortal throes and agony with doubts and\ndifficulties, seizing stubborn knotty points with his teeth, tearing\nthem with his hands, and straining his eyeballs till they almost start\nout of their sockets, in pursuit of a train of visionary reasoning, like\na Highland-seer with his second sight. The description of Balfour of\nBurley in his cave, with his Bible in one hand and his sword in the\nother, contending with the imaginary enemy of mankind, gasping for\nbreath, and with the cold moisture running down his face, gives a lively\nidea of Dr. Chalmers's prophetic fury in the pulpit. If we could\nhave looked in to have seen Burley hard-beset \"by the coinage of his\nheat-oppressed brain,\" who would have asked whether he was a handsome\nman or not? It would be enough to see a man haunted by a spirit, under\nthe strong and entire dominion of a wilful hallucination. So the\nintegrity and vehemence of Dr. Chalmers's manner, the determined way in\nwhich he gives himself up to his subject, or lays about him and buffets\nsceptics and gainsayers, arrests attention in spite of every other\ncircumstance, and fixes it on that, and that alone, which excites\nsuch interest and such eagerness in his own breast! Besides, he is a\nlogician, has a theory in support of whatever he chooses to advance, and\nweaves the tissue of his sophistry so close and intricate, that it is\ndifficult not to be entangled in it, or to escape from it. \"There's\nmagic in the web.\" Whatever appeals to the pride of the human\nunderstanding, has a subtle charm in it. The mind is naturally\npugnacious, cannot refuse a challenge of strength or skill, sturdily\nenters the lists and resolves to conquer, or to yield itself vanquished\nin the forms. This is the chief hold Dr. Chalmers had upon his hearers,\nand upon the readers of his \"Astronomical Discourses.\" No one was\nsatisfied with his arguments, no one could answer them, but every one\nwanted to try what he could make of them, as we try to find out a\nriddle. \"By his so potent art,\" the art of laying down problematical\npremises, and drawing from them still more doubtful, but not impossible,\nconclusions, \"he could bedim the noonday sun, betwixt the green sea and\nthe azure vault set roaring war,\" and almost compel the stars in their\ncourses to testify to his opinions. The mode in which he undertook to\nmake the circuit of the universe, and demand categorical information\n\"now of the planetary and now of the fixed,\" might put one in mind of\nHecate's mode of ascending in a machine from the stage, \"midst troops\nof spirits,\" in which you now admire the skill of the artist, and next\ntremble for the fate of the performer, fearing that the audacity of\nthe attempt will turn his head or break his neck. The style of these\n\"Discourses\" also, though not elegant or poetical, was, like the\nsubject, intricate and endless. It was that of a man pushing his way\nthrough a labyrinth of difficulties, and determined not to flinch. The\nimpression on the reader was proportionate; for, whatever were the\nmerits of the style or matter, both were new and striking; and the train\nof thought that was unfolded at such length and with such strenuousness,\nwas bold, well-sustained, and consistent with itself.\n\nMr. Irving wants the continuity of thought and manner which\ndistinguishes his rival--and shines by patches and in bursts. He does\nnot warm or acquire increasing force or rapidity with his progress. He\nis never hurried away by a deep or lofty enthusiasm, nor touches the\nhighest point of genius or fanaticism, but \"in the very storm and\nwhirlwind of his passion, he acquires and begets a temperance that may\ngive it smoothness.\" He has the self-possession and masterly execution\nof an experienced player or fencer, and does not seem to express his\nnatural convictions, or to be engaged in a mortal struggle. This greater\nease and indifference is the result of vast superiority of personal\nappearance, which \"to be admired needs but to be seen,\" and does not\nrequire the possessor to work himself up into a passion, or to use\nany violent contortions to gain attention or to keep it. These two\ncelebrated preachers are in almost all respects an antithesis to each\nother. If Mr. Irving is an example of what can be done by the help of\nexternal advantages, Dr. Chalmers is a proof of what can be done without\nthem. The one is most indebted to his mind, the other to his body. If\nMr. Irving inclines one to suspect fashionable or popular religion of a\nlittle _anthropomorphitism_, Dr. Chalmers effectually redeems it from\nthat scandal.\n\n\n[Footnote A: We remember finding the volume in the orchard at\nBurford-bridge near Boxhill, and passing a whole and very delightful\nmorning in reading it, without quitting the shade of an apple-tree.\nWe have not been able to pay Mr. Irving's back the same compliment of\nreading it at a sitting.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE LATE MR. HORNE TOOKE.\n\n\n\nMr. Horne Tooke was one of those who may be considered as connecting\nlinks between a former period and the existing generation. His education\nand accomplishments, nay, his political opinions, were of the last age;\nhis mind, and the tone of his feelings were _modern_. There was a hard,\ndry materialism in the very texture of his understanding, varnished over\nby the external refinements of the old school. Mr. Tooke had great\nscope of attainment, and great versatility of pursuit; but the same\nshrewdness, quickness, cool self-possession, the same _literalness_ of\nperception, and absence of passion and enthusiasm, characterised nearly\nall he did, said, or wrote. He was without a rival (almost) in private\nconversation, an expert public speaker, a keen politician, a first-rate\ngrammarian, and the finest gentleman (to say the least) of his own\nparty. He had no imagination (or he would not have scorned it!)--no\ndelicacy of taste, no rooted prejudices or strong attachments: his\nintellect was like a bow of polished steel, from which he shot\nsharp-pointed poisoned arrows at his friends in private, at his enemies\nin public. His mind (so to speak) had no _religion_ in it, and very\nlittle even of the moral qualities of genius; but he was a man of the\nworld, a scholar bred, and a most acute and powerful logician. He was\nalso a wit, and a formidable one: yet it may be questioned whether his\nwit was any thing more than an excess of his logical faculty: it did not\nconsist in the play of fancy, but in close and cutting combinations of\nthe understanding. \"The law is open to every one: _so_,\" said Mr. Tooke,\n\"_is the London Tavern_!\" It is the previous deduction formed in the\nmind, and the splenetic contempt felt for a practical sophism, that\n_beats about the bush for_, and at last finds the apt illustration; not\nthe casual, glancing coincidence of two objects, that points out an\nabsurdity to the understanding. So, on another occasion, when Sir Allan\nGardiner (who was a candidate for Westminster) had objected to Mr. Fox,\nthat \"he was always against the minister, _whether right or wrong_,\" and\nMr. Fox, in his reply, had overlooked this slip of the tongue, Mr. Tooke\nimmediately seized on it, and said, \"he thought it at least an equal\nobjection to Sir Allan, that he was always _with_ the minister, whether\nright or wrong.\" This retort had all the effect, and produced the same\nsurprise as the most brilliant display of wit or fancy: yet it was only\nthe detecting a flaw in an argument, like a flaw in an indictment, by a\nkind of legal pertinacity, or rather by a rigid and constant habit of\nattending to the exact import of every word and clause in a sentence.\nMr. Tooke had the mind of a lawyer; but it was applied to a vast variety\nof topics and general trains of speculation.\n\nMr. Horne Tooke was in private company, and among his friends, the\nfinished gentleman of the last age. His manners were as fascinating as\nhis conversation was spirited and delightful. He put one in mind of the\nburden of the song of \"_The King's Old Courtier, and an Old Courtier of\nthe King's_.\" He was, however, of the opposite party. It was curious to\nhear our modern sciolist advancing opinions of the most radical\nkind without any mixture of radical heat or violence, in a tone of\nfashionable _nonchalance_, with elegance of gesture and attitude, and\nwith the most perfect good-humour. In the spirit of opposition, or in\nthe pride of logical superiority, he too often shocked the prejudices or\nwounded the self-love of those about him, while he himself displayed\nthe same unmoved indifference or equanimity. He said the most provoking\nthings with a laughing gaiety, and a polite attention, that there was\nno withstanding. He threw others off their guard by thwarting their\nfavourite theories, and then availed himself of the temperance of\nhis own pulse to chafe them into madness. He had not one particle\nof deference for the opinion of others, nor of sympathy with their\nfeelings; nor had he any obstinate convictions of his own to defend--\n\n  \"Lord of himself, uncumbered with a _creed_!\"\n\nHe took up any topic by chance, and played with it at will, like a\njuggler with his cups and balls. He generally ranged himself on the\nlosing side; and had rather an ill-natured delight in contradiction, and\nin perplexing the understandings of others, without leaving them any\nclue to guide them out of the labyrinth into which he had led them.\nHe understood, in its perfection, the great art of throwing the _onus\nprobandi_ on his adversary; and so could maintain almost any opinion,\nhowever absurd or fantastical, with fearless impunity. I have heard a\nsensible and well-informed man say, that he never was in company with\nMr. Tooke without being delighted and surprised, or without feeling the\nconversation of every other person to be flat in the comparison; but\nthat he did not recollect having ever heard him make a remark that\nstruck him as a sound and true one, or that he himself appeared to think\nso. He used to plague Fuseli by asking him after the origin of the\nTeutonic dialects, and Dr. Parr, by wishing to know the meaning of the\ncommon copulative, _Is_. Once at G----'s, he defended Pitt from a charge\nof verbiage, and endeavoured to prove him superior to Fox. Some one\nimitated Pitt's manner, to show that it was monotonous, and he imitated\nhim also, to show that it was not. He maintained (what would he not\nmaintain?) that young Betty's acting was finer than John Kemble's, and\nrecited a passage from Douglas in the manner of each, to justify the\npreference he gave to the former. The mentioning this will please the\nliving; it cannot hurt the dead. He argued on the same occasion and in\nthe same breath, that Addison's style was without modulation, and\nthat it was physically impossible for any one to write well, who was\nhabitually silent in company. He sat like a king at his own table, and\ngave law to his guests--and to the world! No man knew better how to\nmanage his immediate circle, to foil or bring them out. A professed\norator, beginning to address some observations to Mr. Tooke with a\nvoluminous apology for his youth and inexperience, he said, \"Speak up,\nyoung man!\"--and by taking him at his word, cut short the flower of\norations. Porson was the only person of whom he stood in some degree of\nawe, on account of his prodigious memory and knowledge of his favourite\nsubject, Languages. Sheridan, it has been remarked, said more good\nthings, but had not an equal flow of pleasantry. As an instance of\nMr. Horne Tooke's extreme coolness and command of nerve, it has been\nmentioned that once at a public dinner when he had got on the table to\nreturn thanks for his health being drank with a glass of wine in his\nhand, and when there was a great clamour and opposition for some time,\nafter it had subsided, he pointed to the glass to shew that it was still\nfull. Mr. Holcroft (the author of the _Road to Ruin_) was one of the\nmost violent and fiery-spirited of all that motley crew of persons, who\nattended the Sunday meetings at Wimbledon. One day he was so enraged by\nsome paradox or raillery of his host, that he indignantly rose from his\nchair, and said, \"Mr. Tooke, you are a scoundrel!\" His opponent without\nmanifesting the least emotion, replied, \"Mr. Holcroft, when is it that\nI am to dine with you? shall it be next Thursday?\"--\"If you please, Mr.\nTooke!\" answered the angry philosopher, and sat down again.--It was\ndelightful to see him sometimes turn from these waspish or ludicrous\naltercations with over-weening antagonists to some old friend and\nveteran politician seated at his elbow; to hear him recal the time of\nWilkes and Liberty, the conversation mellowing like the wine with the\nsmack of age; assenting to all the old man said, bringing out his\npleasant _traits_, and pampering him into childish self-importance, and\nsending him away thirty years younger than he came!\n\nAs a public or at least as a parliamentary speaker, Mr. Tooke did not\nanswer the expectations that had been conceived of him, or probably\nthat he had conceived of himself. It is natural for men who have felt\na superiority over all those whom they happen to have encountered, to\nfancy that this superiority will continue, and that it will extend from\nindividuals to public bodies. There is no rule in the case; or rather,\nthe probability lies the contrary way. That which constitutes the\nexcellence of conversation is of little use in addressing large\nassemblies of people; while other qualities are required that are hardly\nto be looked for in one and the same capacity. The way to move great\nmasses of men is to shew that you yourself are moved. In a private\ncircle, a ready repartee, a shrewd cross-question, ridicule and\nbanter, a caustic remark or an amusing anecdote, whatever sets off\nthe individual to advantage, or gratifies the curiosity or piques the\nself-love of the hearers, keeps attention alive, and secures the triumph\nof the speaker--it is a personal contest, and depends on personal and\nmomentary advantages. But in appealing to the public, no one triumphs\nbut in the triumph of some public cause, or by shewing a sympathy with\nthe general and predominant feelings of mankind. In a private room, a\nsatirist, a sophist may provoke admiration by expressing his contempt\nfor each of his adversaries in turn, and by setting their opinion at\ndefiance--but when men are congregated together on a great public\nquestion and for a weighty object, they must be treated with more\nrespect; they are touched with what affects themselves or the general\nweal, not with what flatters the vanity of the speaker; they must be\nmoved altogether, if they are moved at all; they are impressed with\ngratitude for a luminous exposition of their claims or for zeal in their\ncause; and the lightning of generous indignation at bad men and bad\nmeasures is followed by thunders of applause--even in the House of\nCommons. But a man may sneer and cavil and puzzle and fly-blow every\nquestion that comes before him--be despised and feared by others, and\nadmired by no one but himself. He who thinks first of himself, either in\nthe world or in a popular assembly, will be sure to turn attention away\nfrom his claims, instead of fixing it there. He must make common cause\nwith his hearers. To lead, he must follow the general bias. Mr. Tooke\ndid not therefore succeed as a speaker in parliament. He stood aloof,\nhe played antics, he exhibited his peculiar talent--while he was on his\nlegs, the question before the House stood still; the only point at issue\nrespected Mr. Tooke himself, his personal address and adroitness of\nintellect.\n\nWere there to be no more places and pensions, because Mr. Tooke's style\nwas terse and epigrammatic? Were the Opposition benches to be inflamed\nto an unusual pitch of \"sacred vehemence,\" because he gave them plainly\nto understand there was not a pin to choose between Ministers and\nOpposition? Would the House let him remain among them, because, if\nthey turned him out on account of his _black coat_, Lord Camelford had\nthreatened to send his _black servant_ in his place? This was a good\njoke, but not a practical one. Would he gain the affections of the\npeople out of doors, by scouting the question of reform? Would the King\never relish the old associate of Wilkes? What interest, then, what party\ndid he represent? He represented nobody but himself. He was an example\nof an ingenious man, a clever talker, but he was out of his place in the\nHouse of Commons; where people did not come (as in his own house) to\nadmire or break a lance with him, but to get through the business of\nthe day, and so adjourn! He wanted effect and _momentum_. Each of his\nsentences told very well in itself, but they did not all together make\na speech. He left off where he began. His eloquence was a succession\nof drops, not a stream. His arguments, though subtle and new, did not\naffect the main body of the question. The coldness and pettiness of\nhis manner did not warm the hearts or expand the understandings of his\nhearers. Instead of encouraging, he checked the ardour of his friends;\nand teazed, instead of overpowering his antagonists. The only palpable\nhit he ever made, while he remained there, was the comparing his own\nsituation in being rejected by the House, on account of the supposed\npurity of his clerical character, to the story of the girl at the\nMagdalen, who was told \"she must turn out and qualify.\"[A] This met with\nlaughter and loud applause. It was a _home_ thrust, and the House (to do\nthem justice) are obliged to any one who, by a smart blow, relieves\nthem of the load of grave responsibility, which sits heavy on their\nshoulders.--At the hustings, or as an election-candidate, Mr. Tooke did\nbetter. There was no great question to move or carry--it was an affair\nof political _sparring_ between himself and the other candidates. He\ntook it in a very cool and leisurely manner--watched his competitors\nwith a wary, sarcastic eye; picked up the mistakes or absurdities that\nfell from them, and retorted them on their heads; told a story to the\nmob; and smiled and took snuff with a gentlemanly and becoming air, as\nif he was already seated in the House. But a Court of Law was the place\nwhere Mr. Tooke made the best figure in public. He might assuredly be\nsaid to be \"native and endued unto that element.\" He had here to stand\nmerely on the defensive--not to advance himself, but to block up the\nway--not to impress others, but to be himself impenetrable. All he\nwanted was _negative success_; and to this no one was better qualified\nto aspire. Cross purposes, _moot-points_, pleas, demurrers, flaws in\nthe indictment, double meanings, cases, inconsequentialities, these were\nthe play-things, the darlings of Mr. Tooke's mind; and with these he\nbaffled the Judge, dumb-founded the Counsel, and outwitted the Jury. The\nreport of his trial before Lord Kenyon is a master-piece of acuteness,\ndexterity, modest assurance, and legal effect. It is much like his\nexamination before the Commissioners of the Income-Tax--nothing could\nbe got out of him in either case! Mr. Tooke, as a political leader,\nbelonged to the class of _trimmers_; or at most, it was his delight to\nmake mischief and spoil sport. He would rather be _against_ himself than\n_for_ any body else. He was neither a bold nor a safe leader. He enticed\nothers into scrapes, and kept out of them himself. Provided he could\nsay a clever or a spiteful thing, he did not care whether it served or\ninjured the cause. Spleen or the exercise of intellectual power was the\nmotive of his patriotism, rather than principle. He would talk treason\nwith a saving clause; and instil sedition into the public mind, through\nthe medium of a third (who was to be the responsible) party. He made Sir\nFrancis Burdett his spokesman in the House and to the country, often\nventing his chagrin or singularity of sentiment at the expense of his\nfriend; but what in the first was trick or reckless vanity, was in the\nlast plain downright English honesty and singleness of heart. In the\ncase of the State Trials, in 1794, Mr. Tooke rather compromised his\nfriends to screen himself. He kept repeating that \"others might have\ngone on to Windsor, but he had stopped at Hounslow,\" as if to go farther\nmight have been dangerous and unwarrantable. It was not the question how\nfar he or others had actually gone, but how far they had a right to go,\naccording to the law. His conduct was not the limit of the law, nor did\ntreasonable excess begin where prudence or principle taught him to stop\nshort, though this was the oblique inference liable to be drawn from his\nline of defence. Mr. Tooke was uneasy and apprehensive for the issue of\nthe Government-prosecution while in confinement, and said, in speaking\nof it to a friend, with a morbid feeling and an emphasis quite unusual\nwith him--\"They want our blood--blood--blood!\" It was somewhat\nridiculous to implicate Mr. Tooke in a charge of High Treason (and\nindeed the whole charge was built on the mistaken purport of\nan intercepted letter relating to an engagement for a private\ndinnerparty)--his politics were not at all revolutionary. In this\nrespect he was a mere pettifogger, full of chicane, and captious\nobjections, and unmeaning discontent; but he had none of the grand\nwhirling movements of the French Revolution, nor of the tumultuous glow\nof rebellion in his head or in his heart. His politics were cast in\na different mould, or confined to the party distinctions and court-\nintrigues and pittances of popular right, that made a noise in the time\nof Junius and Wilkes--and even if his understanding had gone along with\nmore modern and unqualified principles, his cautious temper would have\nprevented his risking them in practice. Horne Tooke (though not of the\nsame side in politics) had much of the tone of mind and more of the\nspirit of moral feeling of the celebrated philosopher of Malmesbury. The\nnarrow scale and fine-drawn distinctions of his political creed made\nhis conversation on such subjects infinitely amusing, particularly\nwhen contrasted with that of persons who dealt in the sounding\n_common-places_ and sweeping clauses of abstract politics. He knew all\nthe cabals and jealousies and heart-burnings in the beginning of the\nlate reign, the changes of administration and the springs of secret\ninfluence, the characters of the leading men, Wilkes, Barr\u00e8, Dunning,\nChatham, Burke, the Marquis of Rockingham, North, Shelburne, Fox, Pitt,\nand all the vacillating events of the American war:--these formed a\ncurious back-ground to the more prominent figures that occupied the\npresent time, and Mr. Tooke worked out the minute details and touched in\nthe evanescent _traits_ with the pencil of a master. His conversation\nresembled a political _camera obscura_--as quaint as it was magical. To\nsome pompous pretenders he might seem to narrate _fabellas aniles_ (old\nwives' fables)--but not to those who study human nature, and wish to\nknow the materials of which it is composed. Mr. Tooke's faculties might\nappear to have ripened and acquired a finer flavour with age. In a\nformer period of his life he was hardly the man he was latterly; or else\nhe had greater abilities to contend against. He no where makes so poor a\nfigure as in his controversy with Junius. He has evidently the best of\nthe argument, yet he makes nothing out of it. He tells a long story\nabout himself, without wit or point in it; and whines and whimpers like\na school-boy under the rod of his master. Junius, after bringing a hasty\ncharge against him, has not a single fact to adduce in support of it;\nbut keeps his ground and fairly beats his adversary out of the field by\nthe mere force of style. One would think that \"Parson Horne\" knew who\nJunius was, and was afraid of him. \"Under him his genius is\" quite\n\"rebuked.\" With the best cause to defend, he comes off more shabbily\nfrom the contest than any other person in the LETTERS, except Sir\nWilliam Draper, who is the very hero of defeat.\n\nThe great thing which Mr. Horne Tooke has done, and which he has left\nbehind him to posterity, is his work on Grammar, oddly enough entitled\nTHE DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY. Many people have taken it up as a description\nof a game--others supposing it to be a novel. It is, in truth, one of\nthe few philosophical works on Grammar that were ever written. The\nessence of it (and, indeed, almost all that is really valuable in it) is\ncontained in his _Letter to Dunning_, published about the year 1775.\nMr. Tooke's work is truly elementary. Dr. Lowth described Mr. Harris's\n_Hermes_ as \"the finest specimen of analysis since the days of\nAristotle\"--a work in which there is no analysis at all, for analysis\nconsists in reducing things to their principles, and not in endless\ndetails and subdivisions. Mr. Harris multiplies distinctions, and\nconfounds his readers. Mr. Tooke clears away the rubbish of school-boy\ntechnicalities, and strikes at the root of his subject. In accomplishing\nhis arduous task, he was, perhaps, aided not more by the strength and\nresources of his mind than by its limits and defects. There is a web of\nold associations wound round language, that is a kind of veil over its\nnatural features; and custom puts on the mask of ignorance. But this\nveil, this mask the author of _The Diversions of Purley_ threw aside and\npenetrated to the naked truth of things, by the literal, matter-of-fact,\nunimaginative nature of his understanding, and because he was not\nsubject to prejudices or illusions of any kind. Words may be said to\n\"bear a charmed life, that must not yield to one of woman born\"--with\nwomanish weaknesses and confused apprehensions. But this charm was\nbroken in the case of Mr. Tooke, whose mind was the reverse of\neffeminate--hard, unbending, concrete, physical, half-savage--and who\nsaw language stripped of the clothing of habit or sentiment, or the\ndisguises of doting pedantry, naked in its cradle, and in its primitive\nstate. Our author tells us that he found his discovery on Grammar among\na number of papers on other subjects, which he had thrown aside and\nforgotten. Is this an idle boast? Or had he made other discoveries\nof equal importance, which he did not think it worth his while to\ncommunicate to the world, but chose to die the churl of knowledge? The\nwhole of his reasoning turns upon shewing that the Conjunction _That_\nis the pronoun _That_, which is itself the participle of a verb, and\nin like manner that all the other mystical and hitherto unintelligible\nparts of speech are derived from the only two intelligible ones, the\nVerb and Noun. \"I affirm _that_ gold is yellow,\" that is, \"I affirm\n_that_ fact, or that proposition, viz. gold is yellow.\" The secret of\nthe Conjunction on which so many fine heads had split, on which so many\nlearned definitions were thrown away, as if it was its peculiar province\nand inborn virtue to announce oracles and formal propositions, and\nnothing else, like a Doctor of Laws, is here at once accounted for,\ninasmuch as it is clearly nothing but another part of speech, the\npronoun, _that_, with a third part of speech, the noun, _thing_,\nunderstood. This is getting at a solution of words into their component\nparts, not glossing over one difficulty by bringing another to parallel\nit, nor like saying with Mr. Harris, when it is asked, \"what a\nConjunction is?\" that there are conjunctions copulative, conjunctions\ndisjunctive, and as many other frivolous varieties of the species as any\none chooses to hunt out \"with laborious foolery.\" Our author hit\nupon his parent-discovery in the course of a law-suit, while he was\nexamining, with jealous watchfulness, the meaning of words to prevent\nbeing entrapped by them; or rather, this circumstance might itself be\ntraced to the habit of satisfying his own mind as to the precise sense\nin which he himself made use of words. Mr. Tooke, though he had no\nobjection to puzzle others, was mightily averse to being puzzled or\n_mystified_ himself. All was, to his determined mind, either complete\nlight or complete darkness. There was no hazy, doubtful _chiaro-scuro_\nin his understanding. He wanted something \"palpable to feeling as to\nsight.\" \"What,\" he would say to himself, \"do I mean when I use the\nconjunction _that?_ Is it an anomaly, a class by itself, a word sealed\nagainst all inquisitive attempts? Is it enough to call it a _copula_,\na bridge, a link, a word connecting sentences? That is undoubtedly its\nuse, but what is its origin?\" Mr. Tooke thought he had answered this\nquestion satisfactorily, and loosened the Gordian knot of grammarians,\n\"familiar as his garter,\" when he said, \"It is the common pronoun,\nadjective, or participle, _that_, with the noun, _thing or proposition_,\nimplied, and the particular example following it.\" So he thought, and\nso every reader has thought since, with the exception of teachers and\nwriters upon grammar. Mr. Windham, indeed, who was a sophist, but not a\nlogician, charged him with having found \"a mare's-nest;\" but it is not\nto be doubted that Mr. Tooke's etymologies will stand the test, and\nlast longer than Mr. Windham's ingenious derivation of the practice of\nbull-baiting from the principles of humanity!\n\nHaving thus laid the corner-stone, he proceeded to apply the same method\nof reasoning to other undecyphered and impracticable terms. Thus the\nword, _And_, he explained clearly enough to be the verb _add_, or a\ncorruption of the old Saxon, _anandad_. \"Two _and_ two make four,\" that\nis, \"two _add_ two make four.\" Mr. Tooke, in fact, treated words as\nthe chemists do substances; he separated those which are compounded of\nothers from those which are not decompoundable. He did not explain the\nobscure by the more obscure, but the difficult by the plain, the complex\nby the simple. This alone is proceeding upon the true principles of\nscience: the rest is pedantry and _petit-maitreship._ Our philosophical\nwriter distinguished all words into _names of things_, and directions\nadded for joining them together, or originally into _nouns_ and _verbs_.\nIt is a pity that he has left this matter short, by omitting to define\nthe Verb. After enumerating sixteen different definitions (all of which\nhe dismisses with scorn and contumely) at the end of two quarto volumes,\nhe refers the reader for the true solution to a third volume, which\nhe did not live to finish. This extraordinary man was in the habit\nof tantalizing his guests on a Sunday afternoon with sundry abstruse\nspeculations, and putting them off to the following week for a\nsatisfaction of their doubts; but why should he treat posterity in the\nsame scurvy manner, or leave the world without quitting scores with it?\nI question whether Mr. Tooke was himself in possession of his pretended\n_nostrum_, and whether, after trying hard at a definition of the verb as\na distinct part of speech, as a terrier-dog mumbles a hedge-hog, he did\nnot find it too much for him, and leave it to its fate. It is also a\npity that Mr. Tooke spun out his great work with prolix and dogmatical\ndissertations on irrelevant matters; and after denying the old\nmetaphysical theories of language, should attempt to found a\nmetaphysical theory of his own on the nature and mechanism of language.\nThe nature of words, he contended (it was the basis of his whole system)\nhad no connection with the nature of things or the objects of thought;\nyet he afterwards strove to limit the nature of things and of the human\nmind by the technical structure of language. Thus he endeavours to shew\nthat there are no abstract ideas, by enumerating two thousand instances\nof words, expressing abstract ideas, that are the past participles of\ncertain verbs. It is difficult to know what he means by this. On the\nother hand, he maintains that \"a complex idea is as great an absurdity\nas a complex star,\" and that words only are complex. He also makes out a\ntriumphant list of metaphysical and moral non-entities, proved to be\nso on the pure principle that the names of these non-entities are\nparticiples, not nouns, or names of things. That is strange in so close\na reasoner and in one who maintained that all language was a masquerade\nof words, and that the class to which they grammatically belonged had\nnothing to do with the class of ideas they represented.\n\nIt is now above twenty years since the two quarto volumes of the\n_Diversions of Purley_ were published, and fifty since the same theory\nwas promulgated in the celebrated _Letter to Dunning_. Yet it is a\ncurious example of the _Spirit of the Age_ that Mr. Lindley Murray's\nGrammar (a work out of which Mr. C---- helps himself to English, and Mr.\nM---- to style[B]) has proceeded to the thirtieth edition in complete\ndefiance of all the facts and arguments there laid down. He defines a\nnoun to be the name of a thing. Is quackery a thing, _i.e._ a substance?\nHe defines a verb to be a word signifying _to be, to do, or to suffer_.\nAre being, action, suffering verbs? He defines an adjective to be the\nname of a quality. Are not _wooden, golden, substantial_ adjectives? He\nmaintains that there are six cases in English nouns [C], that is, six\nvarious terminations without any change of termination at all, and that\nEnglish verbs have all the moods, tenses, and persons that the Latin\nones have. This is an extraordinary stretch of blindness and obstinacy.\nHe very formally translates the Latin Grammar into English (as so many\nhad done before him) and fancies he has written an English Grammar; and\ndivines applaud, and schoolmasters usher him into the polite world, and\nEnglish scholars carry on the jest, while Horne Tooke's genuine\nanatomy of our native tongue is laid on the shelf. Can it be that our\npoliticians smell a rat in the Member for Old Sarum? That our clergy\ndo not relish Parson Horne? That the world at large are alarmed at\nacuteness and originality greater than their own? What has all this\nto do with the formation of the English language or with the first\nconditions and necessary foundation of speech itself? Is there nothing\nbeyond the reach of prejudice and party-spirit? It seems in this, as in\nso many other instances, as if there was a patent for absurdity in the\nnatural bias of the human mind, and that folly should be _stereotyped_!\n\n\n[Footnote A: \"They receive him like a virgin at the Magdalen--_Go thou\nand do likewise_.\"--JUNIUS.]\n\n\n[Footnote B: This work is not without merit in the details and examples\nof English construction. But its fault even in that part is that he\nconfounds the genius of the English language, making it periphrastic and\nliteral, instead of elliptical and idiomatic. According to Mr. Murray,\nhardly any of our best writers ever wrote a word of English.]\n\n[Footnote C: At least, with only one change in the genitive case,]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nSIR WALTER SCOTT\n\n\n\nSir Walter Scott is undoubtedly the most popular writer of the age--the\n\"lord of the ascendant\" for the time being. He is just half what the\nhuman intellect is capable of being: if you take the universe, and\ndivide it into two parts, he knows all that it _has been_; all that\nit _is to be_ is nothing to him. His is a mind brooding over\nantiquity--scorning \"the present ignorant time.\" He is \"laudator\ntemporis acti\"--a \"_prophesier_ of things past.\" The old world is to him\na crowded map; the new one a dull, hateful blank. He dotes on all well-\nauthenticated superstitions; he shudders at the shadow of innovation.\nHis retentiveness of memory, his accumulated weight of interested\nprejudice or romantic association have overlaid his other faculties. The\ncells of his memory are vast, various, full even to bursting with life\nand motion; his speculative understanding is empty, flaccid, poor, and\ndead. His mind receives and treasures up every thing brought to it by\ntradition or custom--it does not project itself beyond this into the\nworld unknown, but mechanically shrinks back as from the edge of a\nprejudice. The land of pure reason is to his apprehension like _Van\nDieman's Land_;--barren, miserable, distant, a place of exile, the\ndreary abode of savages, convicts, and adventurers. Sir Walter would\nmake a bad hand of a description of the _Millennium_, unless he could\nlay the scene in Scotland five hundred years ago, and then he would\nwant facts and worm-eaten parchments to support his drooping style.\nOur historical novelist firmly thinks that nothing _is_ but what _has\nbeen_--that the moral world stands still, as the material one was\nsupposed to do of old--and that we can never get beyond the point where\nwe actually are without utter destruction, though every thing changes\nand will change from what it was three hundred years ago to what it is\nnow,--from what it is now to all that the bigoted admirer of the good\nold times most dreads and hates!\n\nIt is long since we read, and long since we thought of our author's\npoetry. It would probably have gone out of date with the immediate\noccasion, even if he himself had not contrived to banish it from our\nrecollection. It is not to be denied that it had great merit, both of\nan obvious and intrinsic kind. It abounded in vivid descriptions, in\nspirited action, in smooth and flowing versification. But it wanted\n_character_. It was poetry \"of no mark or likelihood.\" It slid out of\nthe mind as soon as read, like a river; and would have been forgotten,\nbut that the public curiosity was fed with ever-new supplies from the\nsame teeming liquid source. It is not every man that can write six\nquarto volumes in verse, that are caught up with avidity, even by\nfastidious judges. But what a difference between _their_ popularity and\nthat of the Scotch Novels! It is true, the public read and admired the\n_Lay of the Last Minstrel, Marmion_, and so on, and each individual was\ncontented to read and admire because the public did so: but with\nregard to the prose-works of the same (supposed) author, it is quite\n_another-guess_ sort of thing. Here every one stands forward to applaud\non his own ground, would be thought to go before the public opinion,\nis eager to extol his favourite characters louder, to understand them\nbetter than every body else, and has his own scale of comparative\nexcellence for each work, supported by nothing but his own enthusiastic\nand fearless convictions. It must be amusing to the _Author of Waverley_\nto hear his readers and admirers (and are not these the same thing?[A])\nquarrelling which of his novels is the best, opposing character to\ncharacter, quoting passage against passage, striving to surpass each\nother in the extravagance of their encomiums, and yet unable to settle\nthe precedence, or to do the author's writings justice--so various,\nso equal, so transcendant are their merits! His volumes of poetry were\nreceived as fashionable and well-dressed acquaintances: we are ready\nto tear the others in pieces as old friends. There was something\nmeretricious in Sir Walter's ballad-rhymes; and like those who keep\nopera _figurantes_, we were willing to have our admiration shared, and\nour taste confirmed by the town: but the Novels are like the betrothed\nof our hearts, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, and we are\njealous that any one should be as much delighted or as thoroughly\nacquainted with their beauties as ourselves. For which of his poetical\nheroines would the reader break a lance so soon as for Jeanie Deans?\nWhat _Lady of the Lake_ can compare with the beautiful Rebecca? We\nbelieve the late Mr. John Scott went to his death-bed (though a painful\nand premature one) with some degree of satisfaction, inasmuch as he had\npenned the most elaborate panegyric on the _Scotch Novels_ that had as\nyet appeared!--The _Epics_ are not poems, so much as metrical romances.\nThere is a glittering veil of verse thrown over the features of nature\nand of old romance. The deep incisions into character are \"skinned and\nfilmed over\"--the details are lost or shaped into flimsy and insipid\ndecorum; and the truth of feeling and of circumstance is translated into\na tinkling sound, a tinsel _common-place_. It must be owned, there is a\npower in true poetry that lifts the mind from the ground of reality to\na higher sphere, that penetrates the inert, scattered, incoherent\nmaterials presented to it, and by a force and inspiration of its own,\nmelts and moulds them into sublimity and beauty. But Sir Walter (we\ncontend, under correction) has not this creative impulse, this plastic\npower, this capacity of reacting on his first impressions. He is a\nlearned, a literal, a _matter-of-fact_ expounder of truth or fable:[B]\nhe does not soar above and look down upon his subject, imparting his own\nlofty views and feelings to his descriptions of nature--he relies\nupon it, is raised by it, is one with it, or he is nothing. A poet is\nessentially a _maker_; that is, he must atone for what he loses in\nindividuality and local resemblance by the energies and resources of his\nown mind. The writer of whom we speak is deficient in these last. He has\neither not the faculty or not the will to impregnate his subject by an\neffort of pure invention. The execution also is much upon a par with\nthe more ephemeral effusions of the press. It is light, agreeable,\neffeminate, diffuse. Sir Walter's Muse is a _Modern Antique_. The\nsmooth, glossy texture of his verse contrasts happily with the quaint,\nuncouth, rugged materials of which it is composed; and takes away any\nappearance of heaviness or harshness from the body of local traditions\nand obsolete costume. We see grim knights and iron armour; but then they\nare woven in silk with a careless, delicate hand, and have the softness\nof flowers. The poet's figures might be compared to old [C] tapestries\ncopied on the finest velvet:--they are not like Raphael's _Cartoons_,\nbut they are very like Mr. Westall's drawings, which accompany, and are\nintended to illustrate them. This facility and grace of execution is the\nmore remarkable, as a story goes that not long before the appearance of\nthe _Lay of the Last Minstrel_ Sir Walter (then Mr.) Scott, having, in\nthe company of a friend, to cross the Frith of Forth in a ferry-boat,\nthey proposed to beguile the time by writing a number of verses on a\ngiven subject, and that at the end of an hour's hard study, they found\nthey had produced only six lines between them. \"It is plain,\" said the\nunconscious author to his fellow-labourer, \"that you and I need never\nthink of getting our living by writing poetry!\" In a year or so after\nthis, he set to work, and poured out quarto upon quarto, as if they had\nbeen drops of water. As to the rest, and compared with true and great\npoets, our Scottish Minstrel is but \"a metre ballad-monger.\" We would\nrather have written one song of Burns, or a single passage in Lord\nByron's _Heaven and Earth_, or one of Wordsworth's \"fancies and\ngood-nights,\" than all his epics. What is he to Spenser, over whose\nimmortal, ever-amiable verse beauty hovers and trembles, and who has\nshed the purple light of Fancy, from his ambrosial wings, over all\nnature? What is there of the might of Milton, whose head is canopied in\nthe blue serene, and who takes us to sit with him there? What is there\n(in his ambling rhymes) of the deep pathos of Chaucer? Or of the\no'er-informing power of Shakespear, whose eye, watching alike the\nminutest traces of characters and the strongest movements of passion,\n\"glances from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven,\" and with the\nlambent flame of genius, playing round each object, lights up the\nuniverse in a robe of its own radiance? Sir Walter has no voluntary\npower of combination: all his associations (as we said before) are those\nof habit or of tradition. He is a mere narrative and descriptive poet,\ngarrulous of the old time. The definition of his poetry is a pleasing\nsuperficiality.\n\nNot so of his NOVELS AND ROMANCES. There we turn over a new\nleaf--another and the same--the same in matter, but in form, in power\nhow different! The author of Waverley has got rid of the tagging of\nrhymes, the eking out of syllables, the supplying of epithets, the\ncolours of style, the grouping of his characters, and the regular march\nof events, and comes to the point at once, and strikes at the heart\nof his subject, without dismay and without disguise. His poetry was a\nlady's waiting-maid, dressed out in cast-off finery: his prose is a\nbeautiful, rustic nymph, that, like Dorothea in Don Quixote, when she is\nsurprised with dishevelled tresses bathing her naked feet in the brook,\nlooks round her, abashed at the admiration her charms have excited! The\ngrand secret of the author's success in these latter productions is that\nhe has completely got rid of the trammels of authorship; and torn off at\none rent (as Lord Peter got rid of so many yards of lace in the _Tale of\na Tub_) all the ornaments of fine writing and worn-out sentimentality.