both nature and social life, distorting and discoloring them with the morbid peculiarities of their own minds. These authors belong to the Satanic or the sentimental school, according as their inspiration is mixed with a wilful pride or insatiable vanity; and though their genius may intensely stir the soul for the time, they in the end deform or debilitate it. They represent the grumbler, the sulker, the caustic abstractionist, the unregulated, inharmonious mind and discontented heart, as vitalized and exaggerated—as transfigured by the light, and mighty with the powers, and tyrannous with the influence, of impassioned genius. They are, indeed, bitter fountains of mental disease and gloom; yet as long as people will go to literature as to a sort of gilded dram-shop of the brain, and love to read books that stimulate only to leave them weak and miserable, just so long will such authors continue to be the most popular. 10. The two great European leaders of this school of Satanic sentimentality are Rousseau' and Byron-men whose powers and accomplishments have never been too highly lauded, and the cheerlessness of whose sentiments, the informing and directing soul of their powers, has never been adequately probed and exposed. How mean appears their self-exaggerating disregard of all the laws and limitations of our being, when compared with the lofty composure with which Wordsworth modestly contents his ambition for influence: "Still glides the stream, and shall forever glide: The elements, must perish. Be it so: Content if something from our hands have power And if, as toward the silent tomb we go, Through hope, through love, and Faith's transcendent dower, We feel that we are greater than we know.” 11. It is not necessary to cheerful writing that it should be witty writing or even humorous writing. Cheerfulness is a characteristic of all great writers whose thoughts and imaginations 1 Rousseau (rå so'), a French philosopher and author, born in Gene va, June 28, 1712, died at Ermenonville, near Chantilly, July 3, 1778,. have their spring in primitive feelings and affections, which are sound, vigorous, and unspotted with discontent and misanthropy. There is often in pathos a gentle and refining melancholy, a tender sadness, which does not sadden. The fire of Milton's' genius burns away the mists and vapors of the soul as readily as they are chased away by Ariosto's' more graceful and gleeful enchantments. The tempest-like passions that rend the breasts of Lear, Macbeth, and Othello are spiritual tonics. In short, where there is health in the senses and the soul of the writer, there is cheer; and, what is more, the sun-like radiation of cheer. 12. In conclusion, it may be said that we should specially watch and wait for those precious moments, not common to the most bountifully endowed natures, but coming at intervals to all, when Heaven seems graciously revealed to our minds-when, through inlets of inspiration suddenly opened, stream thoughts and sentiments which, for the time, make existence ecstasy! Fix these moods in the memory, hōard them in the heart, assimilate them to the very substance of the soul; for they can endear life, and make it beautiful and sweet, long after their imparadising rapture has faded into "the light of common day." "Hold," says the Eastern proverb-"hold all the skirts of thy mantle extended when Heaven is raining gold!" Adapted from WHIPPLE. E. P. WHIPPLE, one of the most brilliant of American