\nAll is fresh, as from the hand of nature: by going a century or two back\nand laying the scene in a remote and uncultivated district, all becomes\nnew and startling in the present advanced period.--Highland manners,\ncharacters, scenery, superstitions, Northern dialect and costume, the\nwars, the religion, and politics of the sixteenth and seventeenth\ncenturies, give a charming and wholesome relief to the fastidious\nrefinement and \"over-laboured lassitude\" of modern readers, like the\neffect of plunging a nervous valetudinarian into a cold-bath. The\n_Scotch Novels_, for this reason, are not so much admired in Scotland as\nin England. The contrast, the transition is less striking. From the top\nof the Calton-Hill, the inhabitants of \"Auld Reekie\" can descry, or\nfancy they descry the peaks of Ben Lomond and the waving outline of Rob\nRoy's country: we who live at the southern extremity of the island can\nonly catch a glimpse of the billowy scene in the descriptions of the\nAuthor of Waverley. The mountain air is most bracing to our languid\nnerves, and it is brought us in ship-loads from the neighbourhood\nof Abbot's-Ford. There is another circumstance to be taken into the\naccount. In Edinburgh there is a little opposition and something of\nthe spirit of cabal between the partisans of works proceeding from Mr.\nConstable's and Mr. Blackwood's shops. Mr. Constable gives the highest\nprices; but being the Whig bookseller, it is grudged that he should\ndo so. An attempt is therefore made to transfer a certain share of\npopularity to the second-rate Scotch novels, \"the embryo fry, the little\nairy of _ricketty_ children,\" issuing through Mr. Blackwood's shop-door.\nThis operates a diversion, which does not affect us here. The Author of\nWaverley wears the palm of legendary lore alone. Sir Walter may, indeed,\nsurfeit us: his imitators make us sick! It may be asked, it has been\nasked, \"Have we no materials for romance in England? Must we look to\nScotland for a supply of whatever is original and striking in this\nkind?\" And we answer--\"Yes!\" Every foot of soil is with us worked up:\nnearly every movement of the social machine is calculable. We have no\nroom left for violent catastrophes; for grotesque quaintnesses; for\nwizard spells. The last skirts of ignorance and barbarism are seen\nhovering (in Sir Walter's pages) over the Border. We have, it is true,\ngipsies in this country as well as at the Cairn of Derncleugh: but they\nlive under clipped hedges, and repose in camp-beds, and do not perch\non crags, like eagles, or take shelter, like sea-mews, in basaltic\nsubterranean caverns. We have heaths with rude heaps of stones upon\nthem: but no existing superstition converts them into the Geese of\nMicklestane-Moor, or sees a Black Dwarf groping among them. We have\nsects in religion: but the only thing sublime or ridiculous in that way\nis Mr. Irving, the Caledonian preacher, who \"comes like a satyr staring\nfrom the woods, and yet speaks like an orator!\" We had a Parson Adams\nnot quite a hundred years ago--a Sir Roger de Coverley rather more than\na hundred! Even Sir Walter is ordinarily obliged to pitch his angle\n(strong as the hook is) a hundred miles to the North of the \"Modern\nAthens\" or a century back. His last work,[A] indeed, is mystical,\nis romantic in nothing but the title-page. Instead of \"a\nholy-water sprinkle dipped in dew,\" he has given us a fashionable\nwatering-place--and we see what he has made of it. He must not come down\nfrom his fastnesses in traditional barbarism and native rusticity: the\nlevel, the littleness, the frippery of modern civilization will undo him\nas it has undone us!\n\nSir Walter has found out (oh, rare discovery) that facts are better than\nfiction; that there is no romance like the romance of real life; and\nthat if we can but arrive at what men feel, do, and say in striking and\nsingular situations, the result will be \"more lively, audible, and full\nof vent,\" than the fine-spun cobwebs of the brain. With reverence be it\nspoken, he is like the man who having to imitate the squeaking of a pig\nupon the stage, brought the animal under his coat with him. Our author\nhas conjured up the actual people he has to deal with, or as much as he\ncould get of them, in \"their habits as they lived.\" He has ransacked old\nchronicles, and poured the contents upon his page; he has squeezed out\nmusty records; he has consulted wayfaring pilgrims, bed-rid sibyls; he\nhas invoked the spirits of the air; he has conversed with the living and\nthe dead, and let them tell their story their own way; and by borrowing\nof others, has enriched his own genius with everlasting variety, truth,\nand freedom. He has taken his materials from the original, authentic\nsources, in large concrete masses, and not tampered with or too much\nfrittered them away. He is only the amanuensis of truth and history. It\nis impossible to say how fine his writings in consequence are, unless we\ncould describe how fine nature is. All that portion of the history of\nhis country that he has touched upon (wide as the scope is) the manners,\nthe personages, the events, the scenery, lives over again in his\nvolumes. Nothing is wanting--the illusion is complete. There is a\nhurtling in the air, a trampling of feet upon the ground, as these\nperfect representations of human character or fanciful belief come\nthronging back upon our imaginations. We will merely recall a few of\nthe subjects of his pencil to the reader's recollection; for nothing we\ncould add, by way of note or commendation, could make the impression\nmore vivid.\n\nThere is (first and foremost, because the earliest of our acquaintance)\nthe Baron of Bradwardine, stately, kind-hearted, whimsical, pedantic;\nand Flora MacIvor (whom even _we_ forgive for her Jacobitism), the\nfierce Vich Ian Vohr, and Evan Dhu, constant in death, and Davie\nGellatly roasting his eggs or turning his rhymes with restless\nvolubility, and the two stag-hounds that met Waverley, as fine as ever\nTitian painted, or Paul Veronese:--then there is old Balfour of Burley,\nbrandishing his sword and his Bible with fire-eyed fury, trying a\nfall with the insolent, gigantic Bothwell at the 'Change-house, and\nvanquishing him at the noble battle of Loudonhill; there is Bothwell\nhimself, drawn to the life, proud, cruel, selfish, profligate, but with\nthe love-letters of the gentle Alice (written thirty years before), and\nhis verses to her memory, found in his pocket after his death: in the\nsame volume of _Old Mortality_ is that lone figure, like a figure in\nScripture, of the woman sitting on the stone at the turning to the\nmountain, to warn Burley that there is a lion in his path; and\nthe fawning Claverhouse, beautiful as a panther, smooth-looking,\nblood-spotted; and the fanatics, Macbriar and Mucklewrath, crazed with\nzeal and sufferings; and the inflexible Morton, and the faithful Edith,\nwho refused to \"give her hand to another while her heart was with her\nlover in the deep and dead sea.\" And in _The Heart of Mid-Lothian_ we\nhave Effie Deans (that sweet, faded flower) and Jeanie, her more than\nsister, and old David Deans, the patriarch of St. Leonard's Crags, and\nButler, and Dumbiedikes, eloquent in his silence, and Mr. Bartoline\nSaddle-tree and his prudent helpmate, and Porteous swinging in the\nwind, and Madge Wildfire, full of finery and madness, and her ghastly\nmother.--Again, there is Meg Merrilies, standing on her rock, stretched\non her bier with \"her head to the east,\" and Dirk Hatterick (equal to\nShakespear's Master Barnardine), and Glossin, the soul of an attorney,\nand Dandy Dinmont, with his terrier-pack and his pony Dumple, and the\nfiery Colonel Mannering, and the modish old counsellor Pleydell, and\nDominie Sampson,[D] and Rob Roy (like the eagle in his eyry), and\nBaillie Nicol Jarvie, and the inimitable Major Galbraith, and Rashleigh\nOsbaldistone, and Die Vernon, the best of secret-keepers; and in the\n_Antiquary_, the ingenious and abstruse Mr. Jonathan Oldbuck, and the\nold beadsman Edie Ochiltree, and that preternatural figure of old Edith\nElspeith, a living shadow, in whom the lamp of life had been long\nextinguished, had it not been fed by remorse and \"thick-coming\"\nrecollections; and that striking picture of the effects of feudal\ntyranny and fiendish pride, the unhappy Earl of Glenallan; and the Black\nDwarf, and his friend Habbie of the Heughfoot (the cheerful hunter), and\nhis cousin Grace Armstrong, fresh and laughing like the morning; and the\n_Children of the Mint_, and the baying of the blood-hound that tracks\ntheir steps at a distance (the hollow echoes are in our ears now), and\nAmy and her hapless love, and the villain Varney, and the deep voice of\nGeorge of Douglas--and the immoveable Balafre, and Master Oliver the\nBarber in Quentin Durward--and the quaint humour of the Fortunes of\nNigel, and the comic spirit of Peveril of the Peak--and the fine old\nEnglish romance of Ivanhoe. What a list of names! What a host of\nassociations! What a thing is human life! What a power is that of\ngenius! What a world of thought and feeling is thus rescued from\noblivion! How many hours of heartfelt satisfaction has our author given\nto the gay and thoughtless! How many sad hearts has he soothed in pain\nand solitude! It is no wonder that the public repay with lengthened\napplause and gratitude the pleasure they receive. He writes as fast as\nthey can read, and he does not write himself down. He is always in the\npublic eye, and we do not tire of him. His worst is better than any\nother person's best. His _backgrounds_ (and his later works are little\nelse but back-grounds capitally made out) are more attractive than the\nprincipal figures and most complicated actions of other writers. His\nworks (taken together) are almost like a new edition of human nature.\nThis is indeed to be an author!\n\nThe political bearing of the _Scotch Novels_ has been a considerable\nrecommendation to them. They are a relief to the mind, rarefied as it\nhas been with modern philosophy, and heated with ultra-radicalism. At a\ntime also, when we bid fair to revive the principles of the Stuarts,\nit is interesting to bring us acquainted with their persons and\nmisfortunes. The candour of Sir Walter's historic pen levels our\nbristling prejudices on this score, and sees fair play between\nRoundheads and Cavaliers, between Protestant and Papist. He is a writer\nreconciling all the diversities of human nature to the reader. He does\nnot enter into the distinctions of hostile sects or parties, but treats\nof the strength or the infirmity of the human mind, of the virtues or\nvices of the human breast, as they are to be found blended in the whole\nrace of mankind. Nothing can shew more handsomely or be more gallantly\nexecuted. There was a talk at one time that our author was about to take\nGuy Faux for the subject of one of his novels, in order to put a more\nliberal and humane construction on the Gunpowder Plot than our \"No\nPopery\" prejudices have hitherto permitted. Sir Walter is a professed\n_clarifier_ of the age from the vulgar and still lurking old-English\nantipathy to Popery and Slavery. Through some odd process of _servile_\nlogic, it should seem, that in restoring the claims of the Stuarts by\nthe courtesy of romance, the House of Brunswick are more firmly seated\nin point of fact, and the Bourbons, by collateral reasoning, become\nlegitimate! In any other point of view, we cannot possibly conceive\nhow Sir Walter imagines \"he has done something to revive the declining\nspirit of loyalty\" by these novels. His loyalty is founded on _would-be_\ntreason: he props the actual throne by the shadow of rebellion. Does\nhe really think of making us enamoured of the \"good old times\" by the\nfaithful and harrowing portraits he has drawn of them? Would he carry us\nback to the early stages of barbarism, of clanship, of the feudal system\nas \"a consummation devoutly to be wished?\" Is he infatuated enough,\nor does he so dote and drivel over his own slothful and self-willed\nprejudices, as to believe that he will make a single convert to the\nbeauty of Legitimacy, that is, of lawless power and savage bigotry, when\nhe himself is obliged to apologise for the horrors he describes, and\neven render his descriptions credible to the modern reader by referring\nto the authentic history of these delectable times?[E] He is indeed\nso besotted as to the moral of his own story, that he has even the\nblindness to go out of his way to have a fling at _flints_ and _dungs_\n(the contemptible ingredients, as he would have us believe, of a modern\nrabble) at the very time when he is describing a mob of the twelfth\ncentury--a mob (one should think) after the writer's own heart, without\none particle of modern philosophy or revolutionary politics in their\ncomposition, who were to a man, to a hair, just what priests, and kings,\nand nobles _let_ them be, and who were collected to witness (a spectacle\nproper to the times) the burning of the lovely Rebecca at a stake for\na sorceress, because she was a Jewess, beautiful and innocent, and the\nconsequent victim of insane bigotry and unbridled profligacy. And it is\nat this moment (when the heart is kindled and bursting with indignation\nat the revolting abuses of self-constituted power) that Sir Walter\n_stops the press_ to have a sneer at the people, and to put a spoke (as\nhe thinks) in the wheel of upstart innovation! This is what he \"calls\nbacking his friends\"--it is thus he administers charms and philtres to\nour love of Legitimacy, makes us conceive a horror of all reform, civil,\npolitical, or religious, and would fain put down the _Spirit of the\nAge_. The author of Waverley might just as well get up and make a speech\nat a dinner at Edinburgh, abusing Mr. Mac-Adam for his improvements in\nthe roads, on the ground that they were nearly _impassable_ in many\nplaces \"sixty years since;\" or object to Mr. Peel's _Police-Bill_, by\ninsisting that Hounslow-Heath was formerly a scene of greater interest\nand terror to highwaymen and travellers, and cut a greater figure in\nthe Newgate-Calendar than it does at present.--Oh! Wickliff, Luther,\nHampden, Sidney, Somers, mistaken Whigs, and thoughtless Reformers in\nreligion and politics, and all ye, whether poets or philosophers, heroes\nor sages, inventors of arts or sciences, patriots, benefactors of the\nhuman race, enlighteners and civilisers of the world, who have (so far)\nreduced opinion to reason, and power to law, who are the cause that we\nno longer burn witches and heretics at slow fires, that the thumb-screws\nare no longer applied by ghastly, smiling judges, to extort confession\nof imputed crimes from sufferers for conscience sake; that men are no\nlonger strung up like acorns on trees without judge or jury, or hunted\nlike wild beasts through thickets and glens, who have abated the cruelty\nof priests, the pride of nobles, the divinity of kings in former times;\nto whom we owe it, that we no longer wear round our necks the collar of\nGurth the swineherd, and of Wamba the jester; that the castles of great\nlords are no longer the dens of banditti, from whence they issue with\nfire and sword, to lay waste the land; that we no longer expire in\nloathsome dungeons without knowing the cause, or have our right hands\nstruck off for raising them in self-defence against wanton insult; that\nwe can sleep without fear of being burnt in our beds, or travel without\nmaking our wills; that no Amy Robsarts are thrown down trap-doors by\nRichard Varneys with impunity; that no Red Reiver of Westburn-Flat sets\nfire to peaceful cottages; that no Claverhouse signs cold-blooded\ndeath-warrants in sport; that we have no Tristan the Hermit, or Petit-\nAndr\u00e8, crawling near us, like spiders, and making our flesh creep, and\nour hearts sicken within us at every moment of our lives--ye who have\nproduced this change in the face of nature and society, return to earth\nonce more, and beg pardon of Sir Walter and his patrons, who sigh at not\nbeing able to undo all that you have done! Leaving this question, there\nare two other remarks which we wished to make on the Novels. The one\nwas, to express our admiration at the good-nature of the mottos, in\nwhich the author has taken occasion to remember and quote almost every\nliving author (whether illustrious or obscure) but himself--an indirect\nargument in favour of the general opinion as to the source from which\nthey spring--and the other was, to hint our astonishment at the\ninnumerable and incessant in-stances of bad and slovenly English in\nthem, more, we believe, than in any other works now printed. We should\nthink the writer could not possibly read the manuscript after he has\nonce written it, or overlook the press.\n\nIf there were a writer, who \"born for the universe\"--\n\n\"-----------Narrow'd his mind, And to party gave up what was meant for\nmankind--\"\n\n\nwho, from the height of his genius looking abroad into nature, and\nscanning the recesses of the human heart, \"winked and shut his\napprehension up\" to every thought or purpose that tended to the future\ngood of mankind--who, raised by affluence, the reward of successful\nindustry, and by the voice of fame above the want of any but the most\nhonourable patronage, stooped to the unworthy arts of adulation, and\nabetted the views of the great with the pettifogging feelings of the\nmeanest dependant on office--who, having secured the admiration of the\npublic (with the probable reversion of immortality), shewed no respect\nfor himself, for that genius that had raised him to distinction, for\nthat nature which he trampled under foot--who, amiable, frank, friendly,\nmanly in private life, was seized with the dotage of age and the fury\nof a woman, the instant politics were concerned--who reserved all his\ncandour and comprehensiveness of view for history, and vented his\nlittleness, pique, resentment, bigotry, and intolerance on his\ncontemporaries--who took the wrong side, and defended it by unfair\nmeans--who, the moment his own interest or the prejudices of others\ninterfered, seemed to forget all that was due to the pride of intellect,\nto the sense of manhood--who, praised, admired by men of all parties\nalike, repaid the public liberality by striking a secret and envenomed\nblow at the reputation of every one who was not the ready tool of\npower--who strewed the slime of rankling malice and mercenary scorn\nover the bud and promise of genius, because it was not fostered in the\nhot-bed of corruption, or warped by the trammels of servility--who\nsupported the worst abuses of authority in the worst spirit--who joined\na gang of desperadoes to spread calumny, contempt, infamy, wherever they\nwere merited by honesty or talent on a different side--who officiously\nundertook to decide public questions by private insinuations, to prop\nthe throne by nicknames, and the altar by lies--who being (by common\nconsent) the finest, the most humane and accomplished writer of his age,\nassociated himself with and encouraged the lowest panders of a venal\npress; deluging, nauseating the public mind with the offal and garbage\nof Billingsgate abuse and vulgar _slang_; shewing no remorse, no\nrelenting or compassion towards the victims of this nefarious and\norganized system of party-proscription, carried on under the mask of\nliterary criticism and fair discussion, insulting the misfortunes of\nsome, and trampling on the early grave of others--\n\n  \"Who would not grieve if such a man there be?\n  Who would not weep if Atticus were he?\"\n\nBut we believe there is no other age or country of the world (but ours),\nin which such genius could have been so degraded!\n\n\n[Footnote A: No! For we met with a young lady who kept a circulating\nlibrary and a milliner's-shop, in a watering-place in the country, who,\nwhen we inquired for the _Scotch Novels_, spoke indifferently about\nthem, said they were \"so dry she could hardly get through them,\" and\nrecommended us to read _Agnes_. We never thought of it before; but we\nwould venture to lay a wager that there are many other young ladies in\nthe same situation, and who think \"Old Mortality\" \"dry.\"]\n\n[Footnote B: Just as Cobbett is a _matter-of-fact reasoner_.]\n\n[Footnote C: St. Ronan's Well.]\n\n[Footnote D: Perhaps the finest scene in all these novels, is that where\nthe Dominie meets his pupil, Miss Lucy, the morning after her brother's\narrival.]\n\n[Footnote E: \"And here we cannot but think it necessary to offer some\nbetter proof than the incidents of an idle tale, to vindicate the\nmelancholy representation of manners which has been just laid before\nthe reader. It is grievous to think that those valiant Barons, to whose\nstand against the crown the liberties of England were indebted for their\nexistence, should themselves have been such dreadful oppressors, and\ncapable of excesses, contrary not only to the laws of England, but to\nthose of nature and humanity. But alas! we have only to extract from the\nindustrious Henry one of those numerous passages which he has collected\nfrom contemporary historians, to prove that fiction itself can hardly\nreach the dark reality of the horrors of the period.\n\n\"The description given by the author of the Saxon Chronicle of the\ncruelties exercised in the reign of King Stephen by the great barons and\nlords of castles, who were all Normans, affords a strong proof of the\nexcesses of which they were capable when their passions were inflamed.\n'They grievously oppressed the poor people by building castles; and when\nthey were built, they filled them with wicked men or rather devils, who\nseized both men and women who they imagined had any money, threw them\ninto prison, and put them to more cruel tortures than the martyrs ever\nendured. They suffocated some in mud, and suspended others by the feet,\nor the head, or the thumbs, kindling fires below them. They squeezed the\nheads of some with knotted cords till they pierced their brains, while\nthey threw others into dungeons swarming with serpents, snakes, and\ntoads.' But it would be cruel to put the reader to the pain of perusing\nthe remainder of the description.\"--_Henry's Hist_. edit. 1805, vol.\nvii. p. 346.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nLORD BYRON.\n\n\n\nLord Byron and Sir Walter Scott are among writers now living[A] the two,\nwho would carry away a majority of suffrages as the greatest geniuses of\nthe age. The former would, perhaps, obtain the preference with the fine\ngentlemen and ladies (squeamishness apart)--the latter with the critics\nand the vulgar. We shall treat of them in the same connection, partly\non account of their distinguished pre-eminence, and partly because they\nafford a complete contrast to each other. In their poetry, in their\nprose, in their politics, and in their tempers no two men can be more\nunlike. If Sir Walter Scott may be thought by some to have been\n\n  \"Born universal heir to all humanity,\"\n\nit is plain Lord Byron can set up no such pretension. He is, in a\nstriking degree, the creature of his own will. He holds no communion\nwith his kind; but stands alone, without mate or fellow--\n\n  \"As if a man were author of himself,\n  And owned no other kin.\"\n\nHe is like a solitary peak, all access to which is cut off not more by\nelevation than distance. He is seated on a lofty eminence, \"cloud-capt,\"\nor reflecting the last rays of setting suns; and in his poetical moods,\nreminds us of the fabled Titans, retired to a ridgy steep, playing on\ntheir Pan's-pipes, and taking up ordinary men and things in their hands\nwith haughty indifference. He raises his subject to himself, or tramples\non it: he neither stoops to, nor loses himself in it. He exists not by\nsympathy, but by antipathy. He scorns all things, even himself. Nature\nmust come to him to sit for her picture--he does not go to her. She must\nconsult his time, his convenience, and his humour; and wear a _sombre_\nor a fantastic garb, or his Lordship turns his back upon her. There is\nno ease, no unaffected simplicity of manner, no \"golden mean.\" All is\nstrained, or petulant in the extreme. His thoughts are sphered and\ncrystalline; his style \"prouder than when blue Iris bends;\" his spirit\nfiery, impatient, wayward, indefatigable. Instead of taking his\nimpressions from without, in entire and almost unimpaired masses, he\nmoulds them according to his own temperament, and heats the materials\nof his imagination in the furnace of his passions.--Lord Byron's verse\nglows like a flame, consuming every thing in its way; Sir Walter Scott's\nglides like a river, clear, gentle, harmless. The poetry of the first\nscorches, that of the last scarcely warms. The light of the one proceeds\nfrom an internal source, ensanguined, sullen, fixed; the other reflects\nthe hues of Heaven, or the face of nature, glancing vivid and various.\nThe productions of the Northern Bard have the rust and the freshness\nof antiquity about them; those of the Noble Poet cease to startle\nfrom their extreme ambition of novelty, both in style and matter. Sir\nWalter's rhymes are \"silly sooth\"--\n\n  \"And dally with the innocence of thought,\n  Like the old age\"--\n\nhis Lordship's Muse spurns _the olden time_, and affects all the\nsupercilious airs of a modern fine lady and an upstart. The object of\nthe one writer is to restore us to truth and nature: the other chiefly\nthinks how he shall display his own power, or vent his spleen, or\nastonish the reader either by starting new subjects and trains of\nspeculation, or by expressing old ones in a more striking and emphatic\nmanner than they have been expressed before. He cares little what it is\nhe says, so that he can say it differently from others. This may account\nfor the charges of plagiarism which have been repeatedly brought against\nthe Noble Poet--if he can borrow an image or sentiment from another, and\nheighten it by an epithet or an allusion of greater force and beauty\nthan is to be found in the original passage, he thinks he shews his\nsuperiority of execution in this in a more marked manner than if\nthe first suggestion had been his own. It is not the value of the\nobservation itself he is solicitous about; but he wishes to shine by\ncontrast--even nature only serves as a foil to set off his style. He\ntherefore takes the thoughts of others (whether contemporaries or not)\nout of their mouths, and is content to make them his own, to set his\nstamp upon them, by imparting to them a more meretricious gloss, a\nhigher relief, a greater loftiness of tone, and a characteristic\ninveteracy of purpose. Even in those collateral ornaments of modern\nstyle, slovenliness, abruptness, and eccentricity (as well as in\nterseness and significance), Lord Byron, when he pleases, defies\ncompetition and surpasses all his contemporaries. Whatever he does, he\nmust do in a more decided and daring manner than any one else--he lounges\nwith extravagance, and yawns so as to alarm the reader! Self-will,\npassion, the love of singularity, a disdain of himself and of others\n(with a conscious sense that this is among the ways and means of\nprocuring admiration) are the proper categories of his mind: he is a\nlordly writer, is above his own reputation, and condescends to the Muses\nwith a scornful grace!\n\nLord Byron, who in his politics is a _liberal_, in his genius is haughty\nand aristocratic: Walter Scott, who is an aristocrat in principle, is\npopular in his writings, and is (as it were) equally _servile_ to nature\nand to opinion. The genius of Sir Walter is essentially imitative, or\n\"denotes a foregone conclusion:\" that of Lord Byron is self-dependent;\nor at least requires no aid, is governed by no law, but the impulses of\nits own will. We confess, however much we may admire independence of\nfeeling and erectness of spirit in general or practical questions, yet\nin works of genius we prefer him who bows to the authority of nature,\nwho appeals to actual objects, to mouldering superstitions, to history,\nobservation, and tradition, before him who only consults the pragmatical\nand restless workings of his own breast, and gives them out as oracles\nto the world. We like a writer (whether poet or prose-writer) who takes\nin (or is willing to take in) the range of half the universe in feeling,\ncharacter, description, much better than we do one who obstinately and\ninvariably shuts himself up in the Bastile of his own ruling passions.\nIn short, we had rather be Sir Walter Scott (meaning thereby the Author\nof Waverley) than Lord Byron, a hundred times over. And for the reason\njust given, namely, that he casts his descriptions in the mould of\nnature, ever-varying, never tiresome, always interesting and always\ninstructive, instead of casting them constantly in the mould of his\nown individual impressions. He gives us man as he is, or as he was, in\nalmost every variety of situation, action, and feeling. Lord Byron\nmakes man after his own image, woman after his own heart; the one is\na capricious tyrant, the other a yielding slave; he gives us the\nmisanthrope and the voluptuary by turns; and with these two characters,\nburning or melting in their own fires, he makes out everlasting centos\nof himself. He hangs the cloud, the film of his existence over all\noutward things--sits in the centre of his thoughts, and enjoys dark\nnight, bright day, the glitter and the gloom \"in cell monastic\"--we see\nthe mournful pall, the crucifix, the death's heads, the faded chaplet of\nflowers, the gleaming tapers, the agonized brow of genius, the wasted\nform of beauty--but we are still imprisoned in a dungeon, a curtain\nintercepts our view, we do not breathe freely the air of nature or of\nour own thoughts--the other admired author draws aside the curtain, and\nthe veil of egotism is rent, and he shews us the crowd of living men and\nwomen, the endless groups, the landscape back-ground, the cloud and\nthe rainbow, and enriches our imaginations and relieves one passion\nby another, and expands and lightens reflection, and takes away that\ntightness at the breast which arises from thinking or wishing to think\nthat there is nothing in the world out of a man's self!--In this point\nof view, the Author of Waverley is one of the greatest teachers of\nmorality that ever lived, by emancipating the mind from petty, narrow,\nand bigotted prejudices: Lord Byron is the greatest pamperer of those\nprejudices, by seeming to think there is nothing else worth encouraging\nbut the seeds or the full luxuriant growth of dogmatism and\nself-conceit. In reading the _Scotch Novels_, we never think about\nthe author, except from a feeling of curiosity respecting our unknown\nbenefactor: in reading Lord Byron's works, he himself is never absent\nfrom our minds. The colouring of Lord Byron's style, however rich and\ndipped in Tyrian dyes, is nevertheless opaque, is in itself an object\nof delight and wonder: Sir Walter Scott's is perfectly transparent. In\nstudying the one, you seem to gaze at the figures cut in stained glass,\nwhich exclude the view beyond, and where the pure light of Heaven is\nonly a means of setting off the gorgeousness of art: in reading the\nother, you look through a noble window at the clear and varied landscape\nwithout. Or to sum up the distinction in one word, Sir Walter Scott is\nthe most _dramatic_ writer now living; and Lord Byron is the least so.\nIt would be difficult to imagine that the Author of Waverley is in the\nsmallest degree a pedant; as it would be hard to persuade ourselves that\nthe author of Childe Harold and Don Juan is not a coxcomb, though a\nprovoking and sublime one. In this decided preference given to Sir\nWalter Scott over Lord Byron, we distinctly include the prose-works of\nthe former; for we do not think his poetry alone by any means entitles\nhim to that precedence. Sir Walter in his poetry, though pleasing and\nnatural, is a comparative trifler: it is in his anonymous productions\nthat he has shewn himself for what he is!--\n\n_Intensity_ is the great and prominent distinction of Lord Byron's\nwritings. He seldom gets beyond force of style, nor has he produced any\nregular work or masterly whole. He does not prepare any plan beforehand,\nnor revise and retouch what he has written with polished accuracy. His\nonly object seems to be to stimulate himself and his readers for the\nmoment--to keep both alive, to drive away _ennui_, to substitute a\nfeverish and irritable state of excitement for listless indolence or\neven calm enjoyment. For this purpose he pitches on any subject at\nrandom without much thought or delicacy--he is only impatient to\nbegin--and takes care to adorn and enrich it as he proceeds with\n\"thoughts that breathe and words that burn.\" He composes (as he himself\nhas said) whether he is in the bath, in his study, or on horseback--he\nwrites as habitually as others talk or think--and whether we have the\ninspiration of the Muse or not, we always find the spirit of the man\nof genius breathing from his verse. He grapples with his subject, and\nmoves, penetrates, and animates it by the electric force of his own\nfeelings. He is often monotonous, extravagant, offensive; but he is\nnever dull, or tedious, but when he writes prose. Lord Byron does not\nexhibit a new view of nature, or raise insignificant objects into\nimportance by the romantic associations with which he surrounds them;\nbut generally (at least) takes common-place thoughts and events, and\nendeavours to express them in stronger and statelier language than\nothers. His poetry stands like a Martello tower by the side of his\nsubject. He does not, like Mr. Wordsworth, lift poetry from the ground,\nor create a sentiment out of nothing. He does not describe a daisy or a\nperiwinkle, but the cedar or the cypress: not \"poor men's cottages, but\nprinces' palaces.\" His Childe Harold contains a lofty and impassioned\nreview of the great events of history, of the mighty objects left as\nwrecks of time, but he dwells chiefly on what is familiar to the mind of\nevery school-boy; has brought out few new traits of feeling or thought;\nand has done no more than justice to the reader's preconceptions by the\nsustained force and brilliancy of his style and imagery. Lord Byron's\nearlier productions, _Lara_, the _Corsair_, &c. were wild and gloomy\nromances, put into rapid and shining verse. They discover the madness\nof poetry, together with the inspiration: sullen, moody, capricious,\nfierce, inexorable, gloating on beauty, thirsting for revenge, hurrying\nfrom the extremes of pleasure to pain, but with nothing permanent,\nnothing healthy or natural. The gaudy decorations and the morbid\nsentiments remind one of flowers strewed over the face of death! In\nhis _Childe Harold_ (as has been just observed) he assumes a lofty and\nphilosophic tone, and \"reasons high of providence, fore-knowledge, will,\nand fate.\" He takes the highest points in the history of the world,\nand comments on them from a more commanding eminence: he shews us the\ncrumbling monuments of time, he invokes the great names, the\nmighty spirit of antiquity. The universe is changed into a stately\nmausoleum:--in solemn measures he chaunts a hymn to fame. Lord Byron has\nstrength and elevation enough to fill up the moulds of our classical and\ntime-hallowed recollections, and to rekindle the earliest aspirations of\nthe mind after greatness and true glory with a pen of fire. The names of\nTasso, of Ariosto, of Dante, of Cincinnatus, of Caesar, of Scipio, lose\nnothing of their pomp or their lustre in his hands, and when he begins\nand continues a strain of panegyric on such subjects, we indeed sit\ndown with him to a banquet of rich praise, brooding over imperishable\nglories,\n\n  \"Till Contemplation has her fill.\"\n\nLord Byron seems to cast himself indignantly from \"this bank and shoal\nof time,\" or the frail tottering bark that bears up modern reputation,\ninto the huge sea of ancient renown, and to revel there with untired,\noutspread plume. Even this in him is spleen--his contempt of his\ncontemporaries makes him turn back to the lustrous past, or project\nhimself forward to the dim future!--Lord Byron's tragedies, Faliero,[B]\nSardanapalus, &c. are not equal to his other works. They want the\nessence of the drama. They abound in speeches and descriptions, such as\nhe himself might make either to himself or others, lolling on his couch\nof a morning, but do not carry the reader out of the poet's mind to the\nscenes and events recorded. They have neither action, character,\nnor interest, but are a sort of _gossamer_ tragedies, spun out, and\nglittering, and spreading a flimsy veil over the face of nature. Yet\nhe spins them on. Of all that he has done in this way the _Heaven and\nEarth_ (the same subject as Mr. Moore's _Loves of the Angels_) is the\nbest. We prefer it even to _Manfred_. _Manfred_ is merely himself,\nwith a fancy-drapery on: but in the dramatic fragment published in the\n_Liberal_, the space between Heaven and Earth, the stage on which\nhis characters have to pass to and fro, seems to fill his Lordship's\nimagination; and the Deluge, which he has so finely described, may be\nsaid to have drowned all his own idle humours.\n\nWe must say we think little of our author's turn for satire. His\n\"English Bards and Scotch Reviewers\" is dogmatical and insolent, but\nwithout refinement or point. He calls people names, and tries to\ntransfix a character with an epithet, which does not stick, because\nit has no other foundation than his own petulance and spite; or he\nendeavours to degrade by alluding to some circumstance of external\nsituation. He says of Mr. Wordsworth's poetry, that \"it is his\naversion.\" That may be: but whose fault is it? This is the satire of\na lord, who is accustomed to have all his whims or dislikes taken for\ngospel, and who cannot be at the pains to do more than signify his\ncontempt or displeasure. If a great man meets with a rebuff which he\ndoes not like, he turns on his heel, and this passes for a repartee.\nThe Noble Author says of a celebrated barrister and critic, that he was\n\"born in a garret sixteen stories high.\" The insinuation is not true; or\nif it were, it is low. The allusion degrades the person who makes, not\nhim to whom it is applied. This is also the satire of a person of birth\nand quality, who measures all merit by external rank, that is, by\nhis own standard. So his Lordship, in a \"Letter to the Editor of My\nGrandmother's Review,\" addresses him fifty times as \"_my dear Robarts_;\"\nnor is there any other wit in the article. This is surely a mere\nassumption of superiority from his Lordship's rank, and is the sort of\n_quizzing_ he might use to a person who came to hire himself as a valet\nto him at _Long's_--the waiters might laugh, the public will not. In\nlike manner, in the controversy about Pope, he claps Mr. Bowles on the\nback with a coarse facetious familiarity, as if he were his chaplain\nwhom he had invited to dine with him, or was about to present to a\nbenefice. The reverend divine might submit to the obligation, but he has\nno occasion to subscribe to the jest. If it is a jest that Mr. Bowles\nshould be a parson, and Lord Byron a peer, the world knew this before;\nthere was no need to write a pamphlet to prove it.\n\nThe _Don Juan_ indeed has great power; but its power is owing to the\nforce of the serious writing, and to the oddity of the contrast between\nthat and the flashy passages with which it is interlarded. From the\nsublime to the ridiculous there is but one step. You laugh and are\nsurprised that any one should turn round and _travestie_ himself: the\ndrollery is in the utter discontinuity of ideas and feelings. He makes\nvirtue serve as a foil to vice; _dandyism_ is (for want of any other) a\nvariety of genius. A classical intoxication is followed by the splashing\nof soda-water, by frothy effusions of ordinary bile. After the lightning\nand the hurricane, we are introduced to the interior of the cabin and\nthe contents of wash-hand basins. The solemn hero of tragedy plays\n_Scrub_ in the farce. This is \"very tolerable and not to be endured.\"\nThe Noble Lord is almost the only writer who has prostituted his talents\nin this way. He hallows in order to desecrate; takes a pleasure in\ndefacing the images of beauty his hands have wrought; and raises our\nhopes and our belief in goodness to Heaven only to dash them to the\nearth again, and break them in pieces the more effectually from the very\nheight they have fallen. Our enthusiasm for genius or virtue is thus\nturned into a jest by the very person who has kindled it, and who thus\nfatally quenches the sparks of both. It is not that Lord Byron is\nsometimes serious and sometimes trifling, sometimes profligate, and\nsometimes moral--but when he is most serious and most moral, he is only\npreparing to mortify the unsuspecting reader by putting a pitiful _hoax_\nupon him. This is a most unaccountable anomaly. It is as if the eagle\nwere to build its eyry in a common sewer, or the owl were seen soaring\nto the mid-day sun. Such a sight might make one laugh, but one would not\nwish or expect it to occur more than once![C]\n\nIn fact, Lord Byron is the spoiled child of fame as well as fortune.\nHe has taken a surfeit of popularity, and is not contented to delight,\nunless he can shock the public. He would force them to admire in spite\nof decency and common sense--he would have them read what they would\nread in no one but himself, or he would not give a rush for their\napplause. He is to be \"a chartered libertine,\" from whom insults are\nfavours, whose contempt is to be a new incentive to admiration. His\nLordship is hard to please: he is equally averse to notice or neglect,\nenraged at censure and scorning praise. He tries the patience of the\ntown to the very utmost, and when they shew signs of weariness or\ndisgust, threatens to _discard_ them. He says he will write on, whether\nhe is read or not. He would never write another page, if it were not\nto court popular applause, or to affect a superiority over it. In this\nrespect also, Lord Byron presents a striking contrast to Sir Walter\nScott. The latter takes what part of the public favour falls to his\nshare, without grumbling (to be sure he has no reason to complain) the\nformer is always quarrelling with the world about his _modicum_ of\napplause, the _spolia opima_ of vanity, and ungraciously throwing the\nofferings of incense heaped on his shrine back in the faces of his\nadmirers. Again, there is no taint in the writings of the Author of\nWaverley, all is fair and natural and _above-board:_ he never outrages\nthe public mind. He introduces no anomalous character: broaches no\nstaggering opinion. If he goes back to old prejudices and superstitions\nas a relief to the modern reader, while Lord Byron floats on swelling\nparadoxes--\n\n  \"Like proud seas under him;\"\n\nif the one defers too much to the spirit of antiquity, the other\npanders to the spirit of the age, goes to the very edge of extreme and\nlicentious speculation, and breaks his neck over it. Grossness and\nlevity are the playthings of his pen. It is a ludicrous circumstance\nthat he should have dedicated his _Cain_ to the worthy Baronet! Did the\nlatter ever acknowledge the obligation? We are not nice, not very nice;\nbut we do not particularly approve those subjects that shine chiefly\nfrom their rottenness: nor do we wish to see the Muses drest out in\nthe flounces of a false or questionable philosophy, like _Portia_ and\n_Nerissa_ in the garb of Doctors of Law. We like metaphysics as well as\nLord Byron; but not to see them making flowery speeches, nor dancing a\nmeasure in the fetters of verse. We have as good as hinted, that his\nLordship's poetry consists mostly of a tissue of superb common-places;\neven his paradoxes are _common-place_. They are familiar in the schools:\nthey are only new and striking in his dramas and stanzas, by being out\nof place. In a word, we think that poetry moves best within the circle\nof nature and received opinion: speculative theory and subtle casuistry\nare forbidden ground to it. But Lord Byron often wanders into this\nground wantonly, wilfully, and unwarrantably. The only apology we can\nconceive for the spirit of some of Lord Byron's writings, is the spirit\nof some of those opposed to him. They would provoke a man to write any\nthing. \"Farthest from them is best.\" The extravagance and license of the\none seems a proper antidote to the bigotry and narrowness of the other.\nThe first _Vision of Judgment_ was a set-off to the second, though\n\n  \"None but itself could be its parallel.\"\n\nPerhaps the chief cause of most of Lord Byron's errors is, that he is\nthat anomaly in letters and in society, a Noble Poet. It is a double\nprivilege, almost too much for humanity. He has all the pride of birth\nand genius. The strength of his imagination leads him to indulge in\nfantastic opinions; the elevation of his rank sets censure at defiance.\nHe becomes a pampered egotist. He has a seat in the House of Lords, a\nniche in the Temple of Fame. Every-day mortals, opinions, things are not\ngood enough for him to touch or think of. A mere nobleman is, in his\nestimation, but \"the tenth transmitter of a foolish face:\" a mere man of\ngenius is no better than a worm. His Muse is also a lady of quality.\nThe people are not polite enough for him: the Court not sufficiently\nintellectual. He hates the one and despises the other. By hating and\ndespising others, he does not learn to be satisfied with himself. A\nfastidious man soon grows querulous and splenetic. If there is nobody\nbut ourselves to come up to our idea of fancied perfection, we easily\nget tired of our idol. When a man is tired of what he is, by a natural\nperversity he sets up for what he is not. If he is a poet, he pretends\nto be a metaphysician: if he is a patrician in rank and feeling, he\nwould fain be one of the people. His ruling motive is not the love of\nthe people, but of distinction not of truth, but of singularity. He\npatronizes men of letters out of vanity, and deserts them from caprice,\nor from the advice of friends. He embarks in an obnoxious publication to\nprovoke censure, and leaves it to shift for itself for fear of scandal.\nWe do not like Sir Walter's gratuitous servility: we like Lord Byron's\npreposterous _liberalism_ little better. He may affect the principles of\nequality, but he resumes his privilege of peerage, upon occasion. His\nLordship has made great offers of service to the Greeks--money and\nhorses. He is at present in Cephalonia, waiting the event!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe had written thus far when news came of the death of Lord Byron, and\nput an end at once to a strain of somewhat peevish invective, which was\nintended to meet his eye, not to insult his memory. Had we known that we\nwere writing his epitaph, we must have done it with a different feeling.\nAs it is, we think it better and more like himself, to let what we had\nwritten stand, than to take up our leaden shafts, and try to melt them\ninto \"tears of sensibility,\" or mould them into dull praise, and an\naffected shew of candour. We were not silent during the author's\nlife-time, either for his reproof or encouragement (such us we\ncould give, and _he_ did not disdain to accept) nor can we now turn\nundertakers' men to fix the glittering plate upon his coffin, or fall\ninto the procession of popular woe.--Death cancels every thing but\ntruth; and strips a man of every thing but genius and virtue. It is a\nsort of natural canonization. It makes the meanest of us sacred--it\ninstalls the poet in his immortality, and lifts him to the skies. Death\nis the great assayer of the sterling ore of talent. At his touch the\ndrossy particles fall off, the irritable, the personal, the gross, and\nmingle with the dust--the finer and more ethereal part mounts with the\nwinged spirit to watch over our latest memory and protect our bones from\ninsult. We consign the least worthy qualities to oblivion, and cherish\nthe nobler and imperishable nature with double pride and fondness.\nNothing could shew the real superiority of genius in a more striking\npoint of view than the idle contests and the public indifference about\nthe place of Lord Byron's interment, whether in Westminster-Abbey or\nhis own family-vault. A king must have a coronation--a nobleman a\nfuneral-procession.--The man is nothing without the pageant. The poet's\ncemetery is the human mind, in which he sows the seeds of never ending\nthought--his monument is to be found in his works:\n\n  \"Nothing can cover his high fame but Heaven;\n  No pyramids set off his memory,\n  But the eternal substance of his greatness.\"\n\nLord Byron is dead: he also died a martyr to his zeal in the cause of\nfreedom, for the last, best hopes of man. Let that be his excuse and his\nepitaph!\n\n\n[Footnote A: This Essay was written just before Lord Byron's death.]\n\n[Footnote B:\n\n  \"Don Juan was my Moscow, and Faliero\n  My Leipsic, and my Mont St. Jean seems Cain,\"\n  _Don Juan_, Canto. XI.]\n\n[Footnote C: This censure applies to the first Cantos of DON JUAN much\nmore than to the last. It has been called a TRISTRAM SHANDY in rhyme: it\nis rather a poem written about itself.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. CAMPBELL AND MR. CRABBE.\n\n\n\n\"Mr. Campbell may be said to hold a place (among modern poets) between\nLord Byron and Mr. Rogers. With much of the glossy splendour, the\npointed vigour, and romantic interest of the one, he possesses the\nfastidious refinement, the classic elegance of the other. Mr. Rogers, as\na writer, is too effeminate, Lord Byron too extravagant: Mr. Campbell is\nneither. The author of the _Pleasures of Memory_ polishes his lines till\nthey sparkle with the most exquisite finish; he attenuates them into the\nutmost degree of trembling softness: but we may complain, in spite of\nthe delicacy and brilliancy of the execution, of a want of strength\nand solidity. The author of the _Pleasures of Hope_, with a richer and\ndeeper vein of thought and imagination, works it out into figures of\nequal grace and dazzling beauty, avoiding on the one hand the tinsel of\nflimsy affectation, and on the other the vices of a rude and barbarous\nnegligence. His Pegasus is not a rough, skittish colt, running wild\namong the mountains, covered with bur-docks and thistles, nor a tame,\nsleek pad, unable to get out of the same ambling pace, but a beautiful\n_manege_-horse, full of life and spirit in itself, and subject to the\ncomplete controul of the rider. Mr. Campbell gives scope to his feelings\nand his fancy, and embodies them in a noble and naturally interesting\nsubject; and he at the same time conceives himself called upon (in these\ndays of critical nicety) to pay the exactest attention to the expression\nof each thought, and to modulate each line into the most faultless\nharmony. The character of his mind is a lofty and self-scrutinising\nambition, that strives to reconcile the integrity of general design with\nthe perfect elaboration of each component part, that aims at striking\neffect, but is jealous of the means by which this is to be produced.\nOur poet is not averse to popularity (nay, he is tremblingly alive to\nit)--but self-respect is the primary law, the indispensable condition\non which it must be obtained. We should dread to point out (even if we\ncould) a false concord, a mixed metaphor, an imperfect rhyme in any of\nMr. Campbell's productions; for we think that all his fame would hardly\ncompensate to him for the discovery. He seeks for perfection, and\nnothing evidently short of it can satisfy his mind. He is a _high\nfinisher_ in poetry, whose every work must bear inspection, whose\nslightest touch is precious--not a coarse dauber who is contented to\nimpose on public wonder and credulity by some huge, ill-executed design,\nor who endeavours to wear out patience and opposition together by a load\nof lumbering, feeble, awkward, improgressive lines--on the contrary, Mr.\nCampbell labours to lend every grace of execution to his subject, while\nhe borrows his ardour and inspiration from it, and to deserve the\nlaurels he has earned, by true genius and by true pains. There is an\napparent consciousness of this in most of his writings. He has attained\nto great excellence by aiming at the greatest, by a cautious and yet\ndaring selection of topics, and by studiously (and with a religious\nhorror) avoiding all those faults which arise from grossness, vulgarity,\nhaste, and disregard of public opinion. He seizes on the highest point\nof eminence, and strives to keep it to himself--he \"snatches a grace\nbeyond the reach of art,\" and will not let it go--he steeps a single\nthought or image so deep in the Tyrian dyes of a gorgeous imagination,\nthat it throws its lustre over a whole page--every where vivid _ideal_\nforms hover (in intense conception) over the poet's verse, which\nascends, like the aloe, to the clouds, with pure flowers at its top. Or\nto take an humbler comparison (the pride of genius must sometimes stoop\nto the lowliness of criticism) Mr. Campbell's poetry often reminds us of\nthe purple gilliflower, both for its colour and its scent, its glowing\nwarmth, its rich, languid, sullen hue,\n\n  \"Yet sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,\n  Or Cytherea's breath!\"\n\nThere are those who complain of the little that Mr. Campbell has done\nin poetry, and who seem to insinuate that he is deterred by his own\nreputation from making any further or higher attempts. But after having\nproduced two poems that have gone to the heart of a nation, and are\ngifts to a world, he may surely linger out the rest of his life in a\ndream of immortality. There are moments in our lives so exquisite that\nall that remains of them afterwards seems useless and barren; and there\nare lines and stanzas in our author's early writings in which he may\nbe thought to have exhausted all the sweetness and all the essence of\npoetry, so that nothing farther was left to his efforts or his ambition.\nHappy is it for those few and fortunate worshippers of the Muse (not\na subject of grudging or envy to others) who already enjoy in their\nlife-time a foretaste of their future fame, who see their names\naccompanying them, like a cloud of glory, from youth to age,\n\n  \"And by the vision splendid,\n  Are on their way attended\"--\n\nand who know that they have built a shrine for the thoughts and\nfeelings, that were most dear to them, in the minds and memories\nof other men, till the language which they lisped in childhood is\nforgotten, or the human heart shall beat no more!\n\nThe _Pleasures of Hope_ alone would not have called forth these remarks\nfrom us; but there are passages in the _Gertrude of Wyoming_ of so rare\nand ripe a beauty, that they challenge, as they exceed all praise.\nSuch, for instance, is the following peerless description of Gertrude's\nchildhood:--\n\n  \"A loved bequest--and I may half impart\n  To those that feel the strong paternal tie,\n  How like a new existence in his heart\n  That living flow'r uprose beneath his eye,\n  Dear as she was, from cherub infancy,\n  From hours when she would round his garden play,\n  To time when as the ripening years went by,\n  Her lovely mind could culture well repay,\n  And more engaging grew from pleasing day to day.\n\n  \"I may not paint those thousand infant charms\n  (Unconscious fascination, undesign'd!)\n  The orison repeated in his arms,\n  For God to bless her sire and all mankind;\n  The book, the bosom on his knee reclined,\n  Or how sweet fairy-lore he heard her con\n  (The play-mate ere the teacher of her mind)\n  All uncompanion'd else her years had gone,\n  Till now in Gertrude's eyes their ninth blue summer shone.\n\n  \"And summer was the tide, and sweet the hour,\n  When sire and daughter saw, with fleet descent,\n  An Indian from his bark approach their bower,\n  Of buskin'd limb and swarthy lineament;\n  The red wild feathers on his brow were blent,\n  And bracelets bound the arm that help'd to light\n  A boy, who seem'd, as he beside him went,\n  Of Christian vesture and complexion bright,\n  Led by his dusty guide, like morning brought by night.\"\n\nIn the foregoing stanzas we particularly admire the line--\n\n  \"Till now in Gertrude's eyes their ninth blue summer shone.\"\n\nIt appears to us like the ecstatic union of natural beauty and poetic\nfancy, and in its playful sublimity resembles the azure canopy mirrored\nin the smiling waters, bright, liquid, serene, heavenly! A great outcry,\nwe know, has prevailed for some time past against poetic diction and\naffected conceits, and, to a certain degree, we go along with it; but\nthis must not prevent us from feeling the thrill of pleasure when we see\nbeauty linked to beauty, like kindred flame to flame, or from applauding\nthe voluptuous fancy that raises and adorns the fairy fabric of thought,\nthat nature has begun! Pleasure is \"scattered in stray-gifts o'er the\nearth\"--beauty streaks the \"famous poet's page\" in occasional lines of\ninconceivable brightness; and wherever this is the case, no splenetic\ncensures or \"jealous leer malign,\" no idle theories or cold indifference\nshould hinder us from greeting it with rapture.--There are other parts\nof this poem equally delightful, in which there is a light startling as\nthe red-bird's wing; a perfume like that of the magnolia; a music\nlike the murmuring of pathless woods or of the everlasting ocean. We\nconceive, however, that Mr. Campbell excels chiefly in sentiment and\nimagery. The story moves slow, and is mechanically conducted, and rather\nresembles a Scotch canal carried over lengthened aqueducts and with a\nnumber of _locks_ in it, than one of those rivers that sweep in their\nmajestic course, broad and full, over Transatlantic plains and lose\nthemselves in rolling gulfs, or thunder down lofty precipices. But in\nthe centre, the inmost recesses of our poet's heart, the pearly dew of\nsensibility is distilled and collects, like the diamond in the mine, and\nthe structure of his fame rests on the crystal columns of a polished\nimagination. We prefer the _Gertrude_ to the _Pleasures of Hope_,\nbecause with perhaps less brilliancy, there is more of tenderness and\nnatural imagery in the former. In the _Pleasures of Hope_ Mr. Campbell\nhad not completely emancipated himself from the trammels of the more\nartificial style of poetry--from epigram, and antithesis, and hyperbole.\nThe best line in it, in which earthly joys are said to be--\n\n  \"Like angels' visits, few and far between\"--\n\nis a borrowed one.[A] But in the Gertrude of Wyoming \"we perceive a\nsoftness coming over the heart of the author, and the scales and crust\nof formality that fence in his couplets and give them a somewhat\nglittering and rigid appearance, fall off,\" and he has succeeded in\nengrafting the wild and more expansive interest of the romantic school\nof poetry on classic elegance and precision. After the poem we have\njust named, Mr. Campbell's SONGS are the happiest efforts of his\nMuse:--breathing freshness, blushing like the morn, they seem, like\nclustering roses, to weave a chaplet for love and liberty; or their\nbleeding words gush out in mournful and hurried succession, like \"ruddy\ndrops that visit the sad heart\" of thoughtful Humanity. The _Battle of\nHohenlinden_ is of all modern compositions the most lyrical in spirit\nand in sound. To justify this encomium, we need only recall the lines to\nthe reader's memory.\n\n  \"On Linden, when the sun was low,\n  All bloodless lay th' untrodden snow,\n  And dark as winter was the flow\n  Of Iser, rolling rapidly.\n\n  But Linden saw another sight,\n  When the drum beat at dead of night,\n  Commanding fires of death to light\n  The darkness of her scenery.\n\n  By torch and trumpet fast array'd,\n  Each horseman drew his battle blade,\n  And furious every charger neigh'd,\n  To join the dreadful revelry.\n\n  Then shook the hills with thunder riv'n,\n  Then rush'd the steed to battle driv'n,\n  And louder than the bolts of heav'n\n  Far flash'd the red artillery.\n\n  But redder yet that light shall glow\n  On Linden's hills of stained snow,\n  And bloodier yet the torrent flow\n  Of Iser, rolling rapidly.\n\n  'Tis morn, but scarce yon level sun\n  Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling[B] dun,\n  Where furious Frank and fiery Hun\n  Shout in their sulph'rous canopy.\n\n  The combat deepens.  On, ye brave,\n  Who rush to glory, or the grave!\n  Wave, Munich! all thy banners wave!\n  And charge with all thy chivalry!\n\n  Few, few shall part, where many meet!\n  The snow shall be their winding-sheet,\n  And every turf beneath their feet\n  Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.\"\n\nMr. Campbell's prose-criticisms on contemporary and other poets (which\nhave appeared in the New Monthly Magazine) are in a style at once\nchaste, temperate, guarded, and just.\n\nMr. Crabbe presents an entire contrast to\n\nMr. Campbell:--the one is the most ambitious and aspiring of living\npoets, the other the most humble and prosaic. If the poetry of the one\nis like the arch of the rainbow, spanning and adorning the earth, that\nof the other is like a dull, leaden cloud hanging over it. Mr. Crabbe's\nstyle might be cited as an answer to Audrey's question--\"Is poetry\na true thing?\" There are here no ornaments, no flights of fancy, no\nillusions of sentiment, no tinsel of words. His song is one sad reality,\none unraised, unvaried note of unavailing woe. Literal fidelity serves\nhim in the place of invention; he assumes importance by a number of\npetty details; he rivets attention by being tedious. He not only deals\nin incessant matters of fact, but in matters of fact of the most\nfamiliar, the least animating, and the most unpleasant kind; but he\nrelies for the effect of novelty on the microscopic minuteness with\nwhich he dissects the most trivial objects--and for the interest he\nexcites, on the unshrinking determination with which he handles the most\npainful. His poetry has an official and professional air. He is called\nin to cases of difficult births, of fractured limbs, or breaches of the\npeace; and makes out a parochial list of accidents and offences. He\ntakes the most trite, the most gross and obvious and revolting part of\nnature, for the subject of his elaborate descriptions; but it is Nature\nstill, and Nature is a great and mighty Goddess! It is well for the\nReverend Author that it is so. Individuality is, in his theory, the only\ndefinition of poetry. Whatever _is_, he hitches into rhyme. Whoever\nmakes an exact image of any thing on the earth, however deformed or\ninsignificant, according to him, must succeed--and he himself has\nsucceeded. Mr. Crabbe is one of the most popular and admired of our\nliving authors. That he is so, can be accounted for on no other\nprinciple than the strong ties that bind us to the world about us, and\nour involuntary yearnings after whatever in any manner powerfully and\ndirectly reminds us of it. His Muse is not one of _the Daughters of\nMemory_, but the old toothless, mumbling dame herself, doling out the\ngossip and scandal of the neighbourhood, recounting _totidem verbis et\nliteris_, what happens in every place of the kingdom every hour in the\nyear, and fastening always on the worst as the most palatable morsels.\nBut she is a circumstantial old lady, communicative, scrupulous, leaving\nnothing to the imagination, harping on the smallest grievances, a\nvillage-oracle and critic, most veritable, most identical, bringing us\nacquainted with persons and things just as they chanced to exist, and\ngiving us a local interest in all she knows and tells. Mr. Crabbe's\nHelicon is choked up with weeds and corruption; it reflects no light\nfrom heaven, it emits no cheerful sound: no flowers of love, of hope,\nor joy spring up near it, or they bloom only to wither in a moment. Our\npoet's verse does not put a spirit of youth in every thing, but a spirit\nof fear, despondency, and decay: it is not an electric spark to kindle\nor expand, but acts like the torpedo's touch to deaden or contract. It\nlends no dazzling tints to fancy, it aids no soothing feelings in the\nheart, it gladdens no prospect, it stirs no wish; in its view the\ncurrent of life runs slow, dull, cold, dispirited, half under ground,\nmuddy, and clogged with all creeping things. The world is one vast\ninfirmary; the hill of Parnassus is a penitentiary, of which our author\nis the overseer: to read him is a penance, yet we read on! Mr. Crabbe,\nit must be confessed, is a repulsive writer. He contrives to \"turn\ndiseases to commodities,\" and makes a virtue of necessity. He puts us\nout of conceit with this world, which perhaps a severe divine should do;\nyet does not, as a charitable divine ought, point to another. His morbid\nfeelings droop and cling to the earth, grovel where they should soar;\nand throw a dead weight on every aspiration of the soul after the good\nor beautiful. By degrees we submit, and are reconciled to our fate, like\npatients to the physician, or prisoners in the condemned cell. We can\nonly explain this by saying, as we said before, that Mr. Crabbe gives\nus one part of nature, the mean, the little, the disgusting, the\ndistressing; that he does this thoroughly and like a master, and we\nforgive all the rest.\n\nMr. Crabbe's first poems were published so long ago as the year 1782,\nand received the approbation of Dr. Johnson only a little before he\ndied. This was a testimony from an enemy; for Dr. Johnson was not an\nadmirer of the simple in style or minute in description. Still he was an\nacute, strong-minded man, and could see truth when it was presented to\nhim, even through the mist of his prejudices and his foibles. There was\nsomething in Mr. Crabbe's intricate points that did not, after all, so\nill accord with the Doctor's purblind vision; and he knew quite\nenough of the petty ills of life to judge of the merit of our poet's\ndescriptions, though he himself chose to slur them over in high-sounding\ndogmas or general invectives. Mr. Crabbe's earliest poem of the\n_Village_ was recommended to the notice of Dr. Johnson by Sir Joshua\nReynolds; and we cannot help thinking that a taste for that sort of\npoetry, which leans for support on the truth and fidelity of its\nimitations of nature, began to display itself much about that time, and,\nin a good measure, in consequence of the direction of the public taste\nto the subject of painting. Book-learning, the accumulation of wordy\ncommon-places, the gaudy pretensions of poetical fiction, had enfeebled\nand perverted our eye for nature. The study of the fine arts, which came\ninto fashion about forty years ago, and was then first considered as a\npolite accomplishment, would tend imperceptibly to restore it. Painting\nis essentially an imitative art; it cannot subsist for a moment on empty\ngeneralities: the critic, therefore, who had been used to this sort of\nsubstantial entertainment, would be disposed to read poetry with the\neye of a connoisseur, would be little captivated with smooth, polished,\nunmeaning periods, and would turn with double eagerness and relish to\nthe force and precision of individual details, transferred, as it were,\nto the page from the canvas. Thus an admirer of Teniers or Hobbima\nmight think little of the pastoral sketches of Pope or Goldsmith; even\nThompson describes not so much the naked object as what he sees in his\nmind's eye, surrounded and glowing with the mild, bland, genial vapours\nof his brain:--but the adept in Dutch interiors, hovels, and pig-styes\nmust find in Mr. Crabbe a man after his own heart. He is the very thing\nitself; he paints in words, instead of colours: there is no other\ndifference. As Mr. Crabbe is not a painter, only because he does not use\na brush and colours, so he is for the most part a poet, only because\nhe writes in lines of ten syllables. All the rest might be found in a\nnewspaper, an old magazine, or a county-register. Our author is himself\na little jealous of the prudish fidelity of his homely Muse, and tries\nto justify himself by precedents. He brings as a parallel instance of\nmerely literal description, Pope's lines on the gay Duke of Buckingham,\nbeginning \"In the worst inn's worst room see Villiers lies!\" But surely\nnothing can be more dissimilar. Pope describes what is striking, Crabbe\nwould have described merely what was there. The objects in Pope stand\nout to the fancy from the mixture of the mean with the gaudy, from the\ncontrast of the scene and the character. There is an appeal to the\nimagination; you see what is passing in a poetical point of view. In\nCrabbe there is no foil, no contrast, no impulse given to the mind. It\nis all on a level and of a piece. In fact, there is so little connection\nbetween the subject-matter of Mr. Crabbe's lines and the ornament of\nrhyme which is tacked to them, that many of his verses read like serious\nburlesque, and the parodies which have been made upon them are hardly so\nquaint as the originals.\n\nMr. Crabbe's great fault is certainly that he is a sickly, a querulous,\na uniformly dissatisfied poet. He sings the country; and he sings it in\na pitiful tone. He chooses this subject only to take the charm out of\nit, and to dispel the illusion, the glory, and the dream, which had\nhovered over it in golden verse from Theocritus to Cowper. He sets out\nwith professing to overturn the theory which had hallowed a shepherd's\nlife, and made the names of grove and valley music to our ears, in order\nto give us truth in its stead; but why not lay aside the fool's cap and\nbells at once? Why not insist on the unwelcome reality in plain prose?\nIf our author is a poet, why trouble himself with statistics? If he is a\nstatistic writer, why set his ill news to harsh and grating verse? The\nphilosopher in painting the dark side of human nature may have reason\non his side, and a moral lesson or remedy in view. The tragic poet, who\nshews the sad vicissitudes of things and the disappointments of the\npassions, at least strengthens our yearnings after imaginary good, and\nlends wings to our desires, by which we, \"at one bound, high overleap\nall bound\" of actual suffering. But Mr. Crabbe does neither. He gives\nus discoloured paintings of life; helpless, repining, unprofitable,\nunedifying distress. He is not a philosopher, but a sophist, a\nmisanthrope in verse; a _namby-pamby_ Mandeville, a Malthus turned\nmetrical romancer. He professes historical fidelity; but his vein is not\ndramatic; nor does he give us the _pros_ and _cons_ of that versatile\ngipsey, Nature. He does not indulge his fancy, or sympathise with us, or\ntell us how the poor feel; but how he should feel in their situation,\nwhich we do not want to know. He does not weave the web of their lives\nof a mingled yarn, good and ill together, but clothes them all in the\nsame dingy linsey-woolsey, or tinges them with a green and yellow\nmelancholy. He blocks out all possibility of good, cancels the hope, or\neven the wish for it as a weakness; check-mates Tityrus and Virgil at\nthe game of pastoral cross-purposes, disables all his adversary's white\npieces, and leaves none but black ones on the board. The situation of a\ncountry clergyman is not necessarily favourable to the cultivation of\nthe Muse. He is set down, perhaps, as he thinks, in a small curacy for\nlife, and he takes his revenge by imprisoning the reader's imagination\nin luckless verse. Shut out from social converse, from learned colleges\nand halls, where he passed his youth, he has no cordial fellow-feeling\nwith the unlettered manners of the _Village_ or the _Borough_; and he\ndescribes his neighbours as more uncomfortable and discontented than\nhimself. All this while he dedicates successive volumes to rising\ngenerations of noble patrons; and while he desolates a line of coast\nwith sterile, blighting lines, the only leaf of his books where honour,\nbeauty, worth, or pleasure bloom, is that inscribed to the Rutland\nfamily! We might adduce instances of what we have said from every page\nof his works: let one suffice--\n\n  \"Thus by himself compelled to live each day,\n  To wait for certain hours the tide's delay;\n  At the same times the same dull views to see,\n  The bounding marsh-bank and the blighted tree;\n  The water only when the tides were high,\n  When low, the mud half-covered and half-dry;\n  The sun-burnt tar that blisters on the planks,\n  And bank-side stakes in their uneven ranks;\n  Heaps of entangled weeds that slowly float,\n  As the tide rolls by the impeded boat.\n  When tides were neap, and in the sultry day,\n  Through the tall bounding mud-banks made their way,\n  Which on each side rose swelling, and below\n  The dark warm flood ran silently and slow;\n  There anchoring, Peter chose from man to hide,\n  There hang his head, and view the lazy tide\n  In its hot slimy channel slowly glide;\n  Where the small eels, that left the deeper way\n  For the warm shore, within the shallows play;\n  Where gaping muscles, left upon the mud,\n  Slope their slow passage to the fall'n flood:\n  Here dull and hopeless he'd lie down and trace\n  How side-long crabs had crawled their crooked race;\n  Or sadly listen to the tuneless cry\n  Of fishing gull or clanging golden-eye;\n  What time the sea-birds to the marsh would come,\n  And the loud bittern, from the bull-rush home,\n  Gave from the salt ditch-side the bellowing boom:\n  He nursed the feelings these dull scenes produce\n  And loved to stop beside the opening sluice;\n  Where the small stream, confined in narrow bound,\n  Ran with a dull, unvaried, saddening sound;\n  Where all, presented to the eye or ear,\n  Oppressed the soul with misery, grief, and fear.\"\n\nThis is an exact _fac-simile_ of some of the most unlovely parts of the\ncreation. Indeed the whole of Mr. Crabbe's _Borough_, from which the\nabove passage is taken, is done so to the life, that it seems almost\nlike some sea-monster, crawled out of the neighbouring slime, and\nharbouring a breed of strange vermin, with a strong local scent of\ntar and bulge-water. Mr. Crabbe's _Tales_ are more readable than his\n_Poems_; but in proportion as the interest increases, they become more\noppressive. They turn, one and all, upon the same sort of teazing,\nhelpless, mechanical, unimaginative distress;--and though it is not\neasy to lay them down, you never wish to take them up again. Still in\nthis way, they are highly finished, striking, and original portraits,\nworked out with an eye to nature, and an intimate knowledge of the\nsmall and intricate folds of the human heart. Some of the best are\nthe _Confidant_, the story of _Silly Shore_, the _Young Poet_, the\n_Painter_. The episode of _Phoebe Dawson_ in the _Village_, is one of\nthe most tender and pensive; and the character of the methodist parson\nwho persecutes the sailor's widow with his godly, selfish love, is one\nof the most profound. In a word, if Mr. Crabbe's writings do not add\ngreatly to the store of entertaining and delightful fiction, yet they\nwill remain \"as a thorn in the side of poetry,\" perhaps for a century to\ncome!\n\n\n[Footnote A:\n\n  \"Like angels' visits, short and far between.\"--.\n  _Blair's Grave_.]\n\n[Footnote B: Is not this word, which occurs in the last line but one,\n(as well as before) an instance of that repetition, which we so often\nmeet with in the most correct and elegant writers?]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nSIR JAMES MACKINTOSH.\n\n\n\nThe subject of the present article is one of the ablest and most\naccomplished men of the age, both as a writer, a speaker, and a\nconverser. He is, in fact, master of almost every known topic, whether\nof a passing or of a more recondite nature. He has lived much in\nsociety, and is deeply conversant with books. He is a man of the\nworld and a scholar; but the scholar gives the tone to all his other\nacquirements and pursuits. Sir James is by education and habit, and we\nwere going to add, by the original turn of his mind, a college-man; and\nperhaps he would have passed his time most happily and respectably, had\nhe devoted himself entirely to that kind of life. The strength of his\nfaculties would have been best developed, his ambition would have met\nits proudest reward, in the accumulation and elaborate display of grave\nand useful knowledge. As it is, it may be said, that in company he talks\nwell, but too much; that in writing he overlays the original subject and\nspirit of the composition, by an appeal to authorities and by too formal\na method; that in public speaking the logician takes place of the\norator, and that he fails to give effect to a particular point or to\nurge an immediate advantage home upon his adversary from the enlarged\nscope of his mind, and the wide career he takes in the field of\nargument.\n\nTo consider him in the last point of view, first. As a political\npartisan, he is rather the lecturer than the advocate. He is able to\ninstruct and delight an impartial and disinterested audience by the\nextent of his information, by his acquaintance with general principles,\nby the clearness and aptitude of his illustrations, by vigour and\ncopiousness of style; but where he has a prejudiced or unfair antagonist\nto contend with, he is just as likely to put weapons into his enemy's\nhands as to wrest them from him, and his object seems to be rather to\ndeserve than to obtain success. The characteristics of his mind are\nretentiveness and comprehension, with facility of production: but he is\nnot equally remarkable for originality of view, or warmth of feeling, or\nliveliness of fancy. His eloquence is a little rhetorical; his reasoning\nchiefly logical: he can bring down the account of knowledge on a vast\nvariety of subjects to the present moment, he can embellish any cause he\nundertakes by the most approved and graceful ornaments, he can support\nit by a host of facts and examples, but he cannot advance it a step\nforward by placing it on a new and triumphant 'vantage-ground, nor\ncan he overwhelm and break down the artificial fences and bulwarks\nof sophistry by the irresistible tide of manly enthusiasm. Sir James\nMackintosh is an accomplished debater, rather than a powerful orator: he\nis distinguished more as a man of wonderful and variable talent than\nas a man of commanding intellect. His mode of treating a question is\ncritical, and not parliamentary. It has been formed in the closet and\nthe schools, and is hardly fitted for scenes of active life, or the\ncollisions of party-spirit. Sir James reasons on the square; while the\narguments of his opponents are loaded with iron or gold. He makes,\nindeed, a respectable ally, but not a very formidable opponent. He is as\nlikely, however, to prevail on a neutral, as he is almost certain to be\nbaffled on a hotly contested ground. On any question of general\npolicy or legislative improvement, the Member for Nairn is heard with\nadvantage, and his speeches are attended with effect: and he would have\nequal weight and influence at other times, if it were the object of the\nHouse to hear reason, as it is his aim to speak it. But on subjects of\npeace or war, of political rights or foreign interference, where the\nwaves of party run high, and the liberty of nations or the fate of\nmankind hangs trembling in the scales, though he probably displays equal\ntalent, and does full and heaped justice to the question (abstractedly\nspeaking, or if it were to be tried before an impartial assembly), yet\nwe confess we have seldom heard him, on such occasions, without pain for\nthe event. He did not slur his own character and pretensions, but he\ncompromised the argument. He spoke _the truth, the whole truth, and\nnothing but the truth_; but the House of Commons (we dare aver it) is\nnot the place where the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the\ntruth can be spoken with safety or with advantage. The judgment of the\nHouse is not a balance to weigh scruples and reasons to the turn of a\nfraction: another element, besides the love of truth, enters into the\ncomposition of their decisions, the reaction of which must be calculated\nupon and guarded against. If our philosophical statesman had to open the\ncase before a class of tyros, or a circle of grey-beards, who wished to\nform or to strengthen their judgments upon fair and rational grounds,\nnothing could be more satisfactory, more luminous, more able or more\ndecisive than the view taken of it by Sir James Mackintosh. But the\nHouse of Commons, as a collective body, have not the docility of youth,\nthe calm wisdom of age; and often only want an excuse to do wrong, or\nto adhere to what they have already determined upon; and Sir James,\nin detailing the inexhaustible stores of his memory and reading, in\nunfolding the wide range of his theory and practice, in laying down\nthe rules and the exceptions, in insisting upon the advantages and the\nobjections with equal explicitness, would be sure to let something drop\nthat a dextrous and watchful adversary would easily pick up and turn\nagainst him, if this were found necessary; or if with so many _pros_ and\n_cons_, doubts and difficulties, dilemmas and alternatives thrown into\nit, the scale, with its natural bias to interest and power, did not\nalready fly up and kick the beam. There wanted unity of purpose,\nimpetuosity of feeling to break through the phalanx of hostile and\ninveterate prejudice arrayed against him. He gave a handle to his\nenemies; threw stumbling-blocks in the way of his friends. He raised so\nmany objections for the sake of answering them, proposed so many doubts\nfor the sake of solving them, and made so many concessions where none\nwere demanded, that his reasoning had the effect of neutralizing itself;\nit became a mere exercise of the understanding without zest or spirit\nleft in it; and the provident engineer who was to shatter in pieces\nthe strong-holds of corruption and oppression, by a well-directed and\nunsparing discharge of artillery, seemed to have brought not only his\nown cannon-balls, but his own wool-packs along with him to ward off\nthe threatened mischief. This was a good deal the effect of his maiden\nspeech on the transfer of Genoa, to which Lord Castlereagh did not deign\nan answer, and which another Honourable Member called \"a _finical_\nspeech.\" It was a most able, candid, closely argued, and philosophical\nexposure of that unprincipled transaction; but for this very reason it\nwas a solecism in the place where it was delivered. Sir James has, since\nthis period, and with the help of practice, lowered himself to the tone\nof the House; and has also applied himself to questions more congenial\nto his habits of mind, and where the success would be more likely to be\nproportioned to his zeal and his exertions.\n\nThere was a greater degree of power, or of dashing and splendid effect\n(we wish we could add, an equally humane and liberal spirit) in the\n_Lectures on the Law of Nature and Nations_, formerly delivered by Sir\nJames (then Mr.) Mackintosh, in Lincoln's-Inn Hall. He shewed greater\nconfidence; was more at home there. The effect was more electrical and\ninstantaneous, and this elicited a prouder display of intellectual\nriches, and a more animated and imposing mode of delivery. He grew\nwanton with success. Dazzling others by the brilliancy of his\nacquirements, dazzled himself by the admiration they excited, he lost\nfear as well as prudence; dared every thing, carried every thing before\nhim. The Modern Philosophy, counterscarp, outworks, citadel, and all,\nfell without a blow, by \"the whiff and wind of his fell _doctrine_,\" as\nif it had been a pack of cards. The volcano of the French Revolution\nwas seen expiring in its own flames, like a bon-fire made of straw: the\nprinciples of Reform were scattered in all directions, like chaff before\nthe keen northern blast. He laid about him like one inspired; nothing\ncould withstand his envenomed tooth. Like some savage beast got into\nthe garden of the fabled Hesperides, he made clear work of it, root and\nbranch, with white, foaming tusks--\n\n  \"Laid waste the borders, and o'erthrew the bowers.\"\n\nThe havoc was amazing, the desolation was complete. As to our visionary\nsceptics and Utopian philosophers, they stood no chance with our\nlecturer--he did not \"carve them as a dish fit for the Gods, but hewed\nthem as a carcase fit for hounds.\" Poor Godwin, who had come, in the\n_bonhommie_ and candour of his nature, to hear what new light had broken\nin upon his old friend, was obliged to quit the field, and slunk away\nafter an exulting taunt thrown out at \"such fanciful chimeras as a\ngolden mountain or a perfect man.\" Mr. Mackintosh had something of the\nair, much of the dexterity and self-possession, of a political and\nphilosophical juggler; and an eager and admiring audience gaped and\ngreedily swallowed the gilded bait of sophistry, prepared for their\ncredulity and wonder. Those of us who attended day after day, and were\naccustomed to have all our previous notions confounded and struck out of\nour hands by some metaphysical legerdemain, were at last at some loss to\nknow _whether two and two made four_, till we had heard the lecturer's\nopinion on that head. He might have some mental reservation on the\nsubject, some pointed ridicule to pour upon the common supposition,\nsome learned authority to quote against it. To anticipate the line of\nargument he might pursue, was evidently presumptuous and premature. One\nthing only appeared certain, that whatever opinion he chose to take up,\nhe was able to make good either by the foils or the cudgels, by gross\nbanter or nice distinctions, by a well-timed mixture of paradox and\ncommon-place, by an appeal to vulgar prejudices or startling scepticism.\nIt seemed to be equally his object, or the tendency of his Discourses,\nto unsettle every principle of reason or of common sense, and to leave\nhis audience at the mercy of the _dictum_ of a lawyer, the nod of a\nminister, or the shout of a mob. To effect this purpose, he drew largely\non the learning of antiquity, on modern literature, on history, poetry,\nand the belles-lettres, on the Schoolmen and on writers of novels,\nFrench, English, and Italian. In mixing up the sparkling julep, that\nby its potent operation was to scour away the dregs and feculence and\npeccant humours of the body politic, he seemed to stand with his back\nto the drawers in a metaphysical dispensary, and to take out of them\nwhatever ingredients suited his purpose. In this way he had an antidote\nfor every error, an answer to every folly. The writings of Burke, Hume,\nBerkeley, Paley, Lord Bacon, Jeremy Taylor, Grotius, Puffendorf, Cicero,\nAristotle, Tacitus, Livy, Sully, Machiavel, Guicciardini, Thuanus, lay\nopen beside him, and he could instantly lay his hand upon the passage,\nand quote them chapter and verse to the clearing up of all difficulties,\nand the silencing of all oppugners. Mr. Mackintosh's Lectures were after\nall but a kind of philosophical centos. They were profound, brilliant,\nnew to his hearers; but the profundity, the brilliancy, the novelty were\nnot his own. He was like Dr. Pangloss (not Voltaire's, but Coleman's)\nwho speaks only in quotations; and the pith, the marrow of Sir James's\nreasoning and rhetoric at that memorable period might be put within\ninverted commas. It, however, served its purpose and the loud echo died\naway. We remember an excellent man and a sound critic[A] going to hear\none of these elaborate effusions; and on his want of enthusiasm being\naccounted for from its not being one of the orator's brilliant days, he\nreplied, \"he did not think a man of genius could speak for two hours\nwithout saying something by which he would have been electrified.\"\nWe are only sorry, at this distance of time, for one thing in these\nLectures--the tone and spirit in which they seemed to have been composed\nand to be delivered. If all that body of opinions and principles of\nwhich the orator read his recantation was unfounded, and there was an\nend of all those views and hopes that pointed to future improvement, it\nwas not a matter of triumph or exultation to the lecturer or any body\nelse, to the young or the old, the wise or the foolish; on the contrary,\nit was a subject of regret, of slow, reluctant, painful admission--\n\n  \"Of lamentation loud heard through the rueful air.\"\n\nThe immediate occasion of this sudden and violent change in Sir James's\nviews and opinions was attributed to a personal interview which he\nhad had a little before his death with Mr. Burke, at his house at\nBeaconsfield. In the latter end of the year 1796, appeared the _Regicide\nPeace_, from the pen of the great apostate from liberty and betrayer of\nhis species into the hands of those who claimed it as their property\nby divine right--a work imposing, solid in many respects, abounding in\nfacts and admirable reasoning, and in which all flashy ornaments were\nlaid aside for a testamentary gravity, (the eloquence of despair\nresembling the throes and heaving and muttered threats of an earthquake,\nrather than the loud thunder-bolt)--and soon after came out a criticism\non it in _The Monthly Review_, doing justice to the author and the\nstyle, and combating the inferences with force and at much length; but\nwith candour and with respect, amounting to deference. It was new to Mr.\nBurke not to be called names by persons of the opposite party; it was\nan additional triumph to him to be spoken well of, to be loaded with\nwell-earned praise by the author of the _Vindici\u00e6 Gallic\u00e6_. It was a\ntestimony from an old, a powerful, and an admired antagonist.[B] He sent\nan invitation to the writer to come and see him; and in the course of\nthree days' animated discussion of such subjects, Mr. Mackintosh became\na convert not merely to the graces and gravity of Mr. Burke's style, but\nto the liberality of his views, and the solidity of his opinions.--The\nLincoln's-Inn Lectures were the fruit of this interview: such is the\ninfluence exercised by men of genius and imaginative power over those\nwho have nothing to oppose to their unforeseen flashes of thought and\ninvention, but the dry, cold, formal deductions of the understanding.\nOur politician had time, during a few years of absence from his native\ncountry, and while the din of war and the cries of party-spirit \"were\nlost over a wide and unhearing ocean,\" to recover from his surprise and\nfrom a temporary alienation of mind; and to return in spirit, and in the\nmild and mellowed maturity of age, to the principles and attachments of\nhis early life.\n\nThe appointment of Sir James Mackintosh to a Judgeship in India was one,\nwhich, however flattering to his vanity or favourable to his interests,\nwas entirely foreign to his feelings and habits. It was an honourable\nexile. He was out of his element among black slaves and sepoys, and\nNabobs and cadets, and writers to India. He had no one to exchange ideas\nwith. The \"unbought grace of life,\" the charm of literary conversation\nwas gone. It was the habit of his mind, his ruling passion to enter into\nthe shock and conflict of opinions on philosophical, political, and\ncritical questions--not to dictate to raw tyros or domineer over persons\nin subordinate situations--but to obtain the guerdon and the laurels of\nsuperior sense and information by meeting with men of equal standing, to\nhave a fair field pitched, to argue, to distinguish, to reply, to\nhunt down the game of intellect with eagerness and skill, to push an\nadvantage, to cover a retreat, to give and take a fall--\n\n  \"And gladly would he learn, and gladly teach.\"\n\nIt is no wonder that this sort of friendly intellectual gladiatorship is\nSir James's greatest pleasure, for it is his peculiar _forte_. He has\nnot many equals, and scarcely any superior in it. He is too indolent for\nan author; too unimpassioned for an orator: but in society he is just\nvain enough to be pleased with immediate attention, good-humoured\nenough to listen with patience to others, with great coolness and\nself-possession, fluent, communicative, and with a manner equally free\nfrom violence and insipidity. Few subjects can be started, on which he\nis not qualified to appear to advantage as the gentleman and scholar. If\nthere is some tinge of pedantry, it is carried off by great affability\nof address and variety of amusing and interesting topics. There is\nscarce an author that he has not read; a period of history that he is\nnot conversant with; a celebrated name of which he has not a number of\nanecdotes to relate; an intricate question that he is not prepared\nto enter upon in a popular or scientific manner. If an opinion in an\nabstruse metaphysical author is referred to, he is probably able to\nrepeat the passage by heart, can tell the side of the page on which it\nis to be met with, can trace it back through various descents to Locke,\nHobbes, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, to a place in some obscure folio of\nthe School-men or a note in one of the commentators on Aristotle or\nPlato, and thus give you in a few moments' space, and without any effort\nor previous notice, a chronological table of the progress of the human\nmind in that particular branch of inquiry. There is something, we think,\nperfectly admirable and delightful in an exhibition of this kind, and\nwhich is equally creditable to the speaker and gratifying to the hearer.\nBut this kind of talent was of no use in India: the intellectual wares,\nof which the Chief Judge delighted to make a display, were in no request\nthere. He languished after the friends and the society he had left\nbehind; and wrote over incessantly for books from England. One that was\nsent him at this time was an _Essay on the Principles of Human Action_;\nand the way in which he spoke of that dry, tough, metaphysical\n_choke-pear_, shewed the dearth of intellectual intercourse in which he\nlived, and the craving in his mind after those studies which had once\nbeen his pride, and to which he still turned for consolation in his\nremote solitude.--Perhaps to another, the novelty of the scene, the\ndifferences of mind and manners might have atoned for a want of social\nand literary _agr\u00e8mens_: but Sir James is one of those who see nature\nthrough the spectacles of books. He might like to read an account of\nIndia; but India itself with its burning, shining face would be a mere\nblank, an endless waste to him. To persons of this class of mind things\nmust be translated into words, visible images into abstract propositions\nto meet their refined apprehensions, and they have no more to say to a\nmatter-of-fact staring them in the face without a label in its mouth,\nthan they would to a hippopotamus!--We may add, before we quit this\npoint, that we cannot conceive of any two persons more different in\ncolloquial talents, in which they both excel, than Sir James Mackintosh\nand Mr. Coleridge. They have nearly an equal range of reading and of\ntopics of conversation: but in the mind of the one we see nothing but\n_fixtures_, in the other every thing is fluid. The ideas of the one\nare as formal and tangible, as those of the other are shadowy and\nevanescent. Sir James Mackintosh walks over the ground, Mr. Coleridge is\nalways flying off from it. The first knows all that has been said upon\na subject; the last has something to say that was never said before. If\nthe one deals too much in learned _common-places_, the other teems with\nidle fancies. The one has a good deal of the _caput mortuum_ of genius,\nthe other is all volatile salt. The conversation of Sir James Mackintosh\nhas the effect of reading a well-written book, that of his friend\nis like hearing a bewildered dream. The one is an Encyclopedia of\nknowledge, the other is a succession of _Sybilline Leaves_!\n\nAs an author, Sir James Mackintosh may claim the foremost rank among\nthose who pride themselves on artificial ornaments and acquired\nlearning, or who write what may be termed a _composite_ style. His\n_Vindciae Gallicae_ is a work of great labour, great ingenuity, great\nbrilliancy, and great vigour. It is a little too antithetical in the\nstructure of its periods, too dogmatical in the announcement of its\nopinions. Sir James has, we believe, rejected something of the\n_false brilliant_ of the one, as he has retracted some of the abrupt\nextravagance of the other. We apprehend, however, that our author is not\none of those who draw from their own resources and accumulated feelings,\nor who improve with age. He belongs to a class (common in Scotland\nand elsewhere) who get up school-exercises on any given subject in\na masterly manner at twenty, and who at forty are either where they\nwere--or retrograde, if they are men of sense and modesty. The reason\nis, their vanity is weaned, after the first hey-day and animal spirits\nof youth are flown, from making an affected display of knowledge, which,\nhowever useful, is not their own, and may be much more simply stated;\nthey are tired of repeating the same arguments over and over again,\nafter having exhausted and rung the changes on their whole stock for a\nnumber of times. Sir James Mackintosh is understood to be a writer in\nthe Edinburgh Review; and the articles attributed to him there are full\nof matter of great pith and moment. But they want the trim, pointed\nexpression, the ambitious ornaments, the ostentatious display and rapid\nvolubility of his early productions. We have heard it objected to his\nlater compositions, that his style is good as far as single words and\nphrases are concerned, but that his sentences are clumsy and disjointed,\nand that these make up still more awkward and sprawling paragraphs. This\nis a nice criticism, and we cannot speak to its truth: but if the fact\nbe so, we think we can account for it from the texture and obvious\nprocess of the author's mind. All his ideas may be said to be given\npreconceptions. They do not arise, as it were, out of the subject, or\nout of one another at the moment, and therefore do not flow naturally\nand gracefully from one another. They have been laid down beforehand in\na sort of formal division or frame-work of the understanding; and the\nconnexion between the premises and the conclusion, between one branch\nof a subject and another, is made out in a bungling and unsatisfactory\nmanner. There is no principle of fusion in the work: he strikes after\nthe iron is cold, and there is a want of malleability in the style. Sir\nJames is at present said to be engaged in writing a _History of England_\nafter the downfall of the house of Stuart. May it be worthy of the\ntalents of the author, and of the principles of the period it is\nintended to illustrate!\n\n\n[Footnote A: The late Rev. Joseph Fawcett, of Walthamstow.]\n\n[Footnote B: At the time when the _Vindiciae Gallicae_ first made its\nappearance, as a reply to the _Reflections on the French Revolution_, it\nwas cried up by the partisans of the new school, as a work superior in\nthe charms of composition to its redoubted rival: in acuteness, depth,\nand soundness of reasoning, of course there was supposed to be no\ncomparison.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. WORDSWORTH.\n\n\n\nMr. Wordsworth's genius is a pure emanation of the Spirit of the Age.\nHad he lived in any other period of the world, he would never have been\nheard of. As it is, he has some difficulty to contend with the hebetude\nof his intellect, and the meanness of his subject. With him \"lowliness\nis young ambition's ladder:\" but he finds it a toil to climb in this way\nthe steep of Fame. His homely Muse can hardly raise her wing from the\nground, nor spread her hidden glories to the sun. He has \"no figures nor\nno fantasies, which busy _passion_ draws in the brains of men:\" neither\nthe gorgeous machinery of mythologic lore, nor the splendid colours of\npoetic diction. His style is vernacular: he delivers household truths.\nHe sees nothing loftier than human hopes; nothing deeper than the human\nheart. This he probes, this he tampers with, this he poises, with all\nits incalculable weight of thought and feeling, in his hands; and at the\nsame time calms the throbbing pulses of his own heart, by keeping his\neye ever fixed on the face of nature. If he can make the life-blood flow\nfrom the wounded breast, this is the living colouring with which he\npaints his verse: if he can assuage the pain or close up the wound with\nthe balm of solitary musing, or the healing power of plants and herbs\nand \"skyey influences,\" this is the sole triumph of his art. He takes\nthe simplest elements of nature and of the human mind, the mere abstract\nconditions inseparable from our being, and tries to compound a new\nsystem of poetry from them; and has perhaps succeeded as well as any one\ncould. \"_Nihil humani a me alienum puto_\"--is the motto of his works. He\nthinks nothing low or indifferent of which this can be affirmed: every\nthing that professes to be more than this, that is not an absolute\nessence of truth and feeling, he holds to be vitiated, false, and\nspurious. In a word, his poetry is founded on setting up an opposition\n(and pushing it to the utmost length) between the natural and the\nartificial: between the spirit of humanity, and the spirit of fashion\nand of the world!\n\nIt is one of the innovations of the time. It partakes of, and is carried\nalong with, the revolutionary movement of our age: the political changes\nof the day were the model on which he formed and conducted his poetical\nexperiments. His Muse (it cannot be denied, and without this we cannot\nexplain its character at all) is a levelling one. It proceeds on a\nprinciple of equality, and strives to reduce all things to the same\nstandard. It is distinguished by a proud humility. It relies upon its\nown resources, and disdains external shew and relief. It takes the\ncommonest events and objects, as a test to prove that nature is always\ninteresting from its inherent truth and beauty, without any of the\nornaments of dress or pomp of circumstances to set it off. Hence the\nunaccountable mixture of seeming simplicity and real abstruseness in the\n_Lyrical Ballads_. Fools have laughed at, wise men scarcely understand\nthem. He takes a subject or a story merely as pegs or loops to hang\nthought and feeling on; the incidents are trifling, in proportion to\nhis contempt for imposing appearances; the reflections are profound,\naccording to the gravity and the aspiring pretensions of his mind. His\npopular, inartificial style gets rid (at a blow) of all the trappings\nof verse, of all the high places of poetry: \"the cloud-capt towers, the\nsolemn temples, the gorgeous palaces,\" are swept to the ground, and\n\"like the baseless fabric of a vision, leave not a wreck behind.\"\nAll the traditions of learning, all the superstitions of age, are\nobliterated and effaced. We begin _de novo_, on a _tabula rasa_ of\npoetry. The purple pall, the nodding plume of tragedy are exploded as\nmere pantomime and trick, to return to the simplicity of truth and\nnature. Kings, queens, priests, nobles, the altar and the throne, the\ndistinctions of rank, birth, wealth, power, \"the judge's robe, the\nmarshall's truncheon, the ceremony that to great ones 'longs,\" are not\nto be found here. The author tramples on the pride of art with greater\npride. The Ode and Epode, the Strophe and the Antistrophe, he laughs to\nscorn. The harp of Homer, the trump of Pindar and of Alcaeus are still.\nThe decencies of costume, the decorations of vanity are stripped off\nwithout mercy as barbarous, idle, and Gothic. The jewels in the crisped\nhair, the diadem on the polished brow are thought meretricious,\ntheatrical, vulgar; and nothing contents his fastidious taste beyond\na simple garland of flowers. Neither does he avail himself of the\nadvantages which nature or accident holds out to him. He chooses to have\nhis subject a foil to his invention, to owe nothing but to himself. He\ngathers manna in the wilderness, he strikes the barren rock for the\ngushing moisture. He elevates the mean by the strength of his own\naspirations; he clothes the naked with beauty and grandeur from the\nstore of his own recollections. No cypress-grove loads his verse with\nperfumes: but his imagination lends a sense of joy\n\n  \"To the bare trees and mountains bare,\n  And grass in the green field.\"\n\nNo storm, no shipwreck startles us by its horrors: but the rainbow lifts\nits head in the cloud, and the breeze sighs through the withered fern.\nNo sad vicissitude of fate, no overwhelming catastrophe in nature\ndeforms his page: but the dew-drop glitters on the bending flower, the\ntear collects in the glistening eye.\n\n  \"Beneath the hills, along the flowery vales,\n  The generations are prepared; the pangs,\n  The internal pangs are ready; the dread strife\n  Of poor humanity's afflicted will,\n  Struggling in vain with ruthless destiny.\"\n\nAs the lark ascends from its low bed on fluttering wing, and salutes the\nmorning skies; so Mr. Wordsworth's unpretending Muse, in russet guise,\nscales the summits of reflection, while it makes the round earth its\nfootstool, and its home!\n\nPossibly a good deal of this may be regarded as the effect of\ndisappointed views and an inverted ambition. Prevented by native pride\nand indolence from climbing the ascent of learning or greatness, taught\nby political opinions to say to the vain pomp and glory of the world, \"I\nhate ye,\" seeing the path of classical and artificial poetry blocked up\nby the cumbrous ornaments of style and turgid _common-places_, so\nthat nothing more could be achieved in that direction but by the most\nridiculous bombast or the tamest servility; he has turned back partly\nfrom the bias of his mind, partly perhaps from a judicious policy--has\nstruck into the sequestered vale of humble life, sought out the Muse\namong sheep-cotes and hamlets and the peasant's mountain-haunts, has\ndiscarded all the tinsel pageantry of verse, and endeavoured (not in\nvain) to aggrandise the trivial and add the charm of novelty to the\nfamiliar. No one has shewn the same imagination in raising trifles into\nimportance: no one has displayed the same pathos in treating of the\nsimplest feelings of the heart. Reserved, yet haughty, having no unruly\nor violent passions, (or those passions having been early suppressed,)\nMr. Wordsworth has passed his life in solitary musing, or in daily\nconverse with the face of nature. He exemplifies in an eminent degree\nthe power of _association_; for his poetry has no other source or\ncharacter. He has dwelt among pastoral scenes, till each object has\nbecome connected with a thousand feelings, a link in the chain of\nthought, a fibre of his own heart. Every one is by habit and familiarity\nstrongly attached to the place of his birth, or to objects that recal\nthe most pleasing and eventful circumstances of his life. But to the\nauthor of the _Lyrical Ballads_, nature is a kind of home; and he may be\nsaid to take a personal interest in the universe. There is no image so\ninsignificant that it has not in some mood or other found the way into\nhis heart: no sound that does not awaken the memory of other years.--\n\n  \"To him the meanest flower that blows can give\n  Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.\"\n\nThe daisy looks up to him with sparkling eye as an old acquaintance:\nthe cuckoo haunts him with sounds of early youth not to be expressed: a\nlinnet's nest startles him with boyish delight: an old withered thorn is\nweighed down with a heap of recollections: a grey cloak, seen on some\nwild moor, torn by the wind, or drenched in the rain, afterwards becomes\nan object of imagination to him: even the lichens on the rock have a\nlife and being in his thoughts. He has described all these objects in a\nway and with an intensity of feeling that no one else had done before\nhim, and has given a new view or aspect of nature. He is in this sense\nthe most original poet now living, and the one whose writings could the\nleast be spared: for they have no substitute elsewhere. The vulgar do\nnot read them, the learned, who see all things through books, do not\nunderstand them, the great despise, the fashionable may ridicule them:\nbut the author has created himself an interest in the heart of the\nretired and lonely student of nature, which can never die. Persons\nof this class will still continue to feel what he has felt: he has\nexpressed what they might in vain wish to express, except with\nglistening eye and faultering tongue! There is a lofty philosophic tone,\na thoughtful humanity, infused into his pastoral vein. Remote from the\npassions and events of the great world, he has communicated interest and\ndignity to the primal movements of the heart of man, and ingrafted his\nown conscious reflections on the casual thoughts of hinds and shepherds.\nNursed amidst the grandeur of mountain scenery, he has stooped to have\na nearer view of the daisy under his feet, or plucked a branch of\nwhite-thorn from the spray: but in describing it, his mind seems imbued\nwith the majesty and solemnity of the objects around him--the tall rock\nlifts its head in the erectness of his spirit; the cataract roars in the\nsound of his verse; and in its dim and mysterious meaning, the mists\nseem to gather in the hollows of Helvellyn, and the forked Skiddaw\nhovers in the distance. There is little mention of mountainous scenery\nin Mr. Wordsworth's poetry; but by internal evidence one might be almost\nsure that it was written in a mountainous country, from its bareness,\nits simplicity, its loftiness and its depth!\n\nHis later philosophic productions have a somewhat different character.\nThey are a departure from, a dereliction of his first principles. They\nare classical and courtly. They are polished in style, without being\ngaudy; dignified in subject, without affectation. They seem to have\nbeen composed not in a cottage at Grasmere, but among the half-inspired\ngroves and stately recollections of Cole-Orton. We might allude in\nparticular, for examples of what we mean, to the lines on a Picture by\nClaude Lorraine, and to the exquisite poem, entitled _Laodamia_. The\nlast of these breathes the pure spirit of the finest fragments of\nantiquity--the sweetness, the gravity, the strength, the beauty and the\nlangour of death--\n\n  \"Calm contemplation and majestic pains.\"\n\nIts glossy brilliancy arises from the perfection of the finishing, like\nthat of careful sculpture, not from gaudy colouring--the texture of the\nthoughts has the smoothness and solidity of marble. It is a poem that\nmight be read aloud in Elysium, and the spirits of departed heroes and\nsages would gather round to listen to it! Mr. Wordsworth's philosophic\npoetry, with a less glowing aspect and less tumult in the veins than\nLord Byron's on similar occasions, bends a calmer and keener eye\non mortality; the impression, if less vivid, is more pleasing and\npermanent; and we confess it (perhaps it is a want of taste and proper\nfeeling) that there are lines and poems of our author's, that we think\nof ten times for once that we recur to any of Lord Byron's. Or if there\nare any of the latter's writings, that we can dwell upon in the same\nway, that is, as lasting and heart-felt sentiments, it is when laying\naside his usual pomp and pretension, he descends with Mr. Wordsworth to\nthe common ground of a disinterested humanity. It may be considered\nas characteristic of our poet's writings, that they either make no\nimpression on the mind at all, seem mere _nonsense-verses_, or that they\nleave a mark behind them that never wears out. They either\n\n  \"Fall blunted from the indurated breast\"--\n\nwithout any perceptible result, or they absorb it like a passion. To\none class of readers he appears sublime, to another (and we fear the\nlargest) ridiculous. He has probably realised Milton's wish,--\"and fit\naudience found, though few:\" but we suspect he is not reconciled to the\nalternative. There are delightful passages in the EXCURSION, both of\nnatural description and of inspired reflection (passages of the latter\nkind that in the sound of the thoughts and of the swelling language\nresemble heavenly symphonies, mournful _requiems_ over the grave of\nhuman hopes); but we must add, in justice and in sincerity, that we\nthink it impossible that this work should ever become popular, even in\nthe same degree as the _Lyrical Ballads_. It affects a system without\nhaving any intelligible clue to one; and instead of unfolding a\nprinciple in various and striking lights, repeats the same conclusions\ntill they become flat and insipid. Mr. Wordsworth's mind is obtuse,\nexcept as it is the organ and the receptacle of accumulated feelings:\nit is not analytic, but synthetic; it is reflecting, rather than\ntheoretical. The EXCURSION, we believe, fell stillborn from the press.\nThere was something abortive, and clumsy, and ill-judged in the attempt.\nIt was long and laboured. The personages, for the most part, were low,\nthe fare rustic: the plan raised expectations which were not fulfilled,\nand the effect was like being ushered into a stately hall and invited\nto sit down to a splendid banquet in the company of clowns, and with\nnothing but successive courses of apple-dumplings served up. It was not\neven _toujours perdrix_!\n\nMr. Wordsworth, in his person, is above the middle size, with marked\nfeatures, and an air somewhat stately and Quixotic. He reminds one of\nsome of Holbein's heads, grave, saturnine, with a slight indication of\nsly humour, kept under by the manners of the age or by the pretensions\nof the person. He has a peculiar sweetness in his smile, and great depth\nand manliness and a rugged harmony, in the tones of his voice. His\nmanner of reading his own poetry is particularly imposing; and in his\nfavourite passages his eye beams with preternatural lustre, and the\nmeaning labours slowly up from his swelling breast. No one who has seen\nhim at these moments could go away with an impression that he was a \"man\nof no mark or likelihood.\" Perhaps the comment of his face and voice is\nnecessary to convey a full idea of his poetry. His language may not be\nintelligible, but his manner is not to be mistaken. It is clear that\nhe is either mad or inspired. In company, even in a _t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eate_, Mr.\nWordsworth is often silent, indolent, and reserved. If he is become\nverbose and oracular of late years, he was not so in his better days.\nHe threw out a bold or an indifferent remark without either effort or\npretension, and relapsed into musing again. He shone most (because he\nseemed most roused and animated) in reciting his own poetry, or in\ntalking about it. He sometimes gave striking views of his feelings and\ntrains of association in composing certain passages; or if one did\nnot always understand his distinctions, still there was no want of\ninterest--there was a latent meaning worth inquiring into, like a vein\nof ore that one Cannot exactly hit upon at the moment, but of which\nthere are sure indications. His standard of poetry is high and severe,\nalmost to exclusiveness. He admits of nothing below, scarcely of any\nthing above himself. It is fine to hear him talk of the way in which\ncertain subjects should have been treated by eminent poets, according to\nhis notions of the art. Thus he finds fault with Dryden's description of\nBacchus in the _Alexander's Feast_, as if he were a mere good-looking\nyouth, or boon companion--\n\n  \"Flushed with a purple grace,\n  He shews his honest face\"--\n\ninstead of representing the God returning from the conquest of India,\ncrowned with vine-leaves, and drawn by panthers, and followed by troops\nof satyrs, of wild men and animals that he had tamed. You would thank,\nin hearing him speak on this subject, that you saw Titian's picture of\nthe meeting of _Bacchus and Ariadne_--so classic were his conceptions,\nso glowing his style. Milton is his great idol, and he sometimes dares\nto compare himself with him. His Sonnets, indeed, have something of the\nsame high-raised tone and prophetic spirit. Chaucer is another prime\nfavourite of his, and he has been at the pains to modernise some of the\nCanterbury Tales. Those persons who look upon Mr. Wordsworth as a merely\npuerile writer, must be rather at a loss to account for his strong\npredilection for such geniuses as Dante and Michael Angelo. We do not\nthink our author has any very cordial sympathy with Shakespear. How\nshould he? Shakespear was the least of an egotist of any body in the\nworld. He does not much relish the variety and scope of dramatic\ncomposition. \"He hates those interlocutions between Lucius and Caius.\"\nYet Mr. Wordsworth himself wrote a tragedy when he was young; and we\nhave heard the following energetic lines quoted from it, as put into the\nmouth of a person smit with remorse for some rash crime:\n\n ----\"Action is momentary,\n  The motion of a muscle this way or that;\n  Suffering is long, obscure, and infinite!\"\n\nPerhaps for want of light and shade, and the unshackled spirit of the\ndrama, this performance was never brought forward. Our critic has a\ngreat dislike to Gray, and a fondness for Thomson and Collins. It is\nmortifying to hear him speak of Pope and Dryden, whom, because they have\nbeen supposed to have all the possible excellences of poetry, he will\nallow to have none. Nothing, however, can be fairer, or more amusing,\nthan the way in which he sometimes exposes the unmeaning verbiage of\nmodern poetry. Thus, in the beginning of Dr. Johnson's _Vanity of Human\nWishes_--\n\n  \"Let observation with extensive view\n  Survey mankind from China to Peru\"--\n\nhe says there is a total want of imagination accompanying the words,\nthe same idea is repeated three times under the disguise of a different\nphraseology: it comes to this--\"let _observation_, with extensive\n_observation, observe_ mankind;\" or take away the first line, and the\nsecond,\n\n  \"Survey mankind from China to Peru,\"\n\nliterally conveys the whole. Mr. Wordsworth is, we must say, a perfect\nDrawcansir as to prose writers. He complains of the dry reasoners and\nmatter-of-fact people for their want of _passion_; and he is jealous of\nthe rhetorical declaimers and rhapsodists as trenching on the province\nof poetry. He condemns all French writers (as well of poetry as prose)\nin the lump. His list in this way is indeed small. He approves of\nWalton's Angler, Paley, and some other writers of an inoffensive modesty\nof pretension. He also likes books of voyages and travels, and Robinson\nCrusoe. In art, he greatly esteems Bewick's wood-cuts, and Waterloo's\nsylvan etchings. But he sometimes takes a higher tone, and gives his\nmind fair play. We have known him enlarge with a noble intelligence and\nenthusiasm on Nicolas Poussin's fine landscape-compositions, pointing\nout the unity of design that pervades them, the superintending mind,\nthe imaginative principle that brings all to bear on the same end;\nand declaring he would not give a rush for any landscape that did not\nexpress the time of day, the climate, the period of the world it was\nmeant to illustrate, or had not this character of _wholeness_ in it. His\neye also does justice to Rembrandt's fine and masterly effects. In the\nway in which that artist works something out of nothing, and transforms\nthe stump of a tree, a common figure into an _ideal_ object, by the\ngorgeous light and shade thrown upon it, he perceives an analogy to his\nown mode of investing the minute details of nature with an atmosphere\nof sentiment; and in pronouncing Rembrandt to be a man of genius, feels\nthat he strengthens his own claim to the title. It has been said of\nMr. Wordsworth, that \"he hates conchology, that he hates the Venus of\nMedicis.\" But these, we hope, are mere epigrams and _jeux-d'esprit_, as\nfar from truth as they are free from malice; a sort of running satire or\ncritical clenches--\n\n  \"Where one for sense and one for rhyme\n  Is quite sufficient at one time.\"\n\nWe think, however, that if Mr. Wordsworth had been a more liberal and\ncandid critic, he would have been a more sterling writer. If a greater\nnumber of sources of pleasure had been open to him, he would have\ncommunicated pleasure to the world more frequently. Had he been less\nfastidious in pronouncing sentence on the works of others, his own would\nhave been received more favourably, and treated more leniently.\nThe current of his feelings is deep, but narrow; the range of his\nunderstanding is lofty and aspiring rather than discursive. The force,\nthe originality, the absolute truth and identity with which he feels\nsome things, makes him indifferent to so many others. The simplicity and\nenthusiasm of his feelings, with respect to nature, renders him bigotted\nand intolerant in his judgments of men and things. But it happens to\nhim, as to others, that his strength lies in his weakness; and perhaps\nwe have no right to complain. We might get rid of the cynic and the\negotist, and find in his stead a common-place man. We should \"take the\ngood the Gods provide us:\" a fine and original vein of poetry is not\none of their most contemptible gifts, and the rest is scarcely worth\nthinking of, except as it may be a mortification to those who expect\nperfection from human nature; or who have been idle enough at some\nperiod of their lives, to deify men of genius as possessing claims above\nit. But this is a chord that jars, and we shall not dwell upon it.\n\nLord Byron we have called, according to the old proverb, \"the spoiled\nchild of fortune:\" Mr. Wordsworth might plead, in mitigation of some\npeculiarities, that he is \"the spoiled child of disappointment.\" We are\nconvinced, if he had been early a popular poet, he would have borne his\nhonours meekly, and would have been a person of great _bonhommie_ and\nfrankness of disposition. But the sense of injustice and of undeserved\nridicule sours the temper and narrows the views. To have produced works\nof genius, and to find them neglected or treated with scorn, is one of\nthe heaviest trials of human patience. We exaggerate our own merits when\nthey are denied by others, and are apt to grudge and cavil at every\nparticle of praise bestowed on those to whom we feel a conscious\nsuperiority. In mere self-defence we turn against the world, when it\nturns against us; brood over the undeserved slights we receive; and thus\nthe genial current of the soul is stopped, or vents itself in effusions\nof petulance and self-conceit. Mr. Wordsworth has thought too much of\ncontemporary critics and criticism; and less than he ought of the award\nof posterity, and of the opinion, we do not say of private friends, but\nof those who were made so by their admiration of his genius. He did not\ncourt popularity by a conformity to established models, and he ought\nnot to have been surprised that his originality was not understood as a\nmatter of course. He has _gnawed too much on the bridle_; and has often\nthrown out crusts to the critics, in mere defiance or as a point of\nhonour when he was challenged, which otherwise his own good sense would\nhave withheld. We suspect that Mr. Wordsworth's feelings are a little\nmorbid in this respect, or that he resents censure more than he is\ngratified by praise. Otherwise, the tide has turned much in his favour\nof late years--he has a large body of determined partisans--and is at\npresent sufficiently in request with the public to save or relieve him\nfrom the last necessity to which a man of genius can be reduced--that\nof becoming the God of his own idolatry!\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. MALTHUS.\n\n\n\nMr. Malthus may be considered as one of those rare and fortunate writers\nwho have attained a _scientific_ reputation in questions of moral and\npolitical philosophy. His name undoubtedly stands very high in the\npresent age, and will in all probability go down to posterity with more\nor less of renown or obloquy. It was said by a person well qualified\nto judge both from strength and candour of mind, that \"it would take\na thousand years at least to answer his work on Population.\" He has\ncertainly thrown a new light on that question, and changed the aspect of\npolitical economy in a decided and material point of view--whether he\nhas not also endeavoured to spread a gloom over the hopes and more\nsanguine speculations of man, and to cast a slur upon the face of\nnature, is another question. There is this to be said for Mr. Malthus,\nthat in speaking of him, one knows what one is talking about. He is\nsomething beyond a mere name--one has not to _beat the bush_ about his\ntalents, his attainments, his vast reputation, and leave off without\nknowing what it all amounts to--he is not one of those great men, who\nset themselves off and strut and fret an hour upon the stage, during a\nday-dream of popularity, with the ornaments and jewels borrowed from the\ncommon stock, to which nothing but their vanity and presumption gives\nthem the least individual claim--he has dug into the mine of truth, and\nbrought up ore mixed with dross! In weighing his merits we come at once\nto the question of what he has done or failed to do. It is a specific\nclaim that he sets up. When we speak of Mr. Malthus, we mean the _Essay\non Population_; and when we mention the Essay on Population, we mean\na distinct leading proposition, that stands out intelligibly from all\ntrashy pretence, and is a ground on which to fix the levers that may\nmove the world, backwards or forwards. He has not left opinion where\nhe found it; he has advanced or given it a wrong bias, or thrown a\nstumbling-block in its way. In a word, his name is not stuck, like so\nmany others, in the firmament of reputation, nobody knows why, inscribed\nin great letters, and with a transparency of TALENTS, GENIUS, LEARNING\nblazing round it--it is tantamount to an idea, it is identified with\na principle, it means that _the population cannot go on perpetually\nincreasing without pressing on the limits of the means of subsistence,\nand that a check of some kind or other must, sooner or later, be opposed\nto it_. This is the essence of the doctrine which Mr. Malthus has been\nthe first to bring into general notice, and as we think, to establish\nbeyond the fear of contradiction. Admitting then as we do the prominence\nand the value of his claims to public attention, it yet remains a\nquestion, how far those claims are (as to the talent displayed in them)\nstrictly original; how far (as to the logical accuracy with which he has\ntreated the subject) he has introduced foreign and doubtful matter\ninto it; and how far (as to the spirit in which he has conducted his\ninquiries, and applied a general principle to particular objects) he has\nonly drawn fair and inevitable conclusions from it, or endeavoured to\ntamper with and wrest it to sinister and servile purposes. A writer who\nshrinks from following up a well-founded principle into its untoward\nconsequences from timidity or false delicacy, is not worthy of the\nname of a philosopher: a writer who assumes the garb of candour and an\ninflexible love of truth to garble and pervert it, to crouch to power\nand pander to prejudice, deserves a worse title than that of a sophist!\n\nMr. Malthus's first octavo volume on this subject (published in the year\n1798) was intended as an answer to Mr. Godwin's _Enquiry concerning\nPolitical Justice_. It was well got up for the purpose, and had an\nimmediate effect. It was what in the language of the ring is called _a\nfacer_. It made Mr. Godwin and the other advocates of Modern Philosophy\nlook about them. It may be almost doubted whether Mr. Malthus was in the\nfirst instance serious in many things that he threw out, or whether he\ndid not hazard the whole as an amusing and extreme paradox, which might\npuzzle the reader as it had done himself in an idle moment, but to which\nno practical consequence whatever could attach. This state of mind would\nprobably continue till the irritation of enemies and the encouragement\nof friends convinced him that what he had at first exhibited as an idle\nfancy was in fact a very valuable discovery, or \"like the toad ugly and\nvenomous, had yet a precious jewel in its head.\" Such a supposition\nwould at least account for some things in the original Essay, which\nscarcely any writer would venture upon, except as professed exercises of\ningenuity, and which have been since in part retracted. But a wrong\nbias was thus given, and the author's theory was thus rendered warped,\ndisjointed, and sophistical from the very outset.\n\nNothing could in fact be more illogical (not to say absurd) than the\nwhole of Mr. Malthus's reasoning applied as an answer (_par excellence_)\nto Mr. Godwin's book, or to the theories of other Utopian philosophers.\nMr. Godwin was not singular, but was kept in countenance by many\nauthorities, both ancient and modern, in supposing a state of society\npossible in which the passions and wills of individuals would be\nconformed to the general good, in which the knowledge of the best means\nof promoting human welfare and the desire of contributing to it\nwould banish vice and misery from the world, and in which, the\nstumbling-blocks of ignorance, of selfishness, and the indulgence of\ngross appetite being removed, all things would move on by the mere\nimpulse of wisdom and virtue, to still higher and higher degrees of\nperfection and happiness. Compared with the lamentable and gross\ndeficiencies of existing institutions, such a view of futurity as barely\npossible could not fail to allure the gaze and tempt the aspiring\nthoughts of the philanthropist and the philosopher: the hopes and the\nimaginations of speculative men could not but rush forward into this\nideal world as into a _vacuum_ of good; and from \"the mighty stream of\ntendency\" (as Mr. Wordsworth in the cant of the day calls it,) there was\ndanger that the proud monuments of time-hallowed institutions, that the\nstrong-holds of power and corruption, that \"the Corinthian capitals of\npolished society,\" with the base and pediments, might be overthrown\nand swept away as by a hurricane. There were not wanting persons whose\nignorance, whose fears, whose pride, or whose prejudices contemplated\nsuch an alternative with horror; and who would naturally feel no small\nobligation to the man who should relieve their apprehensions from the\nstunning roar of this mighty change of opinion that thundered at a\ndistance, and should be able, by some logical apparatus or unexpected\nturn of the argument, to prevent the vessel of the state from being\nhurried forward with the progress of improvement, and dashed in pieces\ndown the tremendous precipice of human perfectibility. Then comes Mr.\nMalthus forward with the geometrical and arithmetical ratios in his\nhands, and holds them out to his affrighted contemporaries as the only\nmeans of salvation. \"For\" (so argued the author of the Essay) \"let the\nprinciples of Mr. Godwin's Enquiry and of other similar works be carried\nliterally and completely into effect; let every corruption and abuse of\npower be entirely got rid of; let virtue, knowledge, and civilization\nbe advanced to the greatest height that these visionary reformers would\nsuppose; let the passions and appetites be subjected to the utmost\ncontrol of reason and influence of public opinion: grant them, in\na word, all that they ask, and the more completely their views are\nrealized, the sooner will they be overthrown again, and the more\ninevitable and fatal will be the catastrophe. For the principle of\npopulation will still prevail, and from the comfort, ease, and plenty\nthat will abound, will receive an increasing force and _impetus_; the\nnumber of mouths to be fed will have no limit, but the food that is to\nsupply them cannot keep pace with the demand for it; we must come to a\nstop somewhere, even though each square yard, by extreme improvements in\ncultivation, could maintain its man: in this state of things there\nwill be no remedy, the wholesome checks of vice and misery (which have\nhitherto kept this principle within bounds) will have been done away;\nthe voice of reason will be unheard; the passions only will bear\nsway; famine, distress, havoc, and dismay will spread around; hatred,\nviolence, war, and bloodshed will be the infallible consequence, and\nfrom the pinnacle of happiness, peace, refinement, and social advantage,\nwe shall be hurled once more into a profounder abyss of misery, want,\nand barbarism than ever, by the sole operation of the principle of\npopulation!\"--Such is a brief abstract of the argument of the Essay.\nCan any thing be less conclusive, a more complete fallacy and _petitio\nprincipii_? Mr. Malthus concedes, he assumes a state of perfectibility,\nsuch as his opponents imagined, in which the general good is to obtain\nthe entire mastery of individual interests, and reason of gross\nappetites and passions; and then he argues that such a perfect structure\nof society will fall by its own weight, or rather be undermined by the\nprinciple of population, because in the highest possible state of the\nsubjugation of the passions to reason, they will be absolutely lawless\nand unchecked, and because as men become enlightened, quick sighted\nand public-spirited, they will shew themselves utterly blind to the\nconsequences of their actions, utterly indifferent to their own\nwell-being and that of all succeeding generations, whose fate is placed\nin their hands. This we conceive to be the boldest paralogism that ever\nwas offered to the world, or palmed upon willing credulity. Against\nwhatever other scheme of reform this objection might be valid, the\none it was brought expressly to overturn was impregnable against it,\ninvulnerable to its slightest graze. Say that the Utopian reasoners are\nvisionaries, unfounded; that the state of virtue and knowledge they\nsuppose, in which reason shall have become all-in-all, can never take\nplace, that it is inconsistent with the nature of man and with all\nexperience, well and good--but to say that society will have attained\nthis high and \"palmy state,\" that reason will have become the master-\nkey to all our motives, and that when arrived at its greatest power it\nwill cease to act at all, but will fall down dead, inert, and senseless\nbefore the principle of population, is an opinion which one would\nthink few people would choose to advance or assent to, without strong\ninducements for maintaining or believing it.\n\nThe fact, however, is, that Mr. Malthus found this argument entire (the\nprinciple and the application of it) in an obscure and almost forgotten\nwork published about the middle of the last century, entitled _Various\nProspects of Mankind, Nature, and Providence_, by a Scotch gentleman\nof the name of Wallace. The chapter in this work on the Principle\nof Population, considered as a bar to all ultimate views of human\nimprovement, was probably written to amuse an idle hour, or read as a\npaper to exercise the wits of some literary society in the Northern\ncapital, and no farther responsibility or importance annexed to it. Mr.\nMalthus, by adopting and setting his name to it, has given it sufficient\ncurrency and effect. It sometimes happens that one writer is the first\nto discover a certain principle or lay down a given observation, and\nthat another makes an application of, or draws a remote or an immediate\ninference from it, totally unforeseen by the first, and from which, in\nall probability, he might have widely dissented. But this is not so\nin the present instance. Mr. Malthus has borrowed (perhaps without\nconsciousness, at any rate without acknowledgment) both the preliminary\nstatement, that the increase in the supply of food \"from a limited\nearth and a limited fertility\" must have an end, while the tendency to\nincrease in the principle of population has none, without some external\nand forcible restraint on it, and the subsequent use made of this\nstatement as an insuperable bar to all schemes of Utopian or progressive\nimprovement--both these he has borrowed (whole) from Wallace, with all\ntheir imperfections on their heads, and has added more and greater\nones to them out of his own store. In order to produce something of a\nstartling and dramatic effect, he has strained a point or two. In order\nto quell and frighten away the bugbear of Modern Philosophy, he was\nobliged to make a sort of monster of the principle of population, which\nwas brought into the field against it, and which was to swallow it up\nquick. No half-measures, no middle course of reasoning would do. With a\nview to meet the highest possible power of reason in the new order of\nthings, Mr. Malthus saw the necessity of giving the greatest possible\nphysical weight to the antagonist principle, and he accordingly lays\nit down that its operation is mechanical and irresistible. He premises\nthese two propositions as the basis of all his reasoning, 1. _That food\nis necessary to man_; 2. _That the desire to propagate the species is an\nequally indispensable law of our existence_:--thus making it appear\nthat these two wants or impulses are equal and coordinate principles\nof action. If this double statement had been true, the whole scope and\nstructure of his reasoning (as hostile to human hopes and sanguine\nspeculations) would have been irrefragable; but as it is not true, the\nwhole (in that view) falls to the ground. According to Mr. Malthus's\noctavo edition, the sexual passion is as necessary to be gratified as\nthe appetite of hunger, and a man can no more exist without propagating\nhis species than he can live without eating. Were it so, neither of\nthese passions would admit of any excuses, any delay, any restraint from\nreason or foresight; and the only checks to the principle of population\nmust be vice and misery. The argument would be triumphant and complete.\nBut there is no analogy, no parity in the two cases, such as our author\nhere assumes. No man can live for any length of time without food; many\npersons live all their lives without gratifying the other sense.\nThe longer the craving after food is unsatisfied, the more violent,\nimperious, and uncontroulable the desire becomes; whereas the longer the\ngratification of the sexual passion is resisted, the greater force does\nhabit and resolution acquire over it; and, generally speaking, it is\na well-known fact, attested by all observation and history, that this\nlatter passion is subject more or less to controul from personal\nfeelings and character, from public opinions and the institutions of\nsociety, so as to lead either to a lawful and regulated indulgence, or\nto partial or total abstinence, according to the dictates of _moral\nrestraint_, which latter check to the inordinate excesses and unheard-of\nconsequences of the principle of population, our author, having no\nlonger an extreme case to make out, admits and is willing to patronize\nin addition to the two former and exclusive ones of _vice and misery_,\nin the second and remaining editions of his work. Mr. Malthus has shewn\nsome awkwardness or even reluctance in softening down the harshness of\nhis first peremptory decision. He sometimes grants his grand exception\ncordially, proceeds to argue stoutly, and to try conclusions upon it;\nat other times he seems disposed to cavil about or retract it:--\"the\ninfluence of moral restraint is very inconsiderable, or none at all.\" It\nis indeed difficult (more particularly for so formal and nice a reasoner\nas Mr. Malthus) to piece such contradictions plausibly or gracefully\ntogether. We wonder how _he_ manages it--how _any one_ should attempt\nit! The whole question, the _gist_ of the argument of his early volume\nturned upon this, \"Whether vice and misery were the _only_ actual or\npossible checks to the principle of population?\" He then said they were,\nand farewell to building castles in the air: he now says that _moral\nrestraint_ is to be coupled with these, and that its influence depends\ngreatly on the state of laws and manners--and Utopia stands where\nit did, a great way off indeed, but not turned _topsy-turvy_ by our\nmagician's wand! Should we ever arrive there, that is, attain to a state\nof _perfect moral restraint_, we shall not be driven headlong back into\nEpicurus's stye for want of the only possible checks to population,\n_vice and misery_; and in proportion as we advance that way, that is, as\nthe influence of moral restraint is extended, the necessity for vice and\nmisery will be diminished, instead of being increased according to the\nfirst alarm given by the Essay. Again, the advance of civilization and\nof population in consequence with the same degree of moral restraint (as\nthere exists in England at this present time, for instance) is a good,\nand not an evil--but this does not appear from the Essay. The Essay\nshews that population is not (as had been sometimes taken for granted)\nan abstract and unqualified good; but it led many persons to suppose\nthat it was an abstract and unqualified evil, to be checked only by vice\nand misery, and producing, according to its encouragement a greater\nquantity of vice and misery; and this error the author has not been\nat sufficient pains to do away. Another thing, in which Mr. Malthus\nattempted to _clench_ Wallace's argument, was in giving to the\ndisproportionate power of increase in the principle of population\nand the supply of food a mathematical form, or reducing it to the\narithmetical and geometrical ratios, in which we believe Mr. Malthus is\nnow generally admitted, even by his friends and admirers, to have been\nwrong. There is evidently no inherent difference in the principle of\nincrease in food or population; since a grain of corn, for example, will\npropagate and multiply itself much faster even than the human species.\nA bushel of wheat will sow a field; that field will furnish seed for\ntwenty others. So that the limit to the means of subsistence is only the\nwant of room to raise it in, or, as Wallace expresses it, \"a limited\nfertility and a limited earth.\" Up to the point where the earth or any\ngiven country is fully occupied or cultivated, the means of subsistence\nnaturally increase in a geometrical ratio, and will more than keep pace\nwith the natural and unrestrained progress of population; and beyond\nthat point, they do not go on increasing even in Mr. Malthus's\narithmetical ratio, but are stationary or nearly so. So far, then, is\nthis proportion from being universally and mathematically true, that\nin no part of the world or state of society does it hold good. But our\ntheorist, by laying down this double ratio as a law of nature, gains\nthis advantage, that at all times it seems as if, whether in new or\nold-peopled countries, in fertile or barren soils, the population was\npressing hard on the means of subsistence; and again, it seems as if the\nevil increased with the progress of improvement and civilization; for if\nyou cast your eye at the scale which is supposed to be calculated upon\ntrue and infallible _data_, you find that when the population is at\n8, the means of subsistence are at 4; so that here there is only a\n_deficit_ of one half; but when it is at 32, they have only got to 6, so\nthat here there is a difference of 26 in 32, and so on in proportion;\nthe farther we proceed, the more enormous is the mass of vice and\nmisery we must undergo, as a consequence of the natural excess of the\npopulation over the means of subsistence and as a salutary check to its\nfarther desolating progress. The mathematical Table, placed at the front\nof the Essay, therefore leads to a secret suspicion or a bare-faced\nassumption, that we ought in mere kindness and compassion to give every\nsort of indirect and under-hand encouragement (to say the least) to the\nprovidential checks of vice and misery; as the sooner we arrest this\nformidable and paramount evil in its course, the less opportunity we\nleave it of doing incalculable mischief. Accordingly, whenever there is\nthe least talk of colonizing new countries, of extending the population,\nor adding to social comforts and improvements, Mr. Malthus conjures up\nhis double ratios, and insists on the alarming results of advancing\nthem a single step forward in the series. By the same rule, it would\nbe better to return at once to a state of barbarism; and to take the\nbenefit of acorns and scuttle-fish, as a security against the luxuries\nand wants of civilized life. But it is not our ingenious author's wish\nto hint at or recommend any alterations in existing institutions; and he\nis therefore silent on that unpalatable part of the subject and natural\ninference from his principles.\n\nMr. Malthus's \"gospel is preached to the poor.\" He lectures them on\neconomy, on morality, the regulation of their passions (which, he says,\nat other times, are amenable to no restraint) and on the ungracious\ntopic, that \"the laws of nature, which are the laws of God, have doomed\nthem and their families to starve for want of a right to the smallest\nportion of food beyond what their labour will supply, or some charitable\nhand may hold out in compassion.\" This is illiberal, and it is not\nphilosophical. The laws of nature or of God, to which the author\nappeals, are no other than a limited fertility and a limited earth.\nWithin those bounds, the rest is regulated by the laws of man. The\ndivision of the produce of the soil, the price of labour, the relief\nafforded to the poor, are matters of human arrangement: while any\ncharitable hand can extend relief, it is a proof that the means of\nsubsistence are not exhausted in themselves, that \"the tables are not\nfull!\" Mr. Malthus says that the laws of nature, which are the laws of\nGod, have rendered that relief physically impossible; and yet he would\nabrogate the poor-laws by an act of the legislature, in order to take\naway that _impossible_ relief, which the laws of God deny, and which the\nlaws of man _actually_ afford. We cannot think that this view of his\nsubject, which is prominent and dwelt on at great length and with much\npertinacity, is dictated either by rigid logic or melting charity! A\nlabouring man is not allowed to knock down a hare or a partridge that\nspoils his garden: a country-squire keeps a pack of hounds: a lady of\nquality rides out with a footman behind her, on two sleek, well-fed\nhorses. We have not a word to say against all this as exemplifying the\nspirit of the English Constitution, as a part of the law of the land, or\nas an artful distribution of light and shade in the social picture; but\nif any one insists at the same time that \"the laws of nature, which are\nthe laws of God, have doomed the poor and their families to starve,\"\nbecause the principle of population has encroached upon and swallowed up\nthe means of subsistence, so that not a mouthful of food is left _by the\ngrinding law of necessity_ for the poor, we beg leave to deny both fact\nand inference--and we put it to Mr. Malthus whether we are not, in\nstrictness, justified in doing so?\n\nWe have, perhaps, said enough to explain our feeling on the subject of\nMr. Malthus's merits and defects. We think he had the opportunity and\nthe means in his hands of producing a great work on the principle of\npopulation; but we believe he has let it slip from his having an eye to\nother things besides that broad and unexplored question. He wished not\nmerely to advance to the discovery of certain great and valuable truths,\nbut at the same time to overthrow certain unfashionable paradoxes by\nexaggerated statements--to curry favour with existing prejudices and\ninterests by garbled representations. He has, in a word, as it appears\nto us on a candid retrospect and without any feelings of controversial\nasperity rankling in our minds, sunk the philosopher and the friend of\nhis species (a character to which he might have aspired) in the sophist\nand party-writer. The period at which Mr. Malthus came forward teemed\nwith answers to Modern Philosophy, with antidotes to liberty and\nhumanity, with abusive Histories of the Greek and Roman republics, with\nfulsome panegyrics on the Roman Emperors (at the very time when we were\nreviling Buonaparte for his strides to universal empire) with the slime\nand offal of desperate servility--and we cannot but consider the\nEssay as one of the poisonous ingredients thrown into the cauldron of\nLegitimacy \"to make it thick and slab.\" Our author has, indeed, so\nfar done service to the cause of truth, that he has counteracted\nmany capital errors formerly prevailing as to the universal and\nindiscriminate encouragement of population under all circumstances; but\nhe has countenanced opposite errors, which if adopted in theory and\npractice would be even more mischievous, and has left it to future\nphilosophers to follow up the principle, that some check must be\nprovided for the unrestrained progress of population, into a set of\nwiser and more humane consequences. Mr. Godwin has lately attempted an\nanswer to the Essay (thus giving Mr. Malthus a _Roland for his Oliver_)\nbut we think he has judged ill in endeavouring to invalidate the\nprinciple, instead of confining himself to point out the misapplication\nof it. There is one argument introduced in this Reply, which will,\nperhaps, amuse the reader as a sort of metaphysical puzzle.\n\n\"It has sometimes occurred to me whether Mr. Malthus did not catch the\nfirst hint of his geometrical ratio from a curious passage of Judge\nBlackstone, on consanguinity, which is as follows:--\n\n\"The doctrine of lineal consanguinity is sufficiently plain and obvious;\nbut it is at the first view astonishing to consider the number of lineal\nancestors which every man has within no very great number of degrees:\nand so many different bloods is a man said to contain in his veins, as\nhe hath lineal ancestors. Of these he hath two in the first ascending\ndegree, his own parents; he hath four in the second, the parents of his\nfather and the parents of his mother; he hath eight in the third, the\nparents of his two grandfathers and two grandmothers; and by the same\nrule of progression, he hath an hundred and twenty-eight in the seventh;\na thousand and twenty-four in the tenth; and at the twentieth degree, or\nthe distance of twenty generations, every man hath above a million of\nancestors, as common arithmetic will demonstrate.\n\n\"This will seem surprising to those who are unacquainted with the\nincreasing power of progressive numbers; but is palpably evident from\nthe following table of a geometrical progression, in which the first\nterm is 2, and the denominator also 2; or, to speak more intelligibly,\nit is evident, for that each of us has two ancestors in the first\ndegree; the number of which is doubled at every remove, because each of\nour ancestors had also two ancestors of his own.\n\n  _Lineal Degrees._                        _Number of Ancestors_.\n\n  1        ..       ..        ..                    2\n  2        ..       ..        ..                    4\n  3        ..       ..        ..                    8\n  4        ..       ..        ..                   16\n  5        ..       ..        ..                   32\n  6        ..       ..        ..                   64\n  7        ..       ..        ..                  128\n  8        ..       ..        ..                  256\n  9        ..       ..        ..                  512\n  10        ..       ..        ..                 1024\n  11        ..       ..        ..                 2048\n  12        ..       ..        ..                 4096\n  13        ..       ..        ..                 8192\n  14        ..       ..        ..               16,384\n  15        ..       ..        ..               32,768\n  16        ..       ..        ..               65,536\n  17        ..       ..        ..              131,072\n  18        ..       ..        ..              262,144\n  19        ..       ..        ..              524,288\n  20        ..       ..        ..            1,048,576\n\n\"This argument, however,\" (proceeds Mr. Godwin) \"from Judge Blackstone\nof a geometrical progression would much more naturally apply to\nMontesquieu's hypothesis of the depopulation of the world, and prove\nthat the human species is hastening fast to extinction, than to the\npurpose for which Mr. Malthus has employed it. An ingenious sophism\nmight be raised upon it, to shew that the race of mankind will\nultimately terminate in unity. Mr. Malthus, indeed, should have\nreflected, that it is much more certain that every man has had ancestors\nthan that he will have posterity, and that it is still more doubtful,\nwhether he will have posterity to twenty or to an indefinite number of\ngenerations.\"--ENQUIRY CONCERNING POPULATION, p. 100.\n\nMr. Malthus's style is correct and elegant; his tone of controversy mild\nand gentlemanly; and the care with which he has brought his facts and\ndocuments together, deserves the highest praise. He has lately quitted\nhis favourite subject of population, and broke a lance with Mr. Ricardo\non the question of rent and value. The partisans of Mr. Ricardo, who are\nalso the admirers of Mr. Malthus, say that the usual sagacity of the\nlatter has here failed him, and that he has shewn himself to be a very\nillogical writer. To have said this of him formerly on another ground,\nwas accounted a heresy and a piece of presumption not easily to be\nforgiven. Indeed Mr. Malthus has always been a sort of \"darling in the\npublic eye,\" whom it was unsafe to meddle with. He has contrived to\nmake himself as many friends by his attacks on the schemes of _Human\nPerfectibility_ and on the _Poor-Laws_, as Mandeville formerly procured\nenemies by his attacks on _Human Perfections_ and on _Charity-Schools_;\nand among other instances that we might mention, _Plug_ Pulteney, the\ncelebrated miser, of whom Mr. Burke said on his having a large\nestate left him, \"that now it was to be hoped he would _set up a\npocket-handkerchief_,\" was so enamoured with the saving schemes and\nhumane economy of the Essay, that he desired a friend to find out the\nauthor and offer him a church living! This liberal intention was (by\ndesign or accident) unhappily frustrated.\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. GIFFORD.\n\n\n\nMr. Gifford was originally bred to some handicraft: he afterwards\ncontrived to learn Latin, and was for some time an usher in a school,\ntill he became a tutor in a nobleman's family. The low-bred, self-taught\nman, the pedant, and the dependant on the great contribute to form the\nEditor of the _Quarterly Review_. He is admirably qualified for this\nsituation, which he has held for some years, by a happy combination of\ndefects, natural and acquired; and in the event of his death, it will be\ndifficult to provide him a suitable successor.\n\nMr. Gifford has no pretensions to be thought a man of genius, of taste,\nor even of general knowledge. He merely understands the mechanical and\ninstrumental part of learning. He is a critic of the last age, when\nthe different editions of an author, or the dates of his several\nperformances were all that occupied the inquiries of a profound scholar,\nand the spirit of the writer or the beauties of his style were left to\nshift for themselves, or exercise the fancy of the light and superficial\nreader. In studying an old author, he has no notion of any thing beyond\nadjusting a point, proposing a different reading, or correcting, by the\ncollation of various copies, an error of the press. In appreciating a\nmodern one, if it is an enemy, the first thing he thinks of is to charge\nhim with bad grammar--he scans his sentences instead of weighing his\nsense; or if it is a friend, the highest compliment he conceives it\npossible to pay him is, that his thoughts and expressions are moulded\non some hackneyed model. His standard of _ideal_ perfection is what he\nhimself now is, a person of _mediocre_ literary attainments: his utmost\ncontempt is shewn by reducing any one to what he himself once was, a\nperson without the ordinary advantages of education and learning. It is\naccordingly assumed, with much complacency in his critical pages, that\nTory writers are classical and courtly as a matter of course; as it is\na standing jest and evident truism, that Whigs and Reformers must be\npersons of low birth and breeding--imputations from one of which he\nhimself has narrowly escaped, and both of which he holds in suitable\nabhorrence. He stands over a contemporary performance with all the\nself-conceit and self-importance of a country schoolmaster, tries it by\ntechnical rules, affects not to understand the meaning, examines the\nhand-writing, the spelling, shrugs up his shoulders and chuckles over a\nslip of the pen, and keeps a sharp look-out for a false concord and--a\nflogging. There is nothing liberal, nothing humane in his style of\njudging: it is altogether petty, captious, and literal. The Editor's\npolitical subserviency adds the last finishing to his ridiculous\npedantry and vanity. He has all his life been a follower in the train\nof wealth and power--strives to back his pretensions on Parnassus by a\nplace at court, and to gild his reputation as a man of letters by the\nsmile of greatness. He thinks his works are stamped with additional\nvalue by having his name in the _Red-Book_. He looks up to the\ndistinctions of rank and station as he does to those of learning, with\nthe gross and overweening adulation of his early origin. All his notions\nare low, upstart, servile. He thinks it the highest honour to a poet to\nbe patronised by a peer or by some dowager of quality. He is prouder\nof a court-livery than of a laurel-wreath; and is only sure of having\nestablished his claims to respectability by having sacrificed those of\nindependence. He is a retainer to the Muses; a door-keeper to learning;\na lacquey in the state. He believes that modern literature should wear\nthe fetters of classical antiquity; that truth is to be weighed in the\nscales of opinion and prejudice; that power is equivalent to right; that\ngenius is dependent on rules; that taste and refinement of language\nconsist in _word-catching_. Many persons suppose that Mr. Gifford knows\nbetter than he pretends; and that he is shrewd, artful, and designing.\nBut perhaps it may be nearer the mark to suppose that his dulness is\nguarantee for his sincerity; or that before he is the tool of the\nprofligacy of others, he is the dupe of his own jaundiced feelings, and\nnarrow, hoodwinked perceptions.\n\n  \"Destroy his fib or sophistry: in vain--\n  The creature's at his dirty work again!\"\n\nBut this is less from choice or perversity, than because he cannot help\nit and can do nothing else. He damns a beautiful expression less out\nof spite than because he really does not understand it: any novelty of\nthought or sentiment gives him a shock from which he cannot recover\nfor some time, and he naturally takes his revenge for the alarm and\nuneasiness occasioned him, without referring to venal or party motives.\nHe garbles an author's meaning, not so much wilfully, as because it is a\npain to him to enlarge his microscopic view to take in the context, when\na particular sentence or passage has struck him as quaint and out of the\nway: he fly-blows an author's style, and picks out detached words and\nphrases for cynical reprobation, simply because he feels himself at\nhome, or takes a pride and pleasure in this sort of petty warfare. He is\ntetchy and impatient of contradiction; sore with wounded pride; angry\nat obvious faults, more angry at unforeseen beauties. He has the\n_chalk-stones_ in his understanding, and from being used to long\nconfinement, cannot bear the slightest jostling or irregularity of\nmotion. He may call out with the fellow in the _Tempest_--\"I am not\nStephano, but a cramp!\" He would go back to the standard of opinions,\nstyle, the faded ornaments, and insipid formalities that came into\nfashion about forty years ago. Flashes of thought, flights of fancy,\nidiomatic expressions, he sets down among the signs of the times--the\nextraordinary occurrences of the age we live in. They are marks of a\nrestless and revolutionary spirit: they disturb his composure of mind,\nand threaten (by implication) the safety of the state. His slow,\nsnail-paced, bed-rid habits of reasoning cannot keep up with the\nwhirling, eccentric motion, the rapid, perhaps extravagant combinations\nof modern literature. He has long been stationary himself, and is\ndetermined that others shall remain so. The hazarding a paradox is like\nletting off a pistol close to his ear: he is alarmed and offended. The\nusing an elliptical mode of expression (such as he did not use to find\nin Guides to the English Tongue) jars him like coming suddenly to a\nstep in a flight of stairs that you were not aware of. He _pishes_ and\n_pshaws_ at all this, exercises a sort of interjectional criticism on\nwhat excites his spleen, his envy, or his wonder, and hurls his meagre\nanathemas _ex cathedr\u00e2_ at all those writers who are indifferent alike\nto his precepts and his example!\n\nMr. Gifford, in short, is possessed of that sort of learning which is\nlikely to result from an over-anxious desire to supply the want of the\nfirst rudiments of education; that sort of wit, which is the offspring\nof ill-humour or bodily pain; that sort of sense, which arises from a\nspirit of contradiction and a disposition to cavil at and dispute\nthe opinions of others; and that sort of reputation, which is the\nconsequence of bowing to established authority and ministerial\ninfluence. He dedicates to some great man, and receives his compliments\nin return. He appeals to some great name, and the Under-graduates of the\ntwo Universities look up to him as an oracle of wisdom. He throws the\nweight of his verbal criticism and puny discoveries in _black-letter_\nreading into the gap, that is supposed to be making in the Constitution\nby Whigs and Radicals, whom he qualifies without mercy as dunces and\nmiscreants; and so entitles himself to the protection of Church and\nState. The character of his mind is an utter want of independence and\nmagnanimity in all that he attempts. He cannot go alone, he must have\ncrutches, a go-cart and trammels, or he is timid, fretful, and helpless\nas a child. He cannot conceive of any thing different from what he finds\nit, and hates those who pretend to a greater reach of intellect\nor boldness of spirit than himself. He inclines, by a natural and\ndeliberate bias, to the traditional in laws and government; to\nthe orthodox in religion; to the safe in opinion; to the trite in\nimagination; to the technical in style; to whatever implies a surrender\nof individual judgment into the hands of authority, and a subjection of\nindividual feeling to mechanic rules. If he finds any one flying in the\nface of these, or straggling from the beaten path, he thinks he has them\nat a notable disadvantage, and falls foul of them without loss of time,\npartly to soothe his own sense of mortified self-consequence, and as an\nedifying spectacle to his legitimate friends. He takes none but unfair\nadvantages. He _twits_ his adversaries (that is, those who are not\nin the leading-strings of his school or party) with some personal or\naccidental defect. If a writer has been punished for a political libel,\nhe is sure to hear of it in a literary criticism. If a lady goes on\ncrutches and is out of favour at court, she is reminded of it in Mr.\nGilford's manly satire. He sneers at people of low birth or who have\nnot had a college-education, partly to hide his own want of certain\nadvantages, partly as well-timed flattery to those who possess them. He\nhas a right to laugh at poor, unfriended, untitled genius from wearing\nthe livery of rank and letters, as footmen behind a coronet-coach laugh\nat the rabble. He keeps good company, and forgets himself. He stands at\nthe door of Mr. Murray's shop, and will not let any body pass but the\nwell-dressed mob, or some followers of the court. To edge into the\n_Quarterly_ Temple of Fame the candidate must have a diploma from the\nUniversities, a passport from the Treasury. Otherwise, it is a breach of\netiquette to let him pass, an insult to the better sort who aspire to\nthe love of letters--and may chance to drop in to the _Feast of the\nPoets_. Or, if he cannot manage it thus, or get rid of the claim on the\nbare ground of poverty or want of school-learning, he _trumps_ up an\nexcuse for the occasion, such as that \"a man was confined in Newgate a\nshort time before\"--it is not a _lie_ on the part of the critic, it is\nonly an amiable subserviency to the will of his betters, like that of\na menial who is ordered to deny his master, a sense of propriety, a\nknowledge of the world, a poetical and moral license. Such fellows\n(such is his cue from his employers) should at any rate be kept out of\nprivileged places: persons who have been convicted of prose-libels ought\nnot to be suffered to write poetry--if the fact was not exactly as it\nwas stated, it was something of the kind, or it _ought_ to have been\nso, the assertion was a pious fraud,--the public, the court, the prince\nhimself might read the work, but for this mark of opprobrium set upon\nit--it was not to be endured that an insolent plebeian should aspire to\nelegance, taste, fancy--it was throwing down the barriers which ought\nto separate the higher and the lower classes, the loyal and the\ndisloyal--the paraphrase of the story of Dante was therefore to perform\nquarantine, it was to seem not yet recovered from the gaol infection,\nthere was to be a taint upon it, as there was none in it--and all this\nwas performed by a single slip of Mr. Gifford's pen! We would willingly\nbelieve (if we could) that in this case there was as much weakness and\nprejudice as there was malice and cunning.--Again, we do not think it\npossible that under any circumstances the writer of the _Verses to Anna_\ncould enter into the spirit or delicacy of Mr. Keats's poetry. The fate\nof the latter somewhat resembled that of\n\n --\"a bud bit by an envious worm,\n  Ere it could spread its sweet leaves to the air,\n  Or dedicate its beauty to the sun.\"\n\nMr. Keats's ostensible crime was that he had been praised in the\n_Examiner Newspaper_: a greater and more unpardonable offence probably\nwas, that he was a true poet, with all the errors and beauties of\nyouthful genius to answer for. Mr. Gifford was as insensible to the one\nas he was inexorable to the other. Let the reader judge from the two\nsubjoined specimens how far the one writer could ever, without a\npresumption equalled only by a want of self-knowledge, set himself in\njudgment on the other.\n\n  \"Out went the taper as she hurried in;\n  Its little smoke in pallid moonshine died:\n  She closed the door, she panted, all akin\n  To spirits of the air and visions wide:\n  No utter'd syllable, or woe betide!\n  But to her heart, her heart was voluble,\n  Paining with eloquence her balmy side;\n  As though a tongueless nightingale should swell\n  Her heart in vain, and die, heart-stifled, in her dell.\n\n  \"A casement high and triple-arch'd there was,\n  All garlanded with carven imag'ries\n  Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass,\n  And diamonded with panes of quaint device,\n  Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes,\n  As are the tiger-moth's deep-damask'd wings;\n  And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries,\n  And twilight saints and dim emblazonings,\n  A shielded scutcheon blush'd with blood of queens and kings.\n\n  \"Full on this casement shone the wintry moon,\n  And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast,\n  As down she knelt for Heaven's grace and boon;\n  Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest,\n  And on her silver cross soft amethyst,\n  And on her hair a glory, like a Saint:\n  She seem'd a splendid angel, newly drest,\n  Save wings, for heaven:--Porphyro grew faint:\n  She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal taint.\n\n  \"Anon his heart revives: her vespers done,\n  Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees;\n  Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one;\n  Loosens her fragrant boddice; by degrees\n  Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees:\n  Half-hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed,\n  Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees,\n  In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed,\n  But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled.\n\n  \"Soon trembling in her soft and chilly nest,\n  In sort of wakeful swoon, perplex'd she lay,\n  Until the poppied warmth of sleep oppress'd\n  Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away\n  Flown, like a thought, until the morrow-day:\n  Blissfully haven'd both from joy and pain;\n  Clasp'd like a missal where swart Paynims pray;\n  Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain,\n  As though a rose should shut, and be a bud again.\"\n  EVE OF ST. AGNES.\n\nWith the rich beauties and the dim obscurities of lines like these, let\nus contrast the Verses addressed _To a Tuft of early Violets_ by the\nfastidious author of the Baviad and M\u00e6viad.--\n\n  \"Sweet flowers! that from your humble beds\n  Thus prematurely dare to rise,\n  And trust your unprotected heads\n  To cold Aquarius' watery skies.\n\n  \"Retire, retire! _These_ tepid airs\n  Are not the genial brood of May;\n  _That_ sun with light malignant glares,\n  And flatters only to betray.\n\n  \"Stern Winter's reign is not yet past--\n  Lo! while your buds prepare to blow,\n  On icy pinions comes the blast,\n  And nips your root, and lays you low.\n\n  \"Alas, for such ungentle doom!\n  But I will shield you; and supply\n  A kindlier soil on which to bloom,\n  A nobler bed on which to die.\n\n  \"Come then--'ere yet the morning ray\n  Has drunk the dew that gems your crest,\n  And drawn your balmiest sweets away;\n  O come and grace my Anna's breast.\n\n  \"Ye droop, fond flowers! But did ye know\n  What worth, what goodness there reside,\n  Your cups with liveliest tints would glow;\n  And spread their leaves with conscious pride.\n\n  \"For there has liberal Nature joined\n  Her riches to the stores of Art,\n  And added to the vigorous mind\n  The soft, the sympathising heart.\n\n  \"Come, then--'ere yet the morning ray\n  Has drunk the dew that gems your crest,\n  And drawn your balmiest sweets away;\n  O come and grace my Anna's breast.\n\n  \"O! I should think--_that fragrant bed_\n  _Might I but hope with you to share_--[A]\n  Years of anxiety repaid\n  By one short hour of transport there.\n\n  \"More blest than me, thus shall ye live\n  Your little day; and when ye die,\n  Sweet flowers! the grateful Muse shall give\n  A verse; the sorrowing maid, a sigh.\n\n  \"While I alas! no distant date,\n  Mix with the dust from whence I came,\n  Without a friend to weep my fate,\n  Without a stone to tell my name.\"\n\nWe subjoin one more specimen of these \"wild strains\"[B] said to be\n\"_Written two years after the preceding_.\" ECCE ITERUM CRISPINUS.\n\n\n  \"I wish I was where Anna lies;\n  For I am sick of lingering here,\n  And every hour Affection cries,\n  Go, and partake her humble bier.\n\n  \"I wish I could! for when she died\n  I lost my all; and life has prov'd\n  Since that sad hour a dreary void,\n  A waste unlovely and unlov'd.\n\n  \"But who, when I am turn'd to clay,\n  Shall duly to her grave repair,\n  And pluck the ragged moss away,\n  And weeds that have \"no business there?\"\n\n  \"And who, with pious hand, shall bring\n  The flowers she cherish'd, snow-drops cold,\n  And violets that unheeded spring,\n  To scatter o'er her hallow'd mould?\n\n  \"And who, while Memory loves to dwell\n  Upon her name for ever dear,\n  Shall feel his heart with passion swell,\n  And pour the bitter, bitter tear?\n\n  \"I did it; and would fate allow,\n  Should visit still, should still deplore--\n  But health and strength have left me now,\n  But I, alas! can weep no more.\n\n  \"Take then, sweet maid! this simple strain,\n  The last I offer at thy shrine;\n  Thy grave must then undeck'd remain,\n  And all thy memory fade with mine.\n\n  \"And can thy soft persuasive look,\n  That voice that might with music vie,\n  Thy air that every gazer took,\n  Thy matchless eloquence of eye,\n\n  \"Thy spirits, frolicsome as good,\n  Thy courage, by no ills dismay'd,\n  Thy patience, by no wrongs subdued,\n  Thy gay good-humour--can they \"fade?\"\n\n  \"Perhaps--but sorrow dims my eye:\n  Cold turf, which I no more must view,\n  Dear name, which I no more must sigh,\n  A long, a last, a sad adieu!\"\n\nIt may be said in extenuation of the low, mechanic vein of these\nimpoverished lines, that they were written at an early age--they were\nthe inspired production of a youthful lover! Mr. Gifford was thirty when\nhe wrote them, Mr. Keats died when he was scarce twenty! Farther it may\nbe said, that Mr. Gifford hazarded his first poetical attempts under all\nthe disadvantages of a neglected education: but the same circumstance,\ntogether with a few unpruned redundancies of fancy and quaintnesses of\nexpression, was made the plea on which Mr. Keats was hooted out of the\nworld, and his fine talents and wounded sensibilities consigned to an\nearly grave. In short, the treatment of this heedless candidate for\npoetical fame might serve as a warning, and was intended to serve as a\nwarning to all unfledged tyros, how they venture upon any such doubtful\nexperiments, except under the auspices of some lord of the bedchamber or\nGovernment Aristarchus, and how they imprudently associate themselves\nwith men of mere popular talent or independence of feeling!--It is the\nsame in prose works. The Editor scorns to enter the lists of argument\nwith any proscribed writer of the opposite party. He does not refute,\nbut denounces him. He makes no concessions to an adversary, lest they\nshould in some way be turned against him. He only feels himself safe in\nthe fancied insignificance of others: he only feels himself superior\nto those whom he stigmatizes as the lowest of mankind. All persons are\nwithout common-sense and honesty who do not believe implicitly (with\nhim) in the immaculateness of Ministers and the divine origin of Kings.\nThus he informed the world that the author of TABLE-TALK was a person\nwho could not write a sentence of common English and could hardly spell\nhis own name, because he was not a friend to the restoration of the\nBourbons, and had the assurance to write _Characters of Shakespears\nPlays_ in a style of criticism somewhat different from Mr. Gifford's. He\ncharged this writer with imposing on the public by a flowery style; and\nwhen the latter ventured to refer to a work of his, called _An Essay on\nthe Principles of Human Action_, which has not a single ornament in it,\nas a specimen of his original studies and the proper bias of his mind,\nthe learned critic, with a shrug of great self-satisfaction, said, \"It\nwas amusing to see this person, sitting like one of Brouwer's Dutch\nboors over his gin and tobacco-pipes, and fancying himself a Leibnitz!\"\nThe question was, whether the subject of Mr. Gifford's censure had ever\nwritten such a work or not; for if he had, he had amused himself with\nsomething besides gin and tobacco-pipes. But our Editor, by virtue\nof the situation he holds, is superior to facts or arguments: he is\naccountable neither to the public nor to authors for what he says of\nthem, but owes it to his employers to prejudice the work and vilify the\nwriter, if the latter is not avowedly ready to range himself on the\nstronger side.--The _Quarterly Review_, besides the political _tirades_\nand denunciations of suspected writers, intended for the guidance of the\nheads of families, is filled up with accounts of books of Voyages\nand Travels for the amusement of the younger branches. The poetical\ndepartment is almost a sinecure, consisting of mere summary decisions\nand a list of quotations. Mr. Croker is understood to contribute the\nSt. Helena articles and the liberality, Mr. Canning the practical good\nsense, Mr. D'Israeli the good-nature, Mr. Jacob the modesty, Mr. Southey\nthe consistency, and the Editor himself the chivalrous spirit and the\nattacks on Lady Morgan. It is a double crime, and excites a double\nportion of spleen in the Editor, when female writers are not advocates\nof passive obedience and non-resistance. This Journal, then, is a\ndepository for every species of political sophistry and personal\ncalumny. There is no abuse or corruption that does not there find a\njesuitical palliation or a bare-faced vindication. There we meet the\nslime of hypocrisy, the varnish of courts, the cant of pedantry, the\ncobwebs of the law, the iron hand of power. Its object is as mischievous\nas the means by which it is pursued are odious. The intention is to\npoison the sources of public opinion and of individual fame--to pervert\nliterature, from being the natural ally of freedom and humanity, into an\nengine of priestcraft and despotism, and to undermine the spirit of the\nEnglish Constitution and the independence of the English character.\nThe Editor and his friends systematically explode every principle of\nliberty, laugh patriotism and public spirit to scorn, resent every\npretence to integrity as a piece of singularity or insolence, and strike\nat the root of all free inquiry or discussion, by running down every\nwriter as a vile scribbler and a bad member of society, who is not\na hireling and a slave. No means are stuck at in accomplishing this\nlaudable end. Strong in patronage, they trample on truth, justice, and\ndecency. They claim the privilege of court-favourites. They keep as\nlittle faith with the public, as with their opponents. No statement in\nthe _Quarterly Review_ is to be trusted: there is no fact that is not\nmisrepresented in it, no quotation that is not garbled, no character\nthat is not slandered, if it can answer the purposes of a party to do\nso. The weight of power, of wealth, of rank is thrown into the scale,\ngives its impulse to the machine; and the whole is under the guidance of\nMr. Gifford's instinctive genius--of the inborn hatred of servility for\nindependence, of dulness for talent, of cunning and impudence for truth\nand honesty. It costs him no effort to execute his disreputable task--in\nbeing the tool of a crooked policy, he but labours in his natural\nvocation. He patches up a rotten system as he would supply the chasms in\na worm-eaten manuscript, from a grovelling incapacity to do any thing\nbetter; thinks that if a single iota in the claims of prerogative and\npower were lost, the whole fabric of society would fall upon his\nhead and crush him; and calculates that his best chance for literary\nreputation is by _black-balling_ one half of the competitors as\nJacobins and levellers, and securing the suffrages of the other half in\nhis favour as a loyal subject and trusty partisan!\n\nMr. Gifford, as a satirist, is violent and abrupt. He takes obvious or\nphysical defects, and dwells upon them with much labour and harshness of\ninvective, but with very little wit or spirit. He expresses a great deal\nof anger and contempt, but you cannot tell very well why--except that he\nseems to be sore and out of humour. His satire is mere peevishness and\nspleen, or something worse--personal antipathy and rancour. We are in\nquite as much pain for the writer, as for the object of his resentment.\nHis address to Peter Pindar is laughable from its outrageousness. He\ndenounces him as a wretch hateful to God and man, for some of the most\nharmless and amusing trifles that ever were written--and the very good-\nhumour and pleasantry of which, we suspect, constituted their offence in\nthe eyes of this Drawcansir.--His attacks on Mrs. Robinson were unmanly,\nand even those on Mr. Merry and the Della-Cruscan School were much\nmore ferocious than the occasion warranted. A little affectation and\nquaintness of style did not merit such severity of castigation.[C] As a\ntranslator, Mr. Gifford's version of the Roman satirist is the baldest,\nand, in parts, the most offensive of all others. We do not know why\nhe attempted it, unless he had got it in his head that he should thus\nfollow in the steps of Dryden, as he had already done in those of Pope\nin the Baviad and Maeviad. As an editor of old authors, Mr. Gifford is\nentitled to considerable praise for the pains he has taken in revising\nthe text, and for some improvements he has introduced into it. He had\nbetter have spared the notes, in which, though he has detected the\nblunders of previous commentators, he has exposed his own ill-temper and\nnarrowness of feeling more. As a critic, he has thrown no light on the\ncharacter and spirit of his authors. He has shewn no striking power of\nanalysis nor of original illustration, though he has chosen to exercise\nhis pen on writers most congenial to his own turn of mind, from their\ndry and caustic vein; Massinger, and Ben Jonson. What he will make of\nMarlowe, it is difficult to guess. He has none of \"the fiery quality\"\nof the poet. Mr. Gifford does not take for his motto on these\noccasions--_Spiritus precipitandus est!_--His most successful efforts in\nthis way are barely respectable. In general, his observations are petty,\nill-concocted, and discover as little _tact_, as they do a habit of\nconnected reasoning. Thus, for instance, in attempting to add the name\nof Massinger to the list of Catholic poets, our minute critic insists\non the profusion of crucifixes, glories, angelic visions, garlands of\nroses, and clouds of incense scattered through the _Virgin-Martyr,_ as\nevidence of the theological sentiments meant to be inculcated by the\nplay, when the least reflection might have taught him, that they proved\nnothing but the author's poetical conception of the character and\n_costume_ of his subject. A writer might, with the same sinister,\nshort-sighted shrewdness, be accused of Heathenism for talking of Flora\nand Ceres in a poem on the Seasons! What are produced as the exclusive\nbadges and occult proofs of Catholic bigotry, are nothing but the\nadventitious ornaments and external symbols, the gross and sensible\nlanguage, in a word, the _poetry_ of Christianity in general. What\nindeed shews the frivolousness of the whole inference is that Deckar,\nwho is asserted by our critic to have contributed some of the most\npassionate and fantastic of these devotional scenes, is not even\nsuspected of a leaning to Popery. In like manner, he excuses Massinger\nfor the grossness of one of his plots (that of the _Unnatural Combat_)\nby saying that it was supposed to take place before the Christian era;\nby this shallow common-place persuading himself, or fancying he could\npersuade others, that the crime in question (which yet on the very face\nof the story is made the ground of a tragic catastrophe) was first made\n_statutory_ by the Christian religion.\n\nThe foregoing is a harsh criticism, and may be thought illiberal. But as\nMr. Gifford assumes a right to say what he pleases of others--they may\nbe allowed to speak the truth of him!\n\n\n[Footnote A: What an awkward bed-fellow for a tuft of violets!]\n\n[Footnote B:\n\n  \"How oft, O Dart! what time the faithful pair\n  Walk'd forth, the fragrant hour of eve to share,\n  On thy romantic banks, have my _wild strains_\n  (Not yet forgot amidst my native plains)\n  While thou hast sweetly gurgled down the vale.\n  Filled up the pause of love's delightful tale!\n  While, ever as she read, the conscious maid,\n  By faultering voice and downcast looks betray'd,\n  Would blushing on her lover's neck recline,\n  And with her finger--point the tenderest line!\"\n\n\n  _M\u00e6viad_, pp. 194, 202.\n\nYet the author assures us just before, that in these \"wild strains\" \"all\nwas plain.\"\n\n  \"Even then (admire, John Bell! my simple ways)\n  No heaven and hell danced madly through my lays,\n  No oaths, no execrations; _all was plain_;\n  Yet trust me, while thy ever jingling train\n  Chime their sonorous woes with frigid art,\n  And shock the reason and revolt the heart;\n  My hopes and fears, in nature's language drest,\n  Awakened love in many a gentle breast.\"\n\n  _Ibid._ v. 185-92.\n\nIf any one else had composed these \"wild strains,\" in which \"all is\nplain,\" Mr. Gifford would have accused them of three things, \"1.\nDownright nonsense. 2. Downright frigidity. 3. Downright doggrel;\" and\nproceeded to anatomise them very cordially in his way. As it is, he is\nthrilled with a very pleasing horror at his former scenes of tenderness,\nand \"gasps at the recollection\" _of watery Aquarius_! _he! jam satis\nest!_ \"Why rack a grub--a butterfly upon a wheel?\"]\n\n[Footnote C: Mr. Merry was even with our author in personality of abuse.\nSee his Lines on the Story of the Ape that was given in charge to the\nex-tutor.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. JEFFREY\n\n\n\nThe _Quarterly Review_ arose out of the _Edinburgh_, not as a corollary,\nbut in contradiction to it. An article had appeared in the latter on Don\nPedro Cevallos, which stung the Tories to the quick by the free way in\nwhich it spoke of men and things, and something must be done to check\nthese _escapades_ of the _Edinburgh_. It was not to be endured that the\ntruth should _out_ in this manner, even occasionally and half in jest. A\nstartling shock was thus given to established prejudices, the mask was\ntaken off from grave hypocrisy, and the most serious consequences were\nto be apprehended. The persons who wrote in this Review seemed \"to have\ntheir hands full of truths\", and now and then, in a fit of spleen or\ngaiety, let some of them fly; and while this practice continued, it was\nimpossible to say that the Monarchy or the Hierarchy was safe. Some of\nthe arrows glanced, others might stick, and in the end prove fatal. It\nwas not the principles of the _Edinburgh Review_, but the spirit that\nwas looked at with jealousy and alarm. The principles were by no means\ndecidedly hostile to existing institutions: but the spirit was that of\nfair and free discussion; a field was open to argument and wit; every\nquestion was tried upon its own ostensible merits, and there was no foul\nplay. The tone was that of a studied impartiality (which many called\n_trimming_) or of a sceptical indifference. This tone of impartiality\nand indifference, however, did not at all suit those who profited or\nexisted by abuses, who breathed the very air of corruption. They know\nwell enough that \"those who are not _for_ them are _against_ them.\"\nThey wanted a publication impervious alike to truth and candour; that,\nhood-winked itself, should lead public opinion blindfold; that should\nstick at nothing to serve the turn of a party; that should be the\nexclusive organ of prejudice, the sordid tool of power; that should go\nthe whole length of want of principle in palliating every dishonest\nmeasure, of want of decency in defaming every honest man; that should\nprejudge every question, traduce every opponent; that should give no\nquarter to fair inquiry or liberal sentiment; that should be \"ugly\nall over with hypocrisy\", and present one foul blotch of servility,\nintolerance, falsehood, spite, and ill-manners. The _Quarterly Review_\nwas accordingly set up.\n\n  \"Sithence no fairy lights, no quickning ray,\n  Nor stir of pulse, nor object to entice\n  Abroad the spirits; but the cloister'd heart\n  Sits squat at home, like Pagod in a niche\n  Obscure!\"\n\nThis event was accordingly hailed (and the omen has been fulfilled!) as\na great relief to all those of his Majesty's subjects who are firmly\nconvinced that the only way to have things remain exactly as they are is\nto put a stop to all inquiries whether they are right or wrong, and that\nif you cannot answer a man's arguments, you may at least try to take\naway his character.\n\nWe do not implicitly bow to the political opinions, nor to the critical\ndecisions of the _Edinburgh Review_; but we must do justice to the\ntalent with which they are supported, and to the tone of manly\nexplicitness in which they are delivered.[A] They are eminently\ncharacteristic of the Spirit of the Age; as it is the express object of\nthe _Quarterly Review_ to discountenance and extinguish that spirit,\nboth in theory and practice. The _Edinburgh Review_ stands upon\nthe ground of opinion; it asserts the supremacy of intellect: the\npre-eminence it claims is from an acknowledged superiority of talent and\ninformation and literary attainment, and it does not build one tittle\nof its influence on ignorance, or prejudice, or authority, or personal\nmalevolence. It takes up a question, and argues it _pro_ and _con_ with\ngreat knowledge and boldness and skill; it points out an absurdity, and\nruns it down, fairly, and according to the evidence adduced. In the\nformer case, its conclusions may be wrong, there may be a bias in the\nmind of the writer, but he states the arguments and circumstances on\nboth sides, from which a judgment is to be formed--it is not his cue,\nhe has neither the effrontery nor the meanness to falsify facts or to\nsuppress objections. In the latter case, or where a vein of sarcasm or\nirony is resorted to, the ridicule is not barbed by some allusion (false\nor true) to private history; the object of it has brought the infliction\non himself by some literary folly or political delinquency which is\nreferred to as the understood and justifiable provocation, instead\nof being held up to scorn as a knave for not being a tool, or as a\nblockhead for thinking for himself. In the _Edinburgh Review_ the\ntalents of those on the opposite side are always extolled _pleno\nore_--in the _Quarterly Review_ they are denied altogether, and the\njustice that is in this way withheld from them is compensated by a\nproportionable supply of personal abuse. A man of genius who is a lord,\nand who publishes with Mr. Murray, may now and then stand as good a\nchance as a lord who is not a man of genius and who publishes with\nMessrs. Longman: but that is the utmost extent of the impartiality of\nthe _Quarterly_. From its account you would take Lord Byron and Mr.\nStuart Rose for two very pretty poets; but Mr. Moore's Magdalen Muse is\nsent to Bridewell without mercy, to beat hemp in silk-stockings. In\nthe _Quarterly_ nothing is regarded but the political creed or external\ncircumstances of a writer: in the _Edinburgh_ nothing is ever adverted\nto but his literary merits. Or if there is a bias of any kind, it arises\nfrom an affectation of magnanimity and candour in giving heaped measure\nto those on the aristocratic side in politics, and in being critically\nsevere on others. Thus Sir Walter Scott is lauded to the skies for his\nromantic powers, without any allusion to his political demerits (as if\nthis would be compromising the dignity of genius and of criticism by the\nintroduction of party-spirit)--while Lord Byron is called to a grave\nmoral reckoning. There is, however, little of the cant of morality in\nthe _Edinburgh Review_--and it is quite free from that of religion. It\nkeeps to its province, which is that of criticism--or to the discussion\nof debateable topics, and acquits itself in both with force and spirit.\nThis is the natural consequence of the composition of the two Reviews.\nThe one appeals with confidence to its own intellectual resources, to\nthe variety of its topics, to its very character and existence as a\nliterary journal, which depend on its setting up no pretensions but\nthose which it can make good by the talent and ingenuity it can bring to\nbear upon them--it therefore meets every question, whether of a lighter\nor a graver cast, on its own grounds; the other _blinks_ every question,\nfor it has no confidence but in _the powers that be_--shuts itself up in\nthe impregnable fastnesses of authority, or makes some paltry, cowardly\nattack (under cover of anonymous criticism) on individuals, or dispenses\nits award of merit entirely according to the rank or party of the\nwriter. The faults of the _Edinburgh Review_ arise out of the very\nconsciousness of critical and logical power. In political questions it\nrelies too little on the broad basis of liberty and humanity, enters too\nmuch into mere dry formalities, deals too often in _moot-points_, and\ndescends too readily to a sort of special-pleading in defence of _home_\ntruths and natural feelings: in matters of taste and criticism, its tone\nis sometimes apt to be supercilious and _cavalier_ from its habitual\nfaculty of analysing defects and beauties according to given principles,\nfrom its quickness in deciding, from its facility in illustrating its\nviews. In this latter department it has been guilty of some capital\noversights. The chief was in its treatment of the _Lyrical Ballads_ at\ntheir first appearance--not in its ridicule of their puerilities, but in\nits denial of their beauties, because they were included in no school,\nbecause they were reducible to no previous standard or theory of\npoetical excellence. For this, however, considerable reparation has been\nmade by the prompt and liberal spirit that has been shewn in bringing\nforward other examples of poetical genius. Its capital sin, in a\ndoctrinal point of view, has been (we shrewdly suspect) in the uniform\nand unqualified encouragement it has bestowed on Mr. Malthus's system.\nWe do not mean that the _Edinburgh Review_ was to join in the general\n_hue and cry_ that was raised against this writer; but while it asserted\nthe soundness of many of his arguments, and yielded its assent to the\ntruths he has divulged, it need not have screened his errors. On this\nsubject alone we think the _Quarterly_ has the advantage of it. But as\nthe _Quarterly Review_ is a mere mass and tissue of prejudices on\nall subjects, it is the foible of the _Edinburgh Review_ to affect a\nsomewhat fastidious air of superiority over prejudices of all kinds, and\na determination not to indulge in any of the amiable weaknesses of our\nnature, except as it can give a reason for the faith that is in it.\nLuckily, it is seldom reduced to this alternative: \"reasons\" are with it\n\"as plenty as blackberries!\"\n\nMr. Jeffrey is the Editor of the _Edinburgh Review,_ and is understood\nto have contributed nearly a fourth part of the articles from its\ncommencement. No man is better qualified for this situation; nor indeed\nso much so. He is certainly a person in advance of the age, and yet\nperfectly fitted both from knowledge and habits of mind to put a curb\nupon its rash and headlong spirit. He is thoroughly acquainted with the\nprogress and pretensions of modern literature and philosophy; and to\nthis he adds the natural acuteness and discrimination of the logician\nwith the habitual caution and coolness of his profession. If the\n_Edinburgh Review_ may be considered as the organ of or at all pledged\nto a party, that party is at least a respectable one, and is placed in\nthe middle between two extremes. The Editor is bound to lend a patient\nhearing to the most paradoxical opinions and extravagant theories which\nhave resulted in our times from the \"infinite agitation of wit\", but\nhe is disposed to qualify them by a number of practical objections,\nof speculative doubts, of checks and drawbacks, arising out of actual\ncircumstances and prevailing opinions, or the frailties of human nature.\nHe has a great range of knowledge, an incessant activity of mind; but\nthe suspension of his judgment, the well-balanced moderation of his\nsentiments, is the consequence of the very discursiveness of his reason.\nWhat may be considered as _a commonplace_ conclusion is often the result\nof a comprehensive view of all the circumstances of a case. Paradox,\nviolence, nay even originality of conception is not seldom owing to our\ndwelling long and pertinaciously on some one part of a subject, instead\nof attending to the whole. Mr. Jeffrey is neither a bigot nor an\nenthusiast. He is not the dupe of the prejudices of others, nor of his\nown. He is not wedded to any dogma, he is not long the sport of any\nwhim; before he can settle in any fond or fantastic opinion, another\nstarts up to match it, like beads on sparkling wine. A too restless\ndisplay of talent, a too undisguised statement of all that can be said\nfor and against a question, is perhaps the great fault that is to be\nattributed to him. Where there is so much power and prejudice to contend\nwith in the opposite scale, it may be thought that the balance of truth\ncan hardly be held with a slack or an even hand; and that the infusion\nof a little more visionary speculation, of a little more popular\nindignation into the great Whig Review would be an advantage both to\nitself and to the cause of freedom. Much of this effect is chargeable\nless on an Epicurean levity of feeling or on party-trammels, than on\nreal sanguineness of disposition, and a certain fineness of professional\ntact. Our sprightly Scotchman is not of a desponding and gloomy turn of\nmind. He argues well for the future hopes of mankind from the smallest\nbeginnings, watches the slow, gradual, reluctant growth of liberal\nviews, and smiling sees the aloe of Reform blossom at the end of a\nhundred years; while the habitual subtlety of his mind makes him\nperceive decided advantages where vulgar ignorance or passion sees only\ndoubts and difficulty; and a flaw in an adversary's argument stands him\ninstead of the shout of a mob, the votes of a majority, or the fate of\na pitched battle. The Editor is satisfied with his own conclusions, and\ndoes not make himself uneasy about the fate of mankind. The issue, he\nthinks, will verify his moderate and well-founded expectations.--We\nbelieve also that late events have given a more decided turn to Mr.\nJeffrey's mind, and that he feels that as in the struggle between\nliberty and slavery, the views of the one party have been laid bare with\ntheir success, so the exertions on the other side should become more\nstrenuous, and a more positive stand be made against the avowed and\nappalling encroachments of priestcraft and arbitrary power.\n\nThe characteristics of Mr. Jeffrey's general style as a writer\ncorrespond, we think, with what we have here stated as the\ncharacteristics of his mind. He is a master of the foils; he makes an\nexulting display of the dazzling fence of wit and argument. His strength\nconsists in great range of knowledge, an equal familiarity with the\nprinciples and the details of a subject, and in a glancing brilliancy\nand rapidity of style. Indeed, we doubt whether the brilliancy of his\nmanner does not resolve itself into the rapidity, the variety and\naptness of his illustrations. His pen is never at a loss, never stands\nstill; and would dazzle for this reason alone, like an eye that is ever\nin motion. Mr. Jeffrey is far from a flowery or affected writer; he has\nfew tropes or figures, still less any odd startling thoughts or quaint\ninnovations in expression:--but he has a constant supply of ingenious\nsolutions and pertinent examples; he never proses, never grows dull,\nnever wears an argument to tatters; and by the number, the liveliness\nand facility of his transitions, keeps up that appearance of vivacity,\nof novel and sparkling effect, for which others are too often indebted\nto singularity of combination or tinsel ornaments.\n\nIt may be discovered, by a nice observer, that Mr. Jeffrey's style of\ncomposition is that of a person accustomed to public speaking. There is\nno pause, no meagreness, no inanimateness, but a flow, a redundance and\nvolubility like that of a stream or of a rolling-stone. The language is\nmore copious than select, and sometimes two or three words perform the\noffice of one. This copiousness and facility is perhaps an advantage\nin _extempore_ speaking, where no stop or break is allowed in the\ndiscourse, and where any word or any number of words almost is better\nthan coming to a dead stand; but in written compositions it gives an\nair of either too much carelessness or too much labour. Mr. Jeffrey's\nexcellence, as a public speaker, has betrayed him into this peculiarity.\nHe makes fewer _blots_ in addressing an audience than any one we\nremember to have heard. There is not a hair's-breadth space between any\ntwo of his words, nor is there a single expression either ill-chosen or\nout of its place. He speaks without stopping to take breath, with ease,\nwith point, with elegance, and without \"spinning the thread of his\nverbosity finer than the staple of his argument.\" He may be said to\nweave words into any shapes he pleases for use or ornament, as the\nglass-blower moulds the vitreous fluid with his breath; and his\nsentences shine like glass from their polished smoothness, and are\nequally transparent. His style of eloquence, indeed, is remarkable for\nneatness, for correctness, and epigrammatic point; and he has applied\nthis as a standard to his written compositions, where the very same\ndegree of correctness and precision produces, from the contrast between\nwriting and speaking, an agreeable diffuseness, freedom, and animation.\nWhenever the Scotch advocate has appeared at the bar of the English\nHouse of Lords, he has been admired by those who were in the habit of\nattending to speeches there, as having the greatest fluency of language\nand the greatest subtlety of distinction of any one of the profession.\nThe law-reporters were as little able to follow him from the extreme\nrapidity of his utterance as from the tenuity and evanescent nature of\nhis reasoning.\n\nMr. Jeffrey's conversation is equally lively, various, and instructive.\nThere is no subject on which he is not _au fait_: no company in which he\nis not ready to scatter his pearls for sport. Whether it be politics, or\npoetry, or science, or anecdote, or wit, or raillery, he takes up his\ncue without effort, without preparation, and appears equally incapable\nof tiring himself or his hearers. His only difficulty seems to be not\nto speak, but to be silent. There is a constitutional buoyancy and\nelasticity of mind about him that cannot subside into repose, much less\nsink into dulness. There may be more original talkers, persons who\noccasionally surprise or interest you more; few, if any, with a more\nuninterrupted flow of cheerfulness and animal spirits, with a greater\nfund of information, and with fewer specimens of the _bathos_ in their\nconversation. He is never absurd, nor has he any favourite points\nwhich he is always bringing forward. It cannot be denied that there is\nsomething bordering on petulance of manner, but it is of that least\noffensive kind which may be accounted for from merit and from success,\nand implies no exclusive pretensions nor the least particle of ill-will\nto others. On the contrary, Mr. Jeffrey is profuse of his encomiums and\nadmiration of others, but still with a certain reservation of a right\nto differ or to blame. He cannot rest on one side of a question: he is\nobliged by a mercurial habit and disposition to vary his point of view.\nIf he is ever tedious, it is from an excess of liveliness: he oppresses\nfrom a sense of airy lightness. He is always setting out on a fresh\nscent: there are always _relays_ of topics; the harness is put to, and\nhe rattles away as delightfully and as briskly as ever. New causes are\ncalled; he holds a brief in his hand for every possible question.\nThis is a fault. Mr. Jeffrey is not obtrusive, is not impatient of\nopposition, is not unwilling to be interrupted; but what is said by\nanother, seems to make no impression on him; he is bound to dispute, to\nanswer it, as if he was in Court, or as if it were in a paltry Debating\nSociety, where young beginners were trying their hands. This is not to\nmaintain a character, or for want of good-nature--it is a thoughtless\nhabit. He cannot help cross-examining a witness, or stating the\nadverse view of the question. He listens not to judge, but to reply.\nIn consequence of this, you can as little tell the impression your\nobservations make on him as what weight to assign to his. Mr. Jeffrey\nshines in mixed company; he is not good in a _tete-a-tete_. You can only\nshew your wisdom or your wit in general society: but in private your\nfollies or your weaknesses are not the least interesting topics; and our\ncritic has neither any of his own to confess, nor does he take delight\nin hearing those of others. Indeed in Scotland generally, the display of\npersonal character, the indulging your whims and humours in the presence\nof a friend, is not much encouraged--every one there is looked upon in\nthe light of a machine or a collection of topics. They turn you round\nlike a cylinder to see what use they can make of you, and drag you into\na dispute with as little ceremony as they would drag out an article from\nan Encyclopedia. They criticise every thing, analyse every thing, argue\nupon every thing, dogmatise upon every thing; and the bundle of your\nhabits, feelings, humours, follies and pursuits is regarded by them no\nmore than a bundle of old clothes. They stop you in a sentiment by a\nquestion or a stare, and cut you short in a narrative by the time of\nnight. The accomplished and ingenious person of whom we speak, has been\na little infected by the tone of his countrymen--he is too didactic,\ntoo pugnacious, too full of electrical shocks, too much like a voltaic\nbattery, and reposes too little on his own excellent good sense, his\nown love of ease, his cordial frankness of disposition and unaffected\ncandour. He ought to have belonged to us!\n\nThe severest of critics (as he has been sometimes termed) is the\nbest-natured of men. Whatever there may be of wavering or indecision in\nMr. Jeffrey's reasoning, or of harshness in his critical decisions, in\nhis disposition there is nothing but simplicity and kindness. He is a\nperson that no one knows without esteeming, and who both in his public\nconnections and private friendships, shews the same manly uprightness\nand unbiassed independence of spirit. At a distance, in his writings, or\neven in his manner, there may be something to excite a little uneasiness\nand apprehension: in his conduct there is nothing to except against.\nHe is a person of strict integrity himself, without pretence or\naffectation; and knows how to respect this quality in others, without\nprudery or intolerance. He can censure a friend or a stranger, and serve\nhim effectually at the same time. He expresses his disapprobation, but\nnot as an excuse for closing up the avenues of his liberality. He is a\nScotchman without one particle of hypocrisy, of cant, of servility, or\nselfishness in his composition. He has not been spoiled by fortune--has\nnot been tempted by power--is firm without violence, friendly without\nweakness--a critic and even-tempered, a casuist and an honest man--and\namidst the toils of his profession and the distractions of the world,\nretains the gaiety, the unpretending carelessness and simplicity of\nyouth. Mr. Jeffrey in his person is slight, with a countenance of much\nexpression, and a voice of great flexibility and acuteness of tone.\n\n\n[Footnote A: The style of philosophical criticism, which has been the\nboast of the Edinburgh Review, was first introduced into the Monthly\nReview about the year 1796, in a series of articles by Mr. William\nTaylor, of Norwich.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. BROUGHAM--SIR F. BURDETT.\n\n\n\nThere is a class of eloquence which has been described and particularly\ninsisted on, under the style and title of _Irish Eloquence_: there is\nanother class which it is not absolutely unfair to oppose to this, and\nthat is the Scotch. The first of these is entirely the offspring of\n_impulse_: the last of _mechanism_. The one is as full of fancy as it is\nbare of facts: the other excludes all fancy, and is weighed down with\nfacts. The one is all fire, the other all ice: the one nothing but\nenthusiasm, extravagance, eccentricity; the other nothing but logical\ndeductions, and the most approved postulates. The one without scruple,\nnay, with reckless zeal, throws the reins loose on the neck of the\nimagination: the other pulls up with a curbbridle, and starts at every\ncasual object it meets in the way as a bug-bear. The genius of Irish\noratory stands forth in the naked majesty of untutored nature, its eye\nglancing wildly round on all objects, its tongue darting forked fire:\nthe genius of Scottish eloquence is armed in all the panoply of the\nschools; its drawling, ambiguous dialect seconds its circumspect\ndialectics; from behind the vizor that guards its mouth and shadows\nits pent-up brows, it sees no visions but its own set purpose, its own\n_data_, and its own dogmas. It \"has no figures, nor no fantasies,\" but\n\"those which busy care draws in the brains of men,\" or which set off its\nown superior acquirements and wisdom. It scorns to \"tread the primrose\npath of dalliance\"--it shrinks back from it as from a precipice, and\nkeeps in the iron rail-way of the understanding. Irish oratory, on the\ncontrary, is a sort of aeronaut: it is always going up in a balloon, and\nbreaking its neck, or coming down in the parachute. It is filled\nfull with gaseous matter, with whim and fancy, with alliteration and\nantithesis, with heated passion and bloated metaphors, that burst the\nslender, silken covering of sense; and the airy pageant, that glittered\nin empty space and rose in all the bliss of ignorance, flutters and\nsinks down to its native bogs! If the Irish orator riots in a studied\nneglect of his subject and a natural confusion of ideas, playing with\nwords, ranging them into all sorts of fantastic combinations, because in\nthe unlettered void or chaos of his mind there is no obstacle to their\ncoalescing into any shapes they please, it must be confessed that the\neloquence of the Scotch is encumbered with an excess of knowledge, that\nit cannot get on for a crowd of difficulties, that it staggers under\na load of topics, that it is so environed in the forms of logic and\nrhetoric as to be equally precluded from originality or absurdity, from\nbeauty or deformity:--the plea of humanity is lost by going through the\nprocess of law, the firm and manly tone of principle is exchanged for\nthe wavering and pitiful cant of policy, the living bursts of passion\nare reduced to a defunct _common-place_, and all true imagination\nis buried under the dust and rubbish of learned models and imposing\nauthorities. If the one is a bodiless phantom, the other is a lifeless\nskeleton: if the one in its feverish and hectic extravagance resembles a\nsick man's dream, the other is akin to the sleep of death--cold, stiff,\nunfeeling, monumental! Upon the whole, we despair less of the first than\nof the last, for the principle of life and motion is, after all, the\nprimary condition of all genius. The luxuriant wildness of the one may\nbe disciplined, and its excesses sobered down into reason; but the dry\nand rigid formality of the other can never burst the shell or husk of\noratory. It is true that the one is disfigured by the puerilities and\naffectation of a Phillips; but then it is redeemed by the manly sense\nand fervour of a Plunket, the impassioned appeals and flashes of wit of\na Curran, and by the golden tide of wisdom, eloquence, and fancy, that\nflowed from the lips of a Burke. In the other, we do not sink so low in\nthe negative series; but we get no higher in the ascending scale than\na Mackintosh or a Brougham.[A] It may be suggested that the late Lord\nErskine enjoyed a higher reputation as an orator than either of these:\nbut he owed it to a dashing and graceful manner, to presence of mind,\nand to great animation in delivering his sentiments. Stripped of these\noutward and personal advantages, the matter of his speeches, like that\nof his writings, is nothing, or perfectly inert and dead. Mr. Brougham\nis from the North of England, but he was educated in Edinburgh, and\nrepresents that school of politics and political economy in the House.\nHe differs from Sir James Mackintosh in this, that he deals less in\nabstract principles, and more in individual details. He makes less use\nof general topics, and more of immediate facts. Sir James is better\nacquainted with the balance of an argument in old authors; Mr. Brougham\nwith the balance of power in Europe. If the first is better versed in\nthe progress of history, no man excels the last in a knowledge of the\ncourse of exchange. He is apprised of the exact state of our exports and\nimports, and scarce a ship clears out its cargo at Liverpool or\nHull, but he has notice of the bill of lading. Our colonial policy,\nprison-discipline, the state of the Hulks, agricultural distress,\ncommerce and manufactures, the Bullion question, the Catholic question,\nthe Bourbons or the Inquisition, \"domestic treason, foreign levy,\"\nnothing can come amiss to him--he is at home in the crooked mazes of\nrotten boroughs, is not baffled by Scotch law, and can follow the\nmeaning of one of Mr. Canning's speeches. With so many resources, with\nsuch variety and solidity of information, Mr. Brougham is rather a\npowerful and alarming, than an effectual debater. In so many details\n(which he himself goes through with unwearied and unshrinking\nresolution) the spirit of the question is lost to others who have not\nthe same voluntary power of attention or the same interest in hearing\nthat he has in speaking; the original impulse that urged him forward is\nforgotten in so wide a field, in so interminable a career. If he can,\nothers _cannot_ carry all he knows in their heads at the same time; a\nrope of circumstantial evidence does not hold well together, nor drag\nthe unwilling mind along with it (the willing mind hurries on before it,\nand grows impatient and absent)--he moves in an unmanageable procession\nof facts and proofs, instead of coming to the point at once--and his\npremises (so anxious is he to proceed on sure and ample grounds) overlay\nand block up his conclusion, so that you cannot arrive at it, or not\ntill the first fury and shock of the onset is over. The ball, from\nthe too great width of the _calibre_ from which it is sent, and from\nstriking against such a number of hard, projecting points, is almost\nspent before it reaches its destination. He keeps a ledger or a\ndebtor-and-creditor account between the Government and the Country,\nposts so much actual crime, corruption, and injustice against so much\ncontingent advantage or sluggish prejudice, and at the bottom of the\npage brings in the balance of indignation and contempt, where it is due.\nBut people are not to be _calculated into_ contempt or indignation on\nabstract grounds; for however they may submit to this process where\ntheir own interests are concerned, in what regards the public good we\nbelieve they must see and feel instinctively, or not at all. There is\n(it is to be lamented) a good deal of froth as well as strength in the\npopular spirit, which will not admit of being _decanted_ or served out\nin formal driblets; nor will spleen (the soul of Opposition) bear to be\ncorked up in square patent bottles, and kept for future use! In a word,\nMr. Brougham's is ticketed and labelled eloquence, registered and in\nnumeros (like the successive parts of a Scotch Encyclopedia)--it\nis clever, knowing, imposing, masterly, an extraordinary display of\nclearness of head, of quickness and energy of thought, of application\nand industry; but it is not the eloquence of the imagination or the\nheart, and will never save a nation or an individual from perdition.\n\nMr. Brougham has one considerable advantage in debate: he is overcome\nby no false modesty, no deference to others. But then, by a natural\nconsequence or parity of reasoning, he has little sympathy with other\npeople, and is liable to be mistaken in the effect his arguments will\nhave upon them. He relies too much, among other things, on the patience\nof his hearers, and on his ability to turn every thing to his own\nadvantage. He accordingly goes to the full length of _his tether_ (in\nvulgar phrase) and often overshoots the mark. _C'est dommage_. He has no\nreserve of discretion, no retentiveness of mind or check upon himself.\nHe needs, with so much wit,\n\n  \"As much again to govern it.\"\n\nHe cannot keep a good thing or a shrewd piece of information in his\npossession, though the letting it out should mar a cause. It is not\nthat he thinks too much of himself, too little of his cause: but he is\nabsorbed in the pursuit of truth as an abstract inquiry, he is led away\nby the headstrong and over-mastering activity of his own mind. He is\nborne along, almost involuntarily, and not impossibly against his better\njudgment, by the throng and restlessness of his ideas as by a crowd\nof people in motion. His perceptions are literal, tenacious,\n_epileptic_--his understanding voracious of facts, and equally\ncommunicative of them--and he proceeds to\n\n  \"--------Pour out all as plain\n  As downright Shippen or as old Montaigne\"--\n\nwithout either the virulence of the one or the _bonhommie_ of the other.\nThe repeated, smart, unforeseen discharges of the truth jar those\nthat are next him. He does not dislike this state of irritation and\ncollision, indulges his curiosity or his triumph, till by calling for\nmore facts or hazarding some extreme inference, he urges a question to\nthe verge of a precipice, his adversaries urge it _over_, and he himself\nshrinks back from the consequence--\n\n  \"Scared at the sound himself has made!\"\n\nMr. Brougham has great fearlessness, but not equal firmness; and after\ngoing too far on the _forlorn hope_, turns short round without due\nwarning to others or respect for himself. He is adventurous, but easily\npanic-struck; and sacrifices the vanity of self-opinion to the necessity\nof self-preservation. He is too improvident for a leader, too petulant\nfor a partisan; and does not sufficiently consult those with whom he is\nsupposed to act in concert. He sometimes leaves them in the lurch,\nand is sometimes left in the lurch by them. He wants the principle of\nco-operation. He frequently, in a fit of thoughtless levity, gives an\nunexpected turn to the political machine, which alarms older and more\nexperienced heads: if he was not himself the first to get out of harm's\nway and escape from the danger, it would be well!--We hold, indeed, as\na general rule, that no man born or bred in Scotland can be a great\norator, unless he is a mere quack; or a great statesman unless he turns\nplain knave. The national gravity is against the first: the national\ncaution is against the last. To a Scotchman if a thing _is, it is_;\nthere is an end of the question with his opinion about it. He is\npositive and abrupt, and is not in the habit of conciliating the\nfeelings or soothing the follies of others. His only way therefore to\nproduce a popular effect is to sail with the stream of prejudice, and\nto vent common dogmas, \"the total grist, unsifted, husks and all,\" from\nsome evangelical pulpit. This may answer, and it has answered. On the\nother hand, if a Scotchman, born or bred, comes to think at all of the\nfeelings of others, it is not as they regard them, but as their\nopinion reacts on his own interest and safety. He is therefore either\npragmatical and offensive, or if he tries to please, he becomes cowardly\nand fawning. His public spirit wants pliancy; his selfish compliances\ngo all lengths. He is as impracticable as a popular partisan, as he\nis mischievous as a tool of Government. We do not wish to press\nthis argument farther, and must leave it involved in some degree of\nobscurity, rather than bring the armed intellect of a whole nation on\nour heads.\n\nMr. Brougham speaks in a loud and unmitigated tone of voice, sometimes\nalmost approaching to a scream. He is fluent, rapid, vehement, full of\nhis subject, with evidently a great deal to say, and very regardless\nof the manner of saying it. As a lawyer, he has not hitherto been\nremarkably successful. He is not profound in cases and reports, nor does\nhe take much interest in the peculiar features of a particular cause, or\nshew much adroitness in the management of it. He carries too much weight\nof metal for ordinary and petty occasions: he must have a pretty large\nquestion to discuss, and must make _thorough-stitch_ work of it. He,\nhowever, had an encounter with Mr. Phillips the other day, and shook all\nhis tender blossoms, so that they fell to the ground, and withered in an\nhour; but they soon bloomed again! Mr. Brougham writes almost, if not\nquite, as well as he speaks. In the midst of an Election contest he\ncomes out to address the populace, and goes back to his study to finish\nan article for the Edinburgh Review; sometimes indeed wedging three or\nfour articles (in the shape of _refaccimentos_ of his own pamphlets\nor speeches in parliament) into a single number. Such indeed is the\nactivity of his mind that it appears to require neither repose, nor any\nother stimulus than a delight in its own exercise. He can turn his\nhand to any thing, but he cannot be idle. There are few intellectual\naccomplishments which he does not possess, and possess in a very\nhigh degree. He speaks French (and, we believe, several other modern\nlanguages) fluently: is a capital mathematician, and obtained an\nintroduction to the celebrated Carnot in this latter character, when the\nconversation turned on squaring the circle, and not on the propriety of\nconfining France within the natural boundary of the Rhine. Mr. Brougham\nis, in fact, a striking instance of the versatility and strength of the\nhuman mind, and also in one sense of the length of human life, if we\nmake a good use of our time. There is room enough to crowd almost every\nart and science into it. If we pass \"no day without a line,\" visit no\nplace without the company of a book, we may with ease fill libraries or\nempty them of their contents. Those who complain of the shortness of\nlife, let it slide by them without wishing to seize and make the most of\nits golden minutes. The more we do, the more we can do; the more busy we\nare, the more leisure we have. If any one possesses any advantage in a\nconsiderable degree, he may make himself master of nearly as many more\nas he pleases, by employing his spare time and cultivating the waste\nfaculties of his mind. While one person is determining on the choice of\na profession or study, another shall have made a fortune or gained a\nmerited reputation. While one person is dreaming over the meaning of a\nword, another will have learnt several languages. It is not incapacity,\nbut indolence, indecision, want of imagination, and a proneness to a\nsort of mental tautology, to repeat the same images and tread the same\ncircle, that leaves us so poor, so dull, and inert as we are, so naked\nof acquirement, so barren of resources! While we are walking backwards\nand forwards between Charing-Cross and Temple-Bar, and sitting in the\nsame coffee-house every day, we might make the grand tour of Europe, and\nvisit the Vatican and the Louvre. Mr. Brougham, among other means of\nstrengthening and enlarging his views, has visited, we believe, most of\nthe courts, and turned his attention to most of the Constitutions of the\ncontinent. He is, no doubt, a very accomplished, active-minded, and\nadmirable person.\n\nSir Francis Burdett, in many respects, affords a contrast to the\nforegoing character. He is a plain, unaffected, unsophisticated English\ngentleman. He is a person of great reading too and considerable\ninformation, but he makes very little display of these, unless it be to\nquote Shakespear, which he does often with extreme aptness and felicity.\nSir Francis is one of the most pleasing speakers in the House, and is a\nprodigious favourite of the English people. So he ought to be: for he is\none of the few remaining examples of the old English understanding and\nold English character. All that he pretends to is common sense and\ncommon honesty; and a greater compliment cannot be paid to these than\nthe attention with which he is listened to in the House of Commons. We\ncannot conceive a higher proof of courage than the saying things which\nhe has been known to say there; and we have seen him blush and appear\nashamed of the truths he has been obliged to utter, like a bashful\nnovice. He could not have uttered what he often did there, if, besides\nhis general respectability, he had not been a very honest, a very\ngood-tempered, and a very good-looking man. But there was evidently no\nwish to shine, nor any desire to offend: it was painful to him to hurt\nthe feelings of those who heard him, but it was a higher duty in him not\nto suppress his sincere and earnest convictions. It is wonderful how\nmuch virtue and plain-dealing a man may be guilty of with impunity, if\nhe has no vanity, or ill-nature, or duplicity to provoke the contempt or\nresentment of others, and to make them impatient of the superiority he\nsets up over them. We do not recollect that Sir Francis ever endeavoured\nto atone for any occasional indiscretions or intemperance by giving\nthe Duke of York credit for the battle of Waterloo, or congratulating\nMinisters on the confinement of Buonaparte at St. Helena. There is no\nhonest cause which he dares not avow: no oppressed individual that he\nis not forward to succour. He has the firmness of manhood with the\nunimpaired enthusiasm of youthful feeling about him. His principles are\nmellowed and improved, without having become less sound with time: for\nat one period he sometimes appeared to come charged to the House with\nthe petulance and caustic sententiousness he had imbibed at Wimbledon\nCommon. He is never violent or in extremes, except when the people or\nthe parliament happen to be out of their senses; and then he seems to\nregret the necessity of plainly telling them he thinks so, instead of\npluming himself upon it or exulting over impending calamities. There\nis only one error he seems to labour under (which, we believe, he also\nborrowed from Mr. Horne Tooke or Major Cartwright), the wanting to go\nback to the early times of our Constitution and history in search of the\nprinciples of law and liberty. He might as well\n\n  \"Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream.\"\n\nLiberty, in our opinion, is but a modern invention (the growth of books\nand printing)--and whether new or old, is not the less desirable. A man\nmay be a patriot, without being an antiquary. This is the only point\non which Sir Francis is at all inclined to a tincture of pedantry. In\ngeneral, his love of liberty is pure, as it is warm and steady: his\nhumanity is unconstrained and free. His heart does not ask leave of his\nhead to feel; nor does prudence always keep a guard upon his tongue or\nhis pen. No man writes a better letter to his Constituents than the\nmember for Westminster; and his compositions of that kind ought to be\ngood, for they have occasionally cost him dear. He is the idol of the\npeople of Westminster: few persons have a greater number of friends\nand well-wishers; and he has still greater reason to be proud of his\nenemies, for his integrity and independence have made them so. Sir\nFrancis Burdett has often been left in a Minority in the House of\nCommons, with only one or two on his side. We suspect, unfortunately for\nhis country, that History will be found to enter its protest on the same\nside of the question!\n\n\n[Footnote A: Mr. Brougham is not a Scotchman literally, but by\nadoption.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nLORD ELDON AND MR. WILBERFORCE.\n\n\n\nLord Eldon is an exceedingly good-natured man; but this does not prevent\nhim, like other good-natured people, from consulting his own ease or\ninterest. The character of _good-nature_, as it is called, has been a\ngood deal mistaken; and the present Chancellor is not a bad illustration\nof the grounds of the prevailing error. When we happen to see an\nindividual whose countenance is \"all tranquillity and smiles;\" who\nis full of good-humour and pleasantry; whose manners are gentle and\nconciliating; who is uniformly temperate in his expressions, and\npunctual and just in his every-day dealings; we are apt to conclude from\nso fair an outside, that\n\n  \"All is conscience and tender heart\"\n\nwithin also, and that such a one would not hurt a fly. And neither would\nhe without a motive. But mere good-nature (or what passes in the world\nfor such) is often no better than indolent selfishness. A person\ndistinguished and praised for this quality will not needlessly offend\nothers, because they may retaliate; and besides, it ruffles his own\ntemper. He likes to enjoy a perfect calm, and to live in an interchange\nof kind offices. He suffers few things to irritate or annoy him. He has\na fine oiliness in his disposition, which smooths the waves of passion\nas they rise. He does not enter into the quarrels or enmities of others;\nbears their calamities with patience; he listens to the din and clang of\nwar, the earthquake and the hurricane of the political and moral world\nwith the temper and spirit of a philosopher; no act of injustice puts\nhim beside himself, the follies and absurdities of mankind never give\nhim a moment's uneasiness, he has none of the ordinary causes of\nfretfulness or chagrin that torment others from the undue interest they\ntake in the conduct of their neighbours or in the public good. None of\nthese idle or frivolous sources of discontent, that make such havoc\nwith the peace of human life, ever discompose his features or alter the\nserenity of his pulse. If a nation is robbed of its rights,\n\n  \"If wretches hang that Ministers may dine,\"--\n\nthe laughing jest still collects in his eye, the cordial squeeze of the\nhand is still the same. But tread on the toe of one of these amiable and\nimperturbable mortals, or let a lump of soot fall down the chimney and\nspoil their dinners, and see how they will bear it. All their patience\nis confined to the accidents that befal others: all their good-humour\nis to be resolved into giving themselves no concern about any thing but\ntheir own ease and self-indulgence. Their charity begins and ends at\nhome. Their being free from the common infirmities of temper is owing to\ntheir indifference to the common feelings of humanity; and if you touch\nthe sore place, they betray more resentment, and break out (like spoiled\nchildren) into greater fractiousness than others, partly from a greater\ndegree of selfishness, and partly because they are taken by surprise,\nand mad to think they have not guarded every point against annoyance or\nattack, by a habit of callous insensibility and pampered indolence.\n\nAn instance of what we mean occurred but the other day. An allusion was\nmade in the House of Commons to something in the proceedings in the\nCourt of Chancery, and the Lord Chancellor comes to his place in the\nCourt, with the statement in his hand, fire in his eyes, and a direct\ncharge of falsehood in his mouth, without knowing any thing certain\nof the matter, without making any inquiry into it, without using any\nprecaution or putting the least restraint upon himself, and all on no\nbetter authority than a common newspaper report. The thing was (not that\nwe are imputing any strong blame in this case, we merely bring it as an\nillustration) it touched himself, his office, the inviolability of his\njurisdiction, the unexceptionableness of his proceedings, and the wet\nblanket of the Chancellor's temper instantly took fire like tinder! All\nthe fine balancing was at an end; all the doubts, all the delicacy, all\nthe candour real or affected, all the chances that there might be a\nmistake in the report, all the decencies to be observed towards a Member\nof the House, are overlooked by the blindness of passion, and the wary\nJudge pounces upon the paragraph without mercy, without a moment's\ndelay, or the smallest attention to forms! This was indeed serious\nbusiness, there was to be no trifling here; every instant was an age\ntill the Chancellor had discharged his sense of indignation on the head\nof the indiscreet interloper on his authority. Had it been another\nperson's case, another person's dignity that had been compromised,\nanother person's conduct that had been called in question, who doubts\nbut that the matter might have stood over till the next term, that the\nNoble Lord would have taken the Newspaper home in his pocket, that he\nwould have compared it carefully with other newspapers, that he would\nhave written in the most mild and gentlemanly terms to the Honourable\nMember to inquire into the truth of the statement, that he would have\nwatched a convenient opportunity good-humouredly to ask other Honourable\nMembers what all this was about, that the greatest caution and fairness\nwould have been observed, and that to this hour the lawyers' clerks and\nthe junior counsel would have been in the greatest admiration of the\nChancellor's nicety of discrimination, and the utter inefficacy of the\nheats, importunities, haste, and passions of others to influence his\njudgment? This would have been true; yet his readiness to decide and to\ncondemn where he himself is concerned, shews that passion is not dead in\nhim, nor subject to the controul of reason; but that self-love is the\nmain-spring that moves it, though on all beyond that limit he looks with\nthe most perfect calmness and philosophic indifference.\n\n  \"Resistless passion sways us to the mood\n  Of what it likes or loaths.\"\n\nAll people are passionate in what concerns themselves, or in what they\ntake an interest in. The range of this last is different in different\npersons; but the want of passion is but another name for the want of\nsympathy and imagination.\n\nThe Lord Chancellor's impartiality and conscientious exactness is\nproverbial; and is, we believe, as inflexible as it is delicate in\nall cases that occur in the stated routine of legal practice. The\nimpatience, the irritation, the hopes, the fears, the confident tone of\nthe applicants move him not a jot from his intended course, he looks at\ntheir claims with the \"lack lustre eye\" of prefessional indifference.\nPower and influence apart, his next strongest passion is to indulge in\nthe exercise of professional learning and skill, to amuse himself with\nthe dry details and intricate windings of the law of equity. He delights\nto balance a straw, to see a feather turn the scale, or make it even\nagain; and divides and subdivides a scruple to the smallest fraction. He\nunravels the web of argument and pieces it together again; folds it up\nand lays it aside, that he may examine it more at his leisure. He hugs\nindecision to his breast, and takes home a modest doubt or a nice point\nto solace himself with it in protracted, luxurious dalliance. Delay\nseems, in his mind, to be of the very essence of justice. He no more\nhurries through a question than if no one was waiting for the result,\nand he was merely a _dilettanti_, fanciful judge, who played at my Lord\nChancellor, and busied himself with quibbles and punctilios as an idle\nhobby and harmless illusion. The phlegm of the Chancellor's disposition\ngives one almost a surfeit of impartiality and candour: we are sick\nof the eternal poise of childish dilatoriness; and would wish law and\njustice to be decided at once by a cast of the dice (as they were in\nRabelais) rather than be kept in frivolous and tormenting suspense. But\nthere is a limit even to this extreme refinement and scrupulousness\nof the Chancellor. The understanding acts only in the absence of the\npassions. At the approach of the loadstone, the needle trembles, and\npoints to it. The air of a political question has a wonderful tendency\nto brace and quicken the learned Lord's faculties. The breath of a court\nspeedily oversets a thousand objections, and scatters the cobwebs of his\nbrain. The secret wish of power is a thumping _make-weight,_ where all\nis so nicely-balanced beforehand. In the case of a celebrated beauty and\nheiress, and the brother of a Noble Lord, the Chancellor hesitated long,\nand went through the forms, as usual: but who ever doubted, where all\nthis indecision would end? No man in his senses, for a single instant!\nWe shall not press this point, which is rather a ticklish one. Some\npersons thought that from entertaining a fellow-feeling on the subject,\nthe Chancellor would have been ready to favour the Poet-Laureat's\napplication to the Court of Chancery for an injunction against Wat\nTyler. His Lordship's sentiments on such points are not so variable, he\nhas too much at stake. He recollected the year 1794, though Mr. Southey\nhad forgotten it!--\n\nThe personal always prevails over the intellectual, where the latter is\nnot backed by strong feeling and principle. Where remote and speculative\nobjects do not excite a predominant interest and passion, gross and\nimmediate ones are sure to carry the day, even in ingenuous and\nwell-disposed minds. The will yields necessarily to some motive or\nother; and where the public good or distant consequences excite no\nsympathy in the breast, either from short-sightedness or an easiness of\ntemperament that shrinks from any violent effort or painful emotion,\nself-interest, indolence, the opinion of others, a desire to please, the\nsense of personal obligation, come in and fill up the void of public\nspirit, patriotism, and humanity. The best men in the world in their own\nnatural dispositions or in private life (for this reason) often become\nthe most dangerous public characters, from their pliancy to the unruly\npassions of others, and from their having no set-off in strong moral\n_stamina_ to the temptations that are held out to them, if, as is\nfrequently the case, they are men of versatile talent or patient\nindustry.--Lord Eldon has one of the best-natured faces in the world;\nit is pleasant to meet him in the street, plodding along with an\numbrella under his arm, without one trace of pride, of spleen, or\ndiscontent in his whole demeanour, void of offence, with almost rustic\nsimplicity and honesty of appearance--a man that makes friends at first\nsight, and could hardly make enemies, if he would; and whose only fault\nis that he cannot say _Nay_ to power, or subject himself to an unkind\nword or look from a King or a Minister. He is a thorough-bred Tory.\nOthers boggle or are at fault in their career, or give back at a pinch,\nthey split into different factions, have various objects to distract\nthem, their private friendships or antipathies stand in their way; but\nhe has never flinched, never gone back, never missed his way, he is an\n_out-and-outer_ in this respect, his allegiance has been without flaw,\nlike \"one entire and perfect chrysolite,\" his implicit understanding is\na kind of taffeta-lining to the Crown, his servility has assumed an air\nof the most determined independence, and he has\n\n  \"Read his history in a Prince's eyes!\"--\n\nThere has been no stretch of power attempted in his time that he has not\nseconded: no existing abuse, so odious or so absurd, that he has not\nsanctioned it. He has gone the whole length of the most unpopular\ndesigns of Ministers. When the heavy artillery of interest, power, and\nprejudice is brought into the field, the paper pellets of the brain go\nfor nothing: his labyrinth of nice, lady-like doubts explodes like a\nmine of gun-powder. The Chancellor may weigh and palter--the courtier\nis decided, the politician is firm, and rivetted to his place in the\nCabinet! On all the great questions that have divided party opinion or\nagitated the public mind, the Chancellor has been found uniformly and\nwithout a single exception on the side of prerogative and power,\nand against every proposal for the advancement of freedom. He was a\nstrenuous supporter of the wars and coalitions against the principles of\nliberty abroad; he has been equally zealous in urging or defending every\nact and infringement of the Constitution, for abridging it at home: he\nat the same time opposes every amelioration of the penal laws, on the\nalleged ground of his abhorrence of even the shadow of innovation: he\nhas studiously set his face against Catholic emancipation; he laboured\nhard in his vocation to prevent the abolition of the Slave Trade; he was\nAttorney General in the trials for High Treason in 1794; and the other\nday in giving his opinion on the Queen's Trial, shed tears and protested\nhis innocence before God! This was natural and to be expected; but\non all occasions he is to be found at his post, true to the call of\nprejudice, of power, to the will of others and to his own interest.\nIn the whole of his public career, and with all the goodness of his\ndisposition, he has not shewn \"so small a drop of pity as a wren's eye.\"\nHe seems to be on his guard against every thing liberal and humane as\nhis weak side. Others relax in their obsequiousness either from satiety\nor disgust, or a hankering after popularity, or a wish to be thought\nabove narrow prejudices. The Chancellor alone is fixed and immoveable.\nIs it want of understanding or of principle? No--it is want of\nimagination, a phlegmatic habit, an excess of false complaisance and\ngood-nature ... Common humanity and justice are little better than vague\nterms to him: he acts upon his immediate feelings and least irksome\nimpulses. The King's hand is velvet to the touch--the Woolsack is a\nseat of honour and profit! That is all he knows about the matter. As to\nabstract metaphysical calculations, the ox that stands staring at the\ncorner of the street troubles his head as much about them as he does:\nyet this last is a very good sort of animal with no harm or malice in\nhim, unless he is goaded on to mischief, and then it is necessary to\nkeep out of his way, or warn others against him!\n\nMr. Wilberforce is a less perfect character in his way. He acts from\nmixed motives. He would willingly serve two masters, God and Mammon. He\nis a person of many excellent and admirable qualifications, but he has\nmade a mistake in wishing to reconcile those that are incompatible.\nHe has a most winning eloquence, specious, persuasive, familiar,\nsilver-tongued, is amiable, charitable, conscientious, pious, loyal,\nhumane, tractable to power, accessible to popularity, honouring the\nking, and no less charmed with the homage of his fellow-citizens. \"What\nlacks he then?\" Nothing but an economy of good parts. By aiming at\ntoo much, he has spoiled all, and neutralised what might have been an\nestimable character, distinguished by signal services to mankind. A\nman must take his choice not only between virtue and vice, but between\ndifferent virtues. Otherwise, he will not gain his own approbation, or\nsecure the respect of others. The graces and accomplishments of private\nlife mar the man of business and the statesman. There is a severity, a\nsternness, a self-denial, and a painful sense of duty required in\nthe one, which ill befits the softness and sweetness which should\ncharacterise the other. Loyalty, patriotism, friendship, humanity, are\nall virtues; but may they not sometimes clash? By being unwilling to\nforego the praise due to any, we may forfeit the reputation of all; and\ninstead of uniting the suffrages of the whole world in our favour, we\nmay end in becoming a sort of bye-word for affectation, cant, hollow\nprofessions, trimming, fickleness, and effeminate imbecility. It is best\nto choose and act up to some one leading character, as it is best to\nhave some settled profession or regular pursuit in life.\n\nWe can readily believe that Mr. Wilberforce's first object and principle\nof action is to do what he thinks right: his next (and that we fear is\nof almost equal weight with the first) is to do what will be thought so\nby other people. He is always at a game of _hawk and buzzard_ between\nthese two: his \"conscience will not budge,\" unless the world goes with\nit. He does not seem greatly to dread the denunciation in Scripture,\nbut rather to court it--\"Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of\nyou!\" We suspect he is not quite easy in his mind, because West-India\nplanters and Guinea traders do not join in his praise. His ears are not\nstrongly enough tuned to drink in the execrations of the spoiler and the\noppressor as the sweetest music. It is not enough that one half of the\nhuman species (the images of God carved in ebony, as old Fuller calls\nthem) shout his name as a champion and a saviour through vast burning\nzones, and moisten their parched lips with the gush of gratitude for\ndeliverance from chains--he must have a Prime-Minister drink his health\nat a Cabinet-dinner for aiding to rivet on those of his country and\nof Europe! He goes hand and heart along with Government in all their\nnotions of legitimacy and political aggrandizement, in the hope that\nthey will leave him a sort of _no-man's ground_ of humanity in the Great\nDesert, where his reputation for benevolence and public spirit may\nspring up and flourish, till its head touches the clouds, and it\nstretches out its branches to the farthest part of the earth. He has\nno mercy on those who claim a property in negro-slaves as so much\nlive-stock on their estates; the country rings with the applause of\nhis wit, his eloquence, and his indignant appeals to common sense and\nhumanity on this subject--but not a word has he to say, not a whisper\ndoes he breathe against the claim set up by the Despots of the Earth\nover their Continental subjects, but does every thing in his power to\nconfirm and sanction it! He must give no offence. Mr. Wilberforce's\nhumanity will go all lengths that it can with safety and discretion: but\nit is not to be supposed that it should lose him his seat for Yorkshire,\nthe smile of Majesty, or the countenance of the loyal and pious. He is\nanxious to do all the good he can without hurting himself or his fair\nfame. His conscience and his character compound matters very amicably.\nHe rather patronises honesty than is a martyr to it. His patriotism, his\nphilanthropy are not so ill-bred, as to quarrel with his loyalty or to\nbanish him from the first circles. He preaches vital Christianity to\nuntutored savages; and tolerates its worst abuses in civilized states.\nHe thus shews his respect for religion without offending the clergy, or\ncircumscribing the sphere of his usefulness. There is in all this an\nappearance of a good deal of cant and tricking. His patriotism may\nbe accused of being servile; his humanity ostentatious; his loyalty\nconditional; his religion a mixture of fashion and fanaticism. \"Out upon\nsuch half-faced fellowship!\" Mr. Wilberforce has the pride of being\nfamiliar with the great; the vanity of being popular; the conceit of an\napproving conscience. He is coy in his approaches to power; his public\nspirit is, in a manner, _under the rose_. He thus reaps the credit\nof independence, without the obloquy; and secures the advantages of\nservility, without incurring any obligations. He has two strings to his\nbow:--he by no means neglects his worldly interests, while he expects\na bright reversion in the skies. Mr. Wilberforce is far from being\na hypocrite; but he is, we think, as fine a specimen of _moral\nequivocation_ as can well be conceived. A hypocrite is one who is the\nvery reverse of, or who despises the character he pretends to be: Mr.\nWilberforce would be all that he pretends to be, and he is it in fact,\nas far as words, plausible theories, good inclinations, and easy\nservices go, but not in heart and soul, or so as to give up the\nappearance of any one of his pretensions to preserve the reality of any\nother. He carefully chooses his ground to fight the battles of\nloyalty, religion, and humanity, and it is such as is always safe and\nadvantageous to himself! This is perhaps hardly fair, and it is of\ndangerous or doubtful tendency. Lord Eldon, for instance, is known to be\na thorough-paced ministerialist: his opinion is only that of his party.\nBut Mr. Wilberforce is not a party-man. He is the more looked up to\non this account, but not with sufficient reason. By tampering with\ndifferent temptations and personal projects, he has all the air of the\nmost perfect independence, and gains a character for impartiality and\ncandour, when he is only striking a balance in his mind between the\n_\u00e9clat_ of differing from a Minister on some 'vantage ground, and the\nrisk or odium that may attend it. He carries all the weight of his\nartificial popularity over to the Government on vital points and\nhard-run questions; while they, in return, lend him a little of the\ngilding of court-favour to set off his disinterested philanthropy and\ntramontane enthusiasm. As a leader or a follower, he makes an odd jumble\nof interests. By virtue of religious sympathy, he has brought the Saints\nover to the side of the abolition of Negro slavery. This his adversaries\nthink hard and stealing a march upon them. What have the SAINTS to do\nwith freedom or reform of any kind?--Mr. Wilberforce's style of\nspeaking is not quite _parliamentary_, it is halfway between that and\n_evangelical_. He is altogether a _double-entendre:_ the very tone of\nhis voice is a _double-entendre._ It winds, and undulates, and glides\nup and down on texts of Scripture, and scraps from Paley, and trite\nsophistry, and pathetic appeals to his hearers in a faltering,\ninprogressive, sidelong way, like those birds of weak wing, that are\nborne from their strait-forward course\n\n  \"By every little breath that under heaven is blown.\"\n\nSomething of this fluctuating, time-serving principle was visible even\nin the great question of the Abolition of the Slave Trade. He was, at\none time, half inclined to surrender it into Mr. Pitt's dilatory hands,\nand seemed to think the gloss of novelty was gone from it, and the gaudy\ncolouring of popularity sunk into the _sable_ ground from which it rose!\nIt was, however, persisted in and carried to a triumphant conclusion.\nMr. Wilberforce said too little on this occasion of one, compared with\nwhom he was but the frontispiece to that great chapter in the history of\nthe world--the mask, the varnishing, and painting--the man that effected\nit by Herculean labours of body, and equally gigantic labours of mind\nwas Clarkson, the true Apostle of human Redemption on that occasion, and\nwho, it is remarkable, resembles in his person and lineaments more than\none of the Apostles in the _Cartoons_ of Raphael. He deserves to be\nadded to the Twelve![A]\n\n\n[Footnote A: After all, the best as well as most amusing comment on the\ncharacter just described was that made by Sheridan, who being picked up\nin no very creditable plight by the watch, and asked rather roughly who\nhe was, made answer--\"I am Mr. Wilberforce!\" The guardians of the night\nconducted him home with all the honours due to Grace and Nature.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. SOUTHEY.\n\n\nMr. Southey, as we formerly remember to have seen him, had a hectic\nflush upon his cheek, a roving fire in his eye, a falcon glance, a look\nat once aspiring and dejected--it was the look that had been impressed\nupon his face by the events that marked the outset of his life, it was\nthe dawn of Liberty that still tinged his cheek, a smile betwixt hope\nand sadness that still played upon his quivering lip. Mr. Southey's mind\nis essentially sanguine, even to over-weeningness. It is prophetic of\ngood; it cordially embraces it; it casts a longing, lingering look after\nit, even when it is gone for ever. He cannot bear to give up the thought\nof happiness, his confidence in his fellow-man, when all else despair.\nIt is the very element, \"where he must live or have no life at all.\"\nWhile he supposed it possible that a better form of society could be\nintroduced than any that had hitherto existed, while the light of the\nFrench Revolution beamed into his soul (and long after, it was seen\nreflected on his brow, like the light of setting suns on the peak of\nsome high mountain, or lonely range of clouds, floating in purer ether!)\nwhile he had this hope, this faith in man left, he cherished it with\nchild-like simplicity, he clung to it with the fondness of a lover, he\nwas an enthusiast, a fanatic, a leveller; he stuck at nothing that\nhe thought would banish all pain and misery from the world--in his\nimpatience of the smallest error or injustice, he would have sacrificed\nhimself and the existing generation (a holocaust) to his devotion to the\nright cause. But when he once believed after many staggering doubts and\npainful struggles, that this was no longer possible, when his chimeras\nand golden dreams of human perfectibility vanished from him, he turned\nsuddenly round, and maintained that \"whatever _is_, is right.\" Mr.\nSouthey has not fortitude of mind, has not patience to think that evil\nis inseparable from the nature of things. His irritable sense rejects\nthe alternative altogether, as a weak stomach rejects the food that\nis distasteful to it. He hopes on against hope, he believes in all\nunbelief. He must either repose on actual or on imaginary good. He\nmissed his way in _Utopia_, he has found it at Old Sarum--\n\n  \"His generous _ardour_ no cold medium knows:\"\n\nhis eagerness admits of no doubt or delay. He is ever in extremes, and\never in the wrong!\n\nThe reason is, that not truth, but self-opinion is the ruling principle\nof Mr. Southey's mind. The charm of novelty, the applause of the\nmultitude, the sanction of power, the venerableness of antiquity, pique,\nresentment, the spirit of contradiction have a good deal to do with his\npreferences. His inquiries are partial and hasty: his conclusions raw\nand unconcocted, and with a considerable infusion of whim and humour and\na monkish spleen. His opinions are like certain wines, warm and generous\nwhen new; but they will not keep, and soon turn flat or sour, for want\nof a stronger spirit of the understanding to give a body to them. He\nwooed Liberty as a youthful lover, but it was perhaps more as a mistress\nthan a bride; and he has since wedded with an elderly and not very\nreputable lady, called Legitimacy. _A wilful man_, according to the\nScotch proverb, _must have his way_. If it were the cause to which he\nwas sincerely attached, he would adhere to it through good report and\nevil report; but it is himself to whom he does homage, and would have\nothers do so; and he therefore changes sides, rather than submit to\napparent defeat or temporary mortification. Abstract principle has\nno rule but the understood distinction between right and wrong; the\nindulgence of vanity, of caprice, or prejudice is regulated by the\nconvenience or bias of the moment. The temperament of our politician's\nmind is poetical, not philosophical. He is more the creature of impulse,\nthan he is of reflection. He invents the unreal, he embellishes the\nfalse with the glosses of fancy, but pays little attention to \"the words\nof truth and soberness.\" His impressions are accidental, immediate,\npersonal, instead of being permanent and universal. Of all mortals he is\nsurely the most impatient of contradiction, even when he has completely\nturned the tables on himself. Is not this very inconsistency the reason?\nIs he not tenacious of his opinions, in proportion as they are brittle\nand hastily formed? Is he not jealous of the grounds of his belief,\nbecause he fears they will not bear inspection, or is conscious he\nhas shifted them? Does he not confine others to the strict line of\northodoxy, because he has himself taken every liberty? Is he not afraid\nto look to the right or the left, lest he should see the ghosts of his\nformer extravagances staring him in the face? Does he not refuse to\ntolerate the smallest shade of difference in others, because he feels\nthat he wants the utmost latitude of construction for differing so\nwidely from himself? Is he not captious, dogmatical, petulant in\ndelivering his sentiments, according as he has been inconsistent,\nrash, and fanciful in adopting them? He maintains that there can be no\npossible ground for differing from him, because he looks only at his\nown side of the question! He sets up his own favourite notions as the\nstandard of reason and honesty, because he has changed from one extreme\nto another! He treats his opponents with contempt, because he is himself\nafraid of meeting with disrespect! He says that \"a Reformer is a worse\ncharacter than a house-breaker,\" in order to stifle the recollection\nthat he himself once was one!\n\nWe must say that \"we relish Mr. Southey more in the Reformer\" than in\nhis lately acquired, but by no means natural or becoming character of\npoet-laureat and courtier. He may rest assured that a garland of wild\nflowers suits him better than the laureat-wreath: that his pastoral odes\nand popular inscriptions were far more adapted to his genius than\nhis presentation-poems. He is nothing akin to birth-day suits and\ndrawing-room fopperies. \"He is nothing, if not fantastical.\" In his\nfigure, in his movements, in his sentiments, he is sharp and angular,\nquaint and eccentric. Mr. Southey is not of the court, courtly. Every\nthing of him and about him is from the people. He is not classical, he\nis not legitimate. He is not a man cast in the mould of other men's\nopinions: he is not shaped on any model: he bows to no authority: he\nyields only to his own wayward peculiarities. He is wild, irregular,\nsingular, extreme. He is no formalist, not he! All is crude and chaotic,\nself-opinionated, vain. He wants proportion, keeping, system, standard\nrules. He is not _teres et rotundus_. Mr. Southey walks with his chin\nerect through the streets of London, and with an umbrella sticking out\nunder his arm, in the finest weather. He has not sacrificed to the\nGraces, nor studied decorum. With him every thing is projecting,\nstarting from its place, an episode, a digression, a poetic license. He\ndoes not move in any given orbit, but like a falling star, shoots from\nhis sphere. He is pragmatical, restless, unfixed, full of experiments,\nbeginning every thing a-new, wiser than his betters, judging for\nhimself, dictating to others. He is decidedly _revolutionary_. He may\nhave given up the reform of the State: but depend upon it, he has some\nother _hobby_ of the same kind. Does he not dedicate to his present\nMajesty that extraordinary poem on the death of his father, called _The\nVision of Judgment_, as a specimen of what might be done in English\nhexameters? In a court-poem all should be trite and on an approved\nmodel. He might as well have presented himself at the levee in a fancy\nor masquerade dress. Mr. Southey was not _to try conclusions_ with\nMajesty--still less on such an occasion. The extreme freedoms with\ndeparted greatness, the party-petulance carried to the Throne of\nGrace, the unchecked indulgence of private humour, the assumption of\ninfallibility and even of the voice of Heaven in this poem, are pointed\ninstances of what we have said. They shew the singular state of\nover-excitement of Mr. Southey's mind, and the force of old habits of\nindependent and unbridled thinking, which cannot be kept down even\nin addressing his Sovereign! Look at Mr. Southey's larger poems, his\n_Kehama_, his _Thalaba_, his _Madoc_, his _Roderic_. Who will deny the\nspirit, the scope, the splendid imagery, the hurried and startling\ninterest that pervades them? Who will say that they are not sustained on\nfictions wilder than his own Glendoveer, that they are not the daring\ncreations of a mind curbed by no law, tamed by no fear, that they are\nnot rather like the trances than the waking dreams of genius, that\nthey are not the very paradoxes of poetry? All this is very well, very\nintelligible, and very harmless, if we regard the rank excrescences of\nMr. Southey's poetry, like the red and blue flowers in corn, as the\nunweeded growth of a luxuriant and wandering fancy; or if we allow\nthe yeasty workings of an ardent spirit to ferment and boil over--the\nvariety, the boldness, the lively stimulus given to the mind may then\natone for the violation of rules and the offences to bed-rid authority;\nbut not if our poetic libertine sets up for a law-giver and judge, or an\napprehender of vagrants in the regions either of taste or opinion. Our\nmotley gentleman deserves the strait-waistcoat, if he is for setting\nothers in the stocks of servility, or condemning them to the pillory\nfor a new mode of rhyme or reason. Or if a composer of sacred Dramas on\nclassic models, or a translator of an old Latin author (that will hardly\nbear translation) or a vamper-up of vapid cantos and Odes set to music,\nwere to turn pander to prescription and palliater of every dull,\nincorrigible abuse, it would not be much to be wondered at or even\nregretted. But in Mr. Southey it was a lamentable falling-off. It is\nindeed to be deplored, it is a stain on genius, a blow to humanity, that\nthe author of _Joan of Arc_--that work in which the love of Liberty is\nexhaled like the breath of spring, mild, balmy, heaven-born, that is\nfull of tears and virgin-sighs, and yearnings of affection after truth\nand good, gushing warm and crimsoned from the heart--should ever after\nturn to folly, or become the advocate of a rotten cause. After giving up\nhis heart to that subject, he ought not (whatever others might do) ever\nto have set his foot within the threshold of a court. He might be sure\nthat he would not gain forgiveness or favour by it, nor obtain a single\ncordial smile from greatness. All that Mr. Southey is or that he does\nbest, is independent, spontaneous, free as the vital air he draws--when\nhe affects the courtier or the sophist, he is obliged to put a\nconstraint upon himself, to hold in his breath, he loses his genius,\nand offers a violence to his nature. His characteristic faults are the\nexcess of a lively, unguarded temperament:--oh! let them not degenerate\ninto cold-blooded, heartless vices! If we speak or have ever spoken of\nMr. Southey with severity, it is with \"the malice of old friends,\" for\nwe count ourselves among his sincerest and heartiest well-wishers. But\nwhile he himself is anomalous, incalculable, eccentric, from youth to\nage (the _Wat Tyler_ and the _Vision of Judgment_ are the Alpha\nand Omega of his disjointed career) full of sallies of humour, of\nebullitions of spleen, making _jets-d'eaux,_ cascades, fountains, and\nwater-works of his idle opinions, he would shut up the wits of others in\nleaden cisterns, to stagnate and corrupt, or bury them under ground--\n\n  \"Far from the sun and summer gale!\"\n\nHe would suppress the freedom of wit and humour, of which he has set the\nexample, and claim a privilege for playing antics. He would introduce an\nuniformity of intellectual weights and measures, of irregular metres and\nsettled opinions, and enforce it with a high hand. This has been judged\nhard by some, and has brought down a severity of recrimination, perhaps\ndisproportioned to the injury done. \"Because he is virtuous,\" (it has\nbeen asked,) \"are there to be no more cakes and ale?\" Because he is\nloyal, are we to take all our notions from the _Quarterly Review_?\nBecause he is orthodox, are we to do nothing but read the _Book of the\nChurch_? We declare we think his former poetical scepticism was not only\nmore amiable, but had more of the spirit of religion in it, implied a\nmore heartfelt trust in nature and providence than his present bigotry.\nWe are at the same time free to declare that we think his articles in\nthe _Quarterly Review,_ notwithstanding their virulence and the talent\nthey display, have a tendency to qualify its most pernicious effects.\nThey have redeeming traits in them. \"A little leaven leaveneth the whole\nlump:\" and the spirit of humanity (thanks to Mr. Southey) is not quite\nexpelled from the _Quarterly Review_. At the corner of his pen, \"there\nhangs a vapourous drop profound\" of independence and liberality, which\nfalls upon its pages, and oozes out through the pores of the public\nmind. There is a fortunate difference between writers whose hearts are\nnaturally callous to truth, and whose understandings are hermetically\nsealed against all impressions but those of self-interest, and a man\nlike Mr. Southey. _Once a philanthropist and always a philanthropist_.\nNo man can entirely baulk his nature: it breaks out in spite of him.\nIn all those questions, where the spirit of contradiction does not\ninterfere, on which he is not sore from old bruises, or sick from the\nextravagance of youthful intoxication, as from a last night's debauch,\nour \"laureate\" is still bold, free, candid, open to conviction, a\nreformist without knowing it. He does not advocate the slave-trade, he\ndoes not arm Mr. Malthus's revolting ratios with his authority, he does\nnot strain hard to deluge Ireland with blood. On such points, where\nhumanity has not become obnoxious, where liberty has not passed into a\nby-word, Mr. Southey is still liberal and humane. The elasticity of his\nspirit is unbroken: the bow recoils to its old position. He still stands\nconvicted of his early passion for inquiry and improvement. He was not\nregularly articled as a Government-tool!--Perhaps the most pleasing and\nstriking of all Mr. Southey's poems are not his triumphant taunts hurled\nagainst oppression, are not his glowing effusions to Liberty, but\nthose in which, with a mild melancholy, he seems conscious of his own\ninfirmities of temper, and to feel a wish to correct by thought and\ntime the precocity and sharpness of his disposition. May the quaint but\naffecting aspiration expressed in one of these be fulfilled, that as\nhe mellows into maturer age, all such asperities may wear off, and he\nhimself become\n\n  \"Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree!\"\n\nMr. Southey's prose-style can scarcely be too much praised. It is plain,\nclear, pointed, familiar, perfectly modern in its texture, but with\na grave and sparkling admixture of _archaisms_ in its ornaments and\noccasional phraseology. He is the best and most natural prose-writer of\nany poet of the day; we mean that he is far better than Lord Byron,\nMr. Wordsworth, or Mr. Coleridge, for instance. The manner is perhaps\nsuperior to the matter, that is, in his Essays and Reviews. There is\nrather a want of originality and even of _impetus_: but there is no want\nof playful or biting satire, of ingenuity, of casuistry, of\n\nlearning and of information. He is \"full of wise saws and modern\" (as\nwell as ancient) \"instances.\" Mr. Southey may not always convince his\nopponents; but he seldom fails to stagger, never to gall them. In a\nword, we may describe his style by saying that it has not the body or\nthickness of port wine, but is like clear sherry with kernels of\nold authors thrown into it!--He also excels as an historian and\nprose-translator. His histories abound in information, and exhibit\nproofs of the most indefatigable patience and industry. By no uncommon\nprocess of the mind, Mr. Southey seems willing to steady the extreme\nlevity of his opinions and feelings by an appeal to facts. His\ntranslations of the Spanish and French romances are also executed _con\namore_, and with the literal fidelity and care of a mere linguist. That\nof the _Cid_, in particular, is a masterpiece. Not a word could be\naltered for the better, in the old scriptural style which it adopts in\nconformity to the original. It is no less interesting in itself, or as a\nrecord of high and chivalrous feelings and manners, than it is worthy of\nperusal as a literary curiosity.\n\nMr. Southey's conversation has a little resemblance to a common-place\nbook; his habitual deportment to a piece of clock-work. He is not\nremarkable either as a reasoner or an observer: but he is quick,\nunaffected, replete with anecdote, various and retentive in his reading,\nand exceedingly happy in his play upon words, as most scholars are who\ngive their minds this sportive turn. We have chiefly seen Mr. Southey\nin company where few people appear to advantage, we mean in that of Mr.\nColeridge. He has not certainly the same range of speculation, nor\nthe same flow of sounding words, but he makes up by the details of\nknowledge, and by a scrupulous correctness of statement for what he\nwants in originality of thought, or impetuous declamation. The tones of\nMr. Coleridge's voice are eloquence: those of Mr. Southey are meagre,\nshrill, and dry. Mr. Coleridge's _forte_ is conversation, and he is\nconscious of this: Mr. Southey evidently considers writing as his\nstrong-hold, and if gravelled in an argument, or at a loss for an\nexplanation, refers to something he has written on the subject, or\nbrings out his port-folio, doubled down in dog-ears, in confirmation of\nsome fact. He is scholastic and professional in his ideas. He sets more\nvalue on what he writes than on what he says: he is perhaps prouder of\nhis library than of his own productions--themselves a library! He is\nmore simple in his manners than his friend Mr. Coleridge; but at the\nsame time less cordial or conciliating. He is less vain, or has less\nhope of pleasing, and therefore lays himself less out to please. There\nis an air of condescension in his civility. With a tall, loose figure, a\npeaked austerity of countenance, and no inclination to _embonpoint_,\nyou would say he has something puritanical, something ascetic in his\nappearance. He answers to Mandeville's description of Addison, \"a parson\nin a tye-wig.\" He is not a boon companion, nor does he indulge in the\npleasures of the table, nor in any other vice; nor are we aware that Mr.\nSouthey is chargeable with any human frailty but--_want of charity_!\nHaving fewer errors to plead guilty to, he is less lenient to those of\nothers. He was born an age too late. Had he lived a century or two ago,\nhe would have been a happy as well as blameless character. But the\ndistraction of the time has unsettled him, and the multiplicity of his\npretensions have jostled with each other. No man in our day (at least no\nman of genius) has led so uniformly and entirely the life of a scholar\nfrom boyhood to the present hour, devoting himself to learning with\nthe enthusiasm of an early love, with the severity and constancy of a\nreligious vow--and well would it have been for him if he had confined\nhimself to this, and not undertaken to pull down or to patch up the\nState! However irregular in his opinions, Mr. Southey is constant,\nunremitting, mechanical in his studies, and the performance of his\nduties. There is nothing Pindaric or Shandean here. In all the relations\nand charities of private life, he is correct, exemplary, generous, just.\nWe never heard a single impropriety laid to his charge; and if he has\nmany enemies, few men can boast more numerous or stauncher friends.--The\nvariety and piquancy of his writings form a striking contrast to the\nmode in which they are produced. He rises early, and writes or reads\ntill breakfast-time. He writes or reads after breakfast till dinner,\nafter dinner till tea, and from tea till bed-time--\n\n  \"And follows so the ever-running year\n  With profitable labour to his grave--\"\n\non Derwent's banks, beneath the foot of Skiddaw. Study serves him for\nbusiness, exercise, recreation. He passes from verse to prose, from\nhistory to poetry, from reading to writing, by a stop-watch. He writes a\nfair hand, without blots, sitting upright in his chair, leaves off when\nhe comes to the bottom of the page, and changes the subject for another,\nas opposite as the Antipodes. His mind is after all rather the recipient\nand transmitter of knowledge, than the originator of it. He has hardly\ngrasp of thought enough to arrive at any great leading truth. His\npassions do not amount to more than irritability. With some gall in his\npen, and coldness in his manner, he has a great deal of kindness in his\nheart. Rash in his opinions, he is steady in his attachments--and is a\nman, in many particulars admirable, in all respectable--his political\ninconsistency alone excepted!\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nMR. T. MOORE.--MR. LEIGH HUNT.\n\n\n  \"Or winglet of the fairy humming-bird,\n  Like atoms of the rainbow fluttering round.\"\n\n  CAMPBELL.\n\nThe lines placed at the head of this sketch, from a contemporary writer,\nappear to us very descriptive of Mr. Moore's poetry. His verse is like\na shower of beauty; a dance of images; a stream of music; or like the\nspray of the water-fall, tinged by the morning-beam with rosy light.\nThe characteristic distinction of our author's style is this continuous\nand incessant flow of voluptuous thoughts and shining allusions. He\nought to write with a crystal pen on silver paper. His subject is set\noff by a dazzling veil of poetic diction, like a wreath of flowers\ngemmed with innumerous dewdrops, that weep, tremble, and glitter in\nliquid softness and pearly light, while the song of birds ravishes\nthe ear, and languid odours breathe around, and Aurora opens Heaven's\nsmiling portals, Peris and nymphs peep through the golden glades, and an\nAngel's wing glances over the glossy scene.\n\n  \"No dainty flower or herb that grows on ground,\n  No arboret with painted blossoms drest,\n  And smelling sweet, but there it might be found\n  To bud out fair, and its sweet smells throw all around.\n\n  No tree, whose branches did not bravely spring;\n  No branch, whereon a fine bird did not sit;\n  No bird, but did her shrill notes sweetly sing;\n  No song, but did contain a lovely dit:\n  Trees, branches, birds, and songs were framed fit\n  For to allure frail minds to careless ease.\"....\n\nMr. Campbell's imagination is fastidious and select; and hence, though\nwe meet with more exquisite beauties in his writings, we meet with\nthem more rarely: there is comparatively a dearth of ornament. But Mr.\nMoore's strictest economy is \"wasteful and superfluous excess:\" he is\nalways liberal, and never at a loss; for sooner than not stimulate and\ndelight the reader, he is willing to be tawdry, or superficial, or\ncommon-place. His Muse must be fine at any rate, though she should\npaint, and wear cast-off decorations. Rather than have any lack of\nexcitement, he repeats himself; and \"Eden, and Eblis, and cherub-smiles\"\nfill up the pauses of the sentiment with a sickly monotony.--It has been\ntoo much our author's object to pander to the artificial taste of the\nage; and his productions, however brilliant and agreeable, are in\nconsequence somewhat meretricious and effeminate. It was thought\nformerly enough to have an occasionally fine passage in the progress of\na story or a poem, and an occasionally striking image or expression in\na fine passage or description. But this style, it seems, was to be\nexploded as rude, Gothic, meagre, and dry. Now all must be raised to\nthe same tantalising and preposterous level. There must be no pause, no\ninterval, no repose, no gradation. Simplicity and truth yield up the\npalm to affectation and grimace. The craving of the public mind after\nnovelty and effect is a false and uneasy appetite that must be pampered\nwith fine words at every step--we must be tickled with sound, startled\nwith shew, and relieved by the importunate, uninterrupted display of\nfancy and verbal tinsel as much as possible from the fatigue of thought\nor shock of feeling. A poem is to resemble an exhibition of fireworks,\nwith a continual explosion of quaint figures and devices, flash after\nflash, that surprise for the moment, and leave no trace of light or\nwarmth behind them. Or modern poetry in its retrograde progress comes at\nlast to be constructed on the principles of the modern OPERA, where an\nattempt is made to gratify every sense at every instant, and where the\nunderstanding alone is insulted and the heart mocked. It is in this\nview only that we can discover that Mr. Moore's poetry is vitiated or\nimmoral,--it seduces the taste and enervates the imagination. It creates\na false standard of reference, and inverts or decompounds the natural\norder of association, in which objects strike the thoughts and feelings.\nHis is the poetry of the bath, of the toilette, of the saloon, of the\nfashionable world; not the poetry of nature, of the heart, or of human\nlife. He stunts and enfeebles equally the growth of the imagination and\nthe affections, by not taking the seed of poetry and sowing it in the\nground of truth, and letting it expand in the dew and rain, and shoot up\nto heaven,\n\n  \"And spread its sweet leaves to the air,\n  Or dedicate its beauty to the sun,\"--\n\ninstead of which he anticipates and defeats his own object, by plucking\nflowers and blossoms from the stem, and setting them in the ground of\nidleness and folly--or in the cap of his own vanity, where they soon\nwither and disappear, \"dying or ere they sicken!\" This is but a sort\nof child's play, a short-sighted ambition. In Milton we meet with many\nprosaic lines, either because the subject does not require raising or\nbecause they are necessary to connect the story, or serve as a relief to\nother passages--there is not such a thing to be found in all Mr. Moore's\nwritings. His volumes present us with \"a perpetual feast of nectar'd\nsweets\"--but we cannot add,--\"where no crude surfeit reigns.\" He indeed\ncloys with sweetness; he obscures with splendour; he fatigues with\ngaiety. We are stifled on beds of roses--we literally lie \"on the rack\nof restless ecstacy.\" His flowery fancy \"looks so fair and smells so\nsweet, that the sense aches at it.\" His verse droops and languishes\nunder a load of beauty, like a bough laden with fruit. His gorgeous\nstyle is like \"another morn risen on mid-noon.\" There is no passage\nthat is not made up of blushing lines, no line that is not enriched with\na sparkling metaphor, no image that is left unadorned with a double\nepithet--all his verbs, nouns, adjectives, are equally glossy, smooth,\nand beautiful. Every stanza is transparent with light, perfumed with\nodours, floating in liquid harmony, melting in luxurious, evanescent\ndelights. His Muse is never contented with an offering from one sense\nalone, but brings another rifled charm to match it, and revels in\na fairy round of pleasure. The interest is not dramatic, but\nmelo-dramatic--it is a mixture of painting, poetry, and music, of the\nnatural and preternatural, of obvious sentiment and romantic costume. A\nrose is a _Gul_, a nightingale a _Bulbul_. We might fancy ourselves in\nan eastern harem, amidst Ottomans, and otto of roses, and veils and\nspangles, and marble pillars, and cool fountains, and Arab maids and\nGenii, and magicians, and Peris, and cherubs, and what not? Mr. Moore\nhas a little mistaken the art of poetry for the _cosmetic art_. He does\nnot compose an historic group, or work out a single figure; but throws\na variety of elementary sensations, of vivid impressions together, and\ncalls it a description. He makes out an inventory of beauty--the smile\non the lips, the dimple on the cheeks, _item_, golden locks, _item_, a\npair of blue wings, _item_, a silver sound, with breathing fragrance and\nradiant light, and thinks it a character or a story. He gets together a\nnumber of fine things and fine names, and thinks that, flung on heaps,\nthey make up a fine poem. This dissipated, fulsome, painted, patch-work\nstyle may succeed in the levity and languor of the _boudoir_, or might\nhave been adapted to the Pavilions of royalty, but it is not the style\nof Parnassus, nor a passport to Immortality. It is not the taste of the\nancients, \"'tis not classical lore\"--nor the fashion of Tibullus, or\nTheocritus, or Anacreon, or Virgil, or Ariosto, or Pope, or Byron, or\nany great writer among the living or the dead, but it is the style of\nour English Anacreon, and it is (or was) the fashion of the day! Let one\nexample (and that an admired one) taken from _Lalla Rookh_, suffice to\nexplain the mystery and soften the harshness of the foregoing criticism.\n\n  \"Now upon Syria's land of roses\n  Softly the light of eve reposes,\n  And like a glory, the broad sun\n  Hangs over sainted Lebanon:\n  Whose head in wintry grandeur towers,\n  And whitens with eternal sleet,\n  While summer, in a vale of flowers,\n  Is sleeping rosy at his feet.\n  To one who look'd from upper air,\n  O'er all th' enchanted regions there,\n  How beauteous must have been the glow,\n  The life, the sparkling from below!\n  Fair gardens, shining streams, with ranks\n  Of golden melons on their banks,\n  More golden where the sun-light falls,--\n  Gay lizards, glittering on the walls\n  Of ruin'd shrines, busy and bright\n  As they were all alive with light;--\n  And yet more splendid, numerous flocks\n  Of pigeons, settling on the rocks,\n  With their rich, restless wings, that gleam\n  Variously in the crimson beam\n  Of the warm west, as if inlaid\n  With brilliants from the mine, or made\n  Of tearless rainbows, such as span\n  The unclouded skies of Peristan!\n  And then, the mingling sounds that come\n  Of shepherd's ancient reed, with hum\n  Of the wild bees of Palestine,\n  Banquetting through the flowery vales--\n  And, Jordan, those sweet banks of thine,\n  And woods, so full of nightingales.\"--\n\nThe following lines are the very perfection of Della Cruscan sentiment,\nand affected orientalism of style. The Peri exclaims on finding that old\ntalisman and hackneyed poetical machine, \"a penitent tear\"--\n\n  \"Joy, joy forever! my task is done--\n  The gates are pass'd, and Heaven is won!\n  Oh! am I not happy? I am, I am--\n  To thee, sweet Eden! how dark and sad\n  Are the diamond turrets of Shadukiam,\n  And the fragrant bowers of Amberabad.\"\n\nThere is in all this a play of fancy, a glitter of words, a shallowness\nof thought, and a want of truth and solidity that is wonderful, and\nthat nothing but the heedless, rapid glide of the verse could render\ntolerable:----it seems that the poet, as well as the lover,\n\n  \"May bestride the Gossamer,\n  That wantons in the idle, summer air,\n  And yet not fall, so light is vanity!\"\n\nMr. Moore ought not to contend with serious difficulties or with entire\nsubjects. He can write verses, not a poem. There is no principle of\nmassing or of continuity in his productions--neither height nor breadth\nnor depth of capacity. There is no truth of representation, no strong\ninternal feeling--but a continual flutter and display of affected airs\nand graces, like a finished coquette, who hides the want of symmetry by\nextravagance of dress, and the want of passion by flippant forwardness\nand unmeaning sentimentality. All is flimsy, all is florid to excess.\nHis imagination may dally with insect beauties, with Rosicrucian spells;\nmay describe a butterfly's wing, a flower-pot, a fan: but it should not\nattempt to span the great outlines of nature, or keep pace with the\nsounding march of events, or grapple with the strong fibres of the human\nheart. The great becomes turgid in his hands, the pathetic insipid. If\nMr. Moore were to describe the heights of Chimboraco, instead of the\nloneliness, the vastness and the shadowy might, he would only think\nof adorning it with roseate tints, like a strawberry-ice, and would\ntransform a magician's fortress in the Himmalaya (stripped of its\nmysterious gloom and frowning horrors) into a jeweller's toy, to be set\nupon a lady's toilette. In proof of this, see above \"the diamond turrets\nof Shadukiam,\" &c. The description of Mokanna in the fight, though\nit has spirit and grandeur of effect, has still a great alloy of the\nmock-heroic in it. The route of blood and death, which is otherwise well\nmarked, is infested with a swarm of \"fire-fly\" fancies.\n\n  \"In vain Mokanna, 'midst the general flight,\n  Stands, like the red moon, in some stormy night.\n  Among the fugitive clouds, that hurrying by,\n  Leave only her unshaken in the sky.\"\n\nThis simile is fine, and would have been perfect, but that the moon is\nnot red, and that she seems to hurry by the clouds, not they by her. The\ndescription of the warrior's youthful adversary,\n\n ----\"Whose coming seems\n  A light, a glory, such as breaks in dreams.\"--\n\nis fantastic and enervated--a field of battle has nothing to do with\ndreams:--and again, the two lines immediately after,\n\n  \"And every sword, true as o'er billows dim\n  The needle tracks the load-star, following him\"--\n\nare a mere piece of enigmatical ingenuity and scientific\n_mimminee-pimminee._\n\nWe cannot except the _Irish Melodies_ from the same censure. If these\nnational airs do indeed express the soul of impassioned feeling in his\ncountrymen, the case of Ireland is hopeless. If these prettinesses pass\nfor patriotism, if a country can heave from its heart's core only these\nvapid, varnished sentiments, lip-deep, and let its tears of blood\nevaporate in an empty conceit, let it be governed as it has been. There\nare here no tones to waken Liberty, to console Humanity. Mr. Moore\nconverts the wild harp of Erin into a musical snuff-box[A]!--We _do_\nexcept from this censure the author's political squibs, and the \"Two-\npenny Post-bag.\" These are essences, are \"nests of spicery\", bitter and\nsweet, honey and gall together. No one can so well describe the set\nspeech of a dull formalist[B], or the flowing locks of a Dowager,\n\n  \"In the manner of Ackermann's dresses for May.\"\n\nHis light, agreeable, polished style pierces through the body of the\ncourt--hits off the faded graces of \"an Adonis of fifty\", weighs the\nvanity of fashion in tremulous scales, mimics the grimace of affectation\nand folly, shews up the littleness of the great, and spears a phalanx of\nstatesmen with its glittering point as with a diamond broach.\n\n  \"In choosing songs the Regent named\n  'Had I a heart for falsehood fram'd:'\n  While gentle Hertford begg'd and pray'd\n  For 'Young I am, and sore afraid.'\"\n\nNothing in Pope or Prior ever surpassed the delicate insinuation\nand adroit satire of these lines, and hundreds more of our author's\ncomposition. We wish he would not take pains to make us think of them\nwith less pleasure than formerly.--The \"Fudge Family\" is in the same\nspirit, but with a little falling-off. There is too great a mixture of\nundisguised Jacobinism and fashionable _slang_. The \"divine Fanny Bias\"\nand \"the mountains _\u00e0 la Russe_\" figure in somewhat quaintly with\nBuonaparte and the Bourbons. The poet also launches the lightning of\npolitical indignation; but it rather plays round and illumines his own\npen than reaches the devoted heads at which it is aimed!\n\nMr. Moore is in private life an amiable and estimable man. The\nembellished and voluptuous style of his poetry, his unpretending origin,\nand his _mignon_ figure soon introduced him to the notice of the\ngreat, and his gaiety, his wit, his good-humour, and many agreeable\naccomplishments fixed him there, the darling of his friends and the idol\nof fashion. If he is no longer familiar with Royalty as with his garter,\nthe fault is not his--his adherence to his principles caused the\nseparation--his love of his country was the cloud that intercepted the\nsunshine of court-favour. This is so far well. Mr. Moore vindicates his\nown dignity; but the sense of intrinsic worth, of wide-spread fame, and\nof the intimacy of the great makes him perhaps a little too fastidious\nand _exigeant_ as to the pretensions of others. He has been so long\naccustomed to the society of Whig Lords, and so enchanted by the smile\nof beauty and fashion, that he really fancies himself one of the _set_,\nto which he is admitted on sufferance, and tries very unnecessarily to\nkeep others out of it. He talks familiarly of works that are or are\nnot read \"in _our_ circle;\" and seated smiling and at his ease in a\ncoronet-coach, enlivening the owner by his brisk sallies and Attic\nconceits, is shocked, as he passes, to see a Peer of the realm shake\nhands with a poet. There is a little indulgence of spleen and envy, a\nlittle servility and pandering to aristocratic pride in this proceeding.\nIs Mr. Moore bound to advise a Noble Poet to get as fast as possible out\nof a certain publication, lest he should not be able to give an\naccount at Holland or at Lansdown House, how his friend Lord B----had\nassociated himself with his friend L. H----? Is he afraid that the\n\"Spirit of Monarchy\" will eclipse the \"Fables for the Holy Alliance\" in\nvirulence and plain speaking? Or are the members of the \"Fudge Family\"\nto secure a monopoly for the abuse of the Bourbons and the doctrine of\nDivine Right? Because he is genteel and sarcastic, may not others be\nparadoxical and argumentative? Or must no one bark at a Minister or\nGeneral, unless they have been first dandled, like a little French\npug-dog, in the lap of a lady of quality? Does Mr. Moore insist on the\ndouble claim of birth and genius as a title to respectability in all\nadvocates of the popular side--but himself? Or is he anxious to keep the\npretensions of his patrician and plebeian friends quite separate, so\nas to be himself the only point of union, a sort of _double meaning_,\nbetween the two? It is idle to think of setting bounds to the weakness\nand illusions of self-love as long as it is confined to a man's own\nbreast; but it ought not to be made a plea for holding back the powerful\nhand that is stretched out to save another struggling with the tide\nof popular prejudice, who has suffered shipwreck of health, fame and\nfortune in a common cause, and who has deserved the aid and the good\nwishes of all who are (on principle) embarked in the same cause by equal\nzeal and honesty, if not by equal talents to support and to adorn it!\n\nWe shall conclude the present article with a short notice of an\nindividual who, in the cast of his mind and in political principle,\nbears no very remote resemblance to the patriot and wit just spoken\nof, and on whose merits we should descant at greater length, but that\npersonal intimacy might be supposed to render us partial. It is well\nwhen personal intimacy produces this effect; and when the light, that\ndazzled us at a distance, does not on a closer inspection turn out an\nopaque substance. This is a charge that none of his friends will bring\nagainst Mr. Leigh Hunt. He improves upon acquaintance. The author\ntranslates admirably into the man. Indeed the very faults of his style\nare virtues in the individual. His natural gaiety and sprightliness of\nmanner, his high animal spirits, and the _vinous_ quality of his mind,\nproduce an immediate fascination and intoxication in those who come in\ncontact with him, and carry off in society whatever in his writings may\nto some seem flat and impertinent. From great sanguineness of temper,\nfrom great quickness and unsuspecting simplicity, he runs on to the\npublic as he does at his own fire-side, and talks about himself,\nforgetting that he is not always among friends. His look, his tone are\nrequired to point many things that he says: his frank, cordial manner\nreconciles you instantly to a little over-bearing, over-weening self-\ncomplacency. \"To be admired, he needs but to be seen:\" but perhaps he\nought to be seen to be fully appreciated. No one ever sought his society\nwho did not come away with a more favourable opinion of him: no one was\never disappointed, except those who had entertained idle prejudices\nagainst him. He sometimes trifles with his readers, or tires of\na subject (from not being urged on by the stimulus of immediate\nsympathy)--but in conversation he is all life and animation, combining\nthe vivacity of the school-boy with the resources of the wit and the\ntaste of the scholar. The personal character, the spontaneous impulses,\ndo not appear to excuse the author, unless you are acquainted with his\nsituation and habits--like some proud beauty who gives herself what\nwe think strange airs and graces under a mask, but who is instantly\nforgiven when she shews her face. We have said that Lord Byron is a\nsublime coxcomb: why should we not say that Mr. Hunt is a delightful\none? There is certainly an exuberance of satisfaction in his manner\nwhich is more than the strict logical premises warrant, and which dull\nand phlegmatic constitutions know nothing of, and cannot understand till\nthey see it. He is the only poet or literary man we ever knew who puts\nus in mind of Sir John Suckling or Killigrew or Carew; or who united\nrare intellectual acquirements with outward grace and natural gentility.\nMr. Hunt ought to have been a gentleman born, and to have patronised men\nof letters. He might then have played, and sung, and laughed, and talked\nhis life away; have written manly prose, elegant verse; and his _Story\nof Rimini_ would have been praised by Mr. Blackwood. As it is, there is\nno man now living who at the same time writes prose and verse so well,\nwith the exception of Mr. Southey (an exception, we fear, that will be\nlittle palatable to either of these gentlemen). His prose writings,\nhowever, display more consistency of principle than the laureate's: his\nverses more taste. We will venture to oppose his Third Canto of the\n_Story of Rimini_ for classic elegance and natural feeling to any equal\nnumber of lines from Mr. Southey's Epics or from Mr. Moore's Lalla\nRookh. In a more gay and conversational style of writing, we think his\n_Epistle to Lord Byron_ on his going abroad, is a masterpiece;--and the\n_Feast of the Poets_ has run through several editions. A light, familiar\ngrace, and mild unpretending pathos are the characteristics of his more\nsportive or serious writings, whether in poetry or prose. A smile\nplays round the features of the one; a tear is ready to start from the\nthoughtful gaze of the other. He perhaps takes too little pains, and\nindulges in too much wayward caprice in both. A wit and a poet, Mr. Hunt\nis also distinguished by fineness of tact and sterling sense: he has\nonly been a visionary in humanity, the fool of virtue. What then is the\ndrawback to so many shining qualities, that has made them useless, or\neven hurtful to their owner? His crime is, to have been Editor of the\n_Examiner_ ten years ago, when some allusion was made in it to the age\nof the present king, and that, though his Majesty has grown older, our\nluckless politician is no wiser than he was then!\n\n\n[Footnote A: Compare his songs with Burns's.]\n\n[Footnote B:\n\n  \"There was a little man, and he had a little soul,\n  And he said, Little soul, let us try,\" &c.--\n\nParody on\n\n  \"There was a little man, and he had a little gun.\"--\n\nOne should think this exquisite ridicule of a pedantic effusion might\nhave silenced for ever the automaton that delivered it: but the\nofficial personage in question at the close of the Session addressed an\nextra-official congratulation to the Prince Regent on a bill that had\n_not_ passed--as if to repeat and insist upon our errors were to justify\nthem.]\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nELIA, AND GEOFFREY CRAYON.\n\n\n\nSo Mr. Charles Lamb and Mr. Washington Irvine choose to designate\nthemselves; and as their lucubrations under one or other of these _noms\nde guerre_ have gained considerable notice from the public, we shall\nhere attempt to discriminate their several styles and manner, and to\npoint out the beauties and defects of each in treating of somewhat\nsimilar subjects.\n\nMr. Irvine is, we take it, the more popular writer of the two, or a more\ngeneral favourite: Mr. Lamb has more devoted, and perhaps more judicious\npartisans. Mr. Irvine is by birth an American, and has, as it were,\n_skimmed the cream_, and taken off patterns with great skill and\ncleverness, from our best known and happiest writers, so that their\nthoughts and almost their reputation are indirectly transferred to his\npage, and smile upon us from another hemisphere, like \"the pale reflex\nof Cynthia's brow:\" he succeeds to our admiration and our sympathy by a\nsort of prescriptive title and traditional privilege. Mr. Lamb, on the\ncontrary, being \"native to the manner here,\" though he too has borrowed\nfrom previous sources, instead of availing himself of the most popular\nand admired, has groped out his way, and made his most successful\nresearches among the more obscure and intricate, though certainly not\nthe least pithy or pleasant of our writers. Mr. Washington Irvine has\nculled and transplanted the flowers of modern literature, for the\namusement of the general reader: Mr. Lamb has raked among the dust and\ncobwebs of a more remote period, has exhibited specimens of curious\nrelics, and pored over moth-eaten, decayed manuscripts, for the benefit\nof the more inquisitive and discerning part of the public. Antiquity\nafter a time has the grace of novelty, as old fashions revived are\nmistaken for new ones; and a certain quaintness and singularity of style\nis an agreeable relief to the smooth and insipid monotony of modern\ncomposition. Mr. Lamb has succeeded not by conforming to the _Spirit of\nthe Age_, but in opposition to it. He does not march boldly along with\nthe crowd, but steals off the pavement to pick his way in the contrary\ndirection. He prefers _bye-ways_ to _highways_. When the full tide of\nhuman life pours along to some festive shew, to some pageant of a day,\nElia would stand on one side to look over an old book-stall, or stroll\ndown some deserted pathway in search of a pensive inscription over a\ntottering door-way, or some quaint device in architecture, illustrative\nof embryo art and ancient manners. Mr. Lamb has the very soul of an\nantiquarian, as this implies a reflecting humanity; the film of the past\nhovers for ever before him. He is shy, sensitive, the reverse of every\nthing coarse, vulgar, obtrusive, and _common-place_. He would fain\n\"shuffle off this mortal coil\", and his spirit clothes itself in the\ngarb of elder time, homelier, but more durable. He is borne along with\nno pompous paradoxes, shines in no glittering tinsel of a fashionable\nphraseology; is neither fop nor sophist. He has none of the turbulence\nor froth of new-fangled opinions. His style runs pure and clear,\nthough it may often take an underground course, or be conveyed through\nold-fashioned conduit-pipes. Mr. Lamb does not court popularity, nor\nstrut in gaudy plumes, but shrinks from every kind of ostentatious and\nobvious pretension into the retirement of his own mind.\n\n  \"The self-applauding bird, the peacock see:--\n  Mark what a sumptuous pharisee is he!\n  Meridian sun-beams tempt him to unfold\n  His radiant glories, azure, green, and gold:\n  He treads as if, some solemn music near,\n  His measured step were governed by his ear:\n  And seems to say--Ye meaner fowl, give place,\n  I am all splendour, dignity, and grace!\n  Not so the pheasant on his charms presumes,\n  Though he too has a glory in his plumes.\n  He, christian-like, retreats with modest mien\n  To the close copse or far sequestered green,\n  And shines without desiring to be seen.\"\n\nThese lines well describe the modest and delicate beauties of Mr. Lamb's\nwritings, contrasted with the lofty and vain-glorious pretensions of\nsome of his contemporaries. This gentleman is not one of those who pay\nall their homage to the prevailing idol: he thinks that\n\n  \"New-born gauds are made and moulded of things past.\"\n\nnor does he\n\n  \"Give to dust that is a little gilt\n  More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.\"\n\nHis convictions \"do not in broad rumour lie,\" nor are they \"set off to\nthe world in the glistering foil\" of fashion; but \"live and breathe\naloft in those pure eyes, and perfect judgment of all-seeing _time_.\"\nMr. Lamb rather affects and is tenacious of the obscure and remote: of\nthat which rests on its own intrinsic and silent merit; which scorns all\nalliance, or even the suspicion of owing any thing to noisy clamour, to\nthe glare of circumstances. There is a fine tone of _chiaro-scuro_, a\nmoral perspective in his writings. He delights to dwell on that which is\nfresh to the eye of memory; he yearns after and covets what soothes the\nfrailty of human nature. That touches him most nearly which is withdrawn\nto a certain distance, which verges on the borders of oblivion:--that\npiques and provokes his fancy most, which is hid from a superficial\nglance. That which, though gone by, is still remembered, is in his view\nmore genuine, and has given more \"vital signs that it will live,\" than a\nthing of yesterday, that may be forgotten to-morrow. Death has in this\nsense the spirit of life in it; and the shadowy has to our author\nsomething substantial in it. Ideas savour most of reality in his mind;\nor rather his imagination loiters on the edge of each, and a page of his\nwritings recals to our fancy the _stranger_ on the grate, fluttering in\nits dusky tensity, with its idle superstition and hospitable welcome!\n\nMr. Lamb has a distaste to new faces, to new books, to new buildings, to\nnew customs. He is shy of all imposing appearances, of all assumptions\nof self-importance, of all adventitious ornaments, of all mechanical\nadvantages, even to a nervous excess. It is not merely that he does\nnot rely upon, or ordinarily avail himself of them; he holds them in\nabhorrence, he utterly abjures and discards them, and places a great\ngulph between him and them. He disdains all the vulgar artifices of\nauthorship, all the cant of criticism, and helps to notoriety. He has no\ngrand swelling theories to attract the visionary and the enthusiast, no\npassing topics to allure the thoughtless and the vain. He evades the\npresent, he mocks the future. His affections revert to, and settle on\nthe past, but then, even this must have something personal and local in\nit to interest him deeply and thoroughly; he pitches his tent in the\nsuburbs of existing manners; brings down the account of character to the\nfew straggling remains of the last generation; seldom ventures beyond\nthe bills of mortality, and occupies that nice point between egotism\nand disinterested humanity. No one makes the tour of our southern\nmetropolis, or describes the manners of the last age, so well as Mr.\nLamb--with so fine, and yet so formal an air--with such vivid obscurity,\nwith such arch piquancy, such picturesque quaintness, such smiling\npathos. How admirably he has sketched the former inmates of the South-\nSea House; what \"fine fretwork he makes of their double and single\nentries!\" With what a firm, yet subtle pencil he has embodied _Mrs.\nBattle's Opinions on Whist_! How notably he embalms a battered _beau_;\nhow delightfully an amour, that was cold forty years ago, revives in\nhis pages! With what well-disguised humour he introduces us to his\nrelations, and how freely he serves up his friends! Certainly, some of\nhis portraits are _fixtures_, and will do to hang up as lasting and\nlively emblems of human infirmity. Then there is no one who has so sure\nan ear for \"the chimes at midnight\", not even excepting Mr. Justice\nShallow; nor could Master Silence himself take his \"cheese and pippins\"\nwith a more significant and satisfactory air. With what a gusto Mr. Lamb\ndescribes the inns and courts of law, the Temple and Gray's-Inn, as if\nhe had been a student there for the last two hundred years, and had been\nas well acquainted with the person of Sir Francis Bacon as he is with\nhis portrait or writings! It is hard to say whether St. John's Gate is\nconnected with more intense and authentic associations in his mind, as\na part of old London Wall, or as the frontispiece (time out of mind) of\nthe Gentleman's Magazine. He haunts Watling-street like a gentle spirit;\nthe avenues to the play-houses are thick with panting recollections,\nand Christ's-Hospital still breathes the balmy breath of infancy in his\ndescription of it! Whittington and his Cat are a fine hallucination for\nMr. Lamb's historic Muse, and we believe he never heartily forgave a\ncertain writer who took the subject of Guy Faux out of his hands. The\nstreets of London are his fairy-land, teeming with wonder, with life\nand interest to his retrospective glance, as it did to the eager eye\nof childhood; he has contrived to weave its tritest traditions into a\nbright and endless romance!\n\nMr. Lamb's taste in books is also fine, and it is peculiar. It is not\nthe worse for a little _idiosyncrasy_. He does not go deep into the\nScotch novels, but he is at home in Smollett and Fielding. He is little\nread in Junius or Gibbon, but no man can give a better account of\nBurton's Anatomy of Melancholy, or Sir Thomas Brown's Urn-Burial,\nor Fuller's Worthies, or John Bunyan's Holy War. No one is more\nunimpressible to a specious declamation; no one relishes a recondite\nbeauty more. His admiration of Shakespear and Milton does not make\nhim despise Pope; and he can read Parnell with patience, and Gay\nwith delight. His taste in French and German literature is somewhat\ndefective: nor has he made much progress in the science of Political\nEconomy or other abstruse studies, though he has read vast folios of\ncontroversial divinity, merely for the sake of the intricacy of style,\nand to save himself the pain of thinking. Mr. Lamb is a good judge of\nprints and pictures. His admiration of Hogarth does credit to both,\nparticularly when it is considered that Leonardo da Vinci is his next\ngreatest favourite, and that his love of the _actual_ does not\nproceed from a want of taste for the _ideal_. His worst fault is an\nover-eagerness of enthusiasm, which occasionally makes him take a\nsurfeit of his highest favourites.--Mr. Lamb excels in familiar\nconversation almost as much as in writing, when his modesty does not\noverpower his self-possession. He is as little of a proser as possible;\nbut he _blurts_ out the finest wit and sense in the world. He keeps\na good deal in the back-ground at first, till some excellent conceit\npushes him forward, and then he abounds in whim and pleasantry. There\nis a primitive simplicity and self-denial about his manners; and a\nQuakerism in his personal appearance, which is, however, relieved by\na fine Titian head, full of dumb eloquence! Mr. Lamb is a general\nfavourite with those who know him. His character is equally singular and\namiable. He is endeared to his friends not less by his foibles than his\nvirtues; he insures their esteem by the one, and does not wound their\nself-love by the other. He gains ground in the opinion of others,\nby making no advances in his own. We easily admire genius where the\ndiffidence of the possessor makes our acknowledgment of merit seem like\na sort of patronage, or act of condescension, as we willingly extend our\ngood offices where they are not exacted as obligations, or repaid with\nsullen indifference.--The style of the Essays of Elia is liable to the\ncharge of a certain _mannerism_. His sentences are cast in the mould of\nold authors; his expressions are borrowed from them; but his feelings\nand observations are genuine and original, taken from actual life, or\nfrom his own breast; and he may be said (if any one can) \"to have\ncoined his heart for _jests_,\" and to have split his brain for fine\ndistinctions! Mr. Lamb, from the peculiarity of his exterior and address\nas an author, would probably never have made his way by detached and\nindependent efforts; but, fortunately for himself and others, he has\ntaken advantage of the Periodical Press, where he has been stuck into\nnotice, and the texture of his compositions is assuredly fine enough to\nbear the broadest glare of popularity that has hitherto shone upon them.\nMr. Lamb's literary efforts have procured him civic honours (a thing\nunheard of in our times), and he has been invited, in his character of\nELIA, to dine at a select party with the Lord Mayor. We should prefer\nthis distinction to that of being poet-laureat. We would recommend\nto Mr. Waithman's perusal (if Mr. Lamb has not anticipated us) the\n_Rosamond Gray_ and the _John Woodvil_ of the same author, as an\nagreeable relief to the noise of a city feast, and the heat of city\nelections. A friend, a short time ago, quoted some lines[A] from the\nlast-mentioned of these works, which meeting Mr. Godwin's eye, he was\nso struck with the beauty of the passage, and with a consciousness of\nhaving seen it before, that he was uneasy till he could recollect where,\nand after hunting in vain for it in Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher,\nand other not unlikely places, sent to Mr. Lamb to know if he could help\nhim to the author!\n\nMr. Washington Irvine's acquaintance with English literature begins\nalmost where Mr. Lamb's ends,--with the Spectator, Tom Brown's works,\nand the wits of Queen Anne. He is not bottomed in our elder writers, nor\ndo we think he has tasked his own faculties much, at least on English\nground. Of the merit of his _Knicker-bocker,_ and New York stories,\nwe cannot pretend to judge. But in his _Sketch-book_ and\n_Bracebridge-Hall_ he gives us very good American copies of our British\nEssayists and Novelists, which may be very well on the other side of the\nwater, and as proofs of the capabilities of the national genius, but\nwhich might be dispensed with here, where we have to boast of the\noriginals. Not only Mr. Irvine's language is with great taste and\nfelicity modelled on that of Addison, Sterne, Goldsmith, or Mackenzie;\nbut the thoughts and sentiments are taken at the rebound, and as they\nare brought forward at the present period, want both freshness and\nprobability. Mr. Irvine's writings are literary _anachronisms_. He comes\nto England for the first time; and being on the spot, fancies himself in\nthe midst of those characters and manners which he had read of in the\nSpectator and other approved authors, and which were the only idea he\nhad hitherto formed of the parent country. Instead of looking round\nto see what _we are_, he sets to work to describe us as _we were_--at\nsecond hand. He has Parson Adams, or Sir Roger de Coverley in his\n\"_mind's eye_\"; and he makes a village curate, or a country 'squire in\nYorkshire or Hampshire sit to these admired models for their portraits\nin the beginning of the nineteenth century. Whatever the ingenious\nauthor has been most delighted with in the representations of books, he\ntransfers to his port-folio, and swears that he has found it actually\nexisting in the course of his observation and travels through Great\nBritain. Instead of tracing the changes that have taken place in society\nsince Addison or Fielding wrote, he transcribes their account in a\ndifferent hand-writing, and thus keeps us stationary, at least in our\nmost attractive and praise-worthy qualities of simplicity, honesty,\nhospitality, modesty, and good-nature. This is a very flattering mode\nof turning fiction into history, or history into fiction; and we should\nscarcely know ourselves again in the softened and altered likeness,\nbut that it bears the date of 1820, and issues from the press in\nAlbemarle-street. This is one way of complimenting our national and\nTory prejudices; and coupled with literal or exaggerated portraits of\n_Yankee_ peculiarities, could hardly fail to please. The first Essay in\nthe _Sketch-book_, that on National Antipathies, is the best; but after\nthat, the sterling ore of wit or feeling is gradually spun thinner and\nthinner, till it fades to the shadow of a shade. Mr. Irvine is himself,\nwe believe, a most agreeable and deserving man, and has been led into\nthe natural and pardonable error we speak of, by the tempting bait of\nEuropean popularity, in which he thought there was no more likely method\nof succeeding than by imitating the style of our standard authors, and\ngiving us credit for the virtues of our forefathers.\n\n\n[Footnote A: The description of sports in the forest:\n\n  \"To see the sun to bed and to arise,\n  Like some hot amourist with glowing eyes,\" &c.]\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\n\nWe should not feel that we had discharged our obligations to truth or\nfriendship, if we were to let this volume go without introducing into it\nthe name of the author of _Virginius_. This is the more proper, inasmuch\nas he is a character by himself, and the only poet now living that is a\nmere poet. If we were asked what sort of a man Mr. Knowles is, we could\nonly say, \"he is the writer of Virginius.\" His most intimate friends see\nnothing in him, by which they could trace the work to the author. The\nseeds of dramatic genius are contained and fostered in the warmth of the\nblood that flows in his veins; his heart dictates to his head. The most\nunconscious, the most unpretending, the most artless of mortals, he\ninstinctively obeys the impulses of natural feeling, and produces a\nperfect work of art. He has hardly read a poem or a play or seen any\nthing of the world, but he hears the anxious beatings of his own heart,\nand makes others feel them by the force of sympathy. Ignorant alike\nof rules, regardless of models, he follows the steps of truth and\nsimplicity; and strength, proportion, and delicacy are the infallible\nresults. By thinking of nothing but his subject, he rivets the attention\nof the audience to it. All his dialogue tends to action, all his\nsituations form classic groups. There is no doubt that Virginius is the\nbest acting tragedy that has been produced on the modern stage. Mr.\nKnowles himself was a player at one time, and this circumstance has\nprobably enabled him to judge of the picturesque and dramatic effect of\nhis lines, as we think it might have assisted Shakespear. There is\nno impertinent display, no flaunting poetry; the writer immediately\nconceives how a thought would tell if he had to speak it himself. Mr.\nKnowles is the first tragic writer of the age; in other respects he is\na common man; and divides his time and his affections between his\nplots and his fishing-tackle, between the Muses' spring, and those\nmountain-streams which sparkle like his own eye, that gush out like his\nown voice at the sight of an old friend. We have known him almost from a\nchild, and we must say he appears to us the same boy-poet that he ever\nwas. He has been cradled in song, and rocked in it as in a dream,\nforgetful of himself and of the world!\n\n\n\n\nTHE END.","title":"The Spirit of the Age; Or, Contemporary Portraits","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":80681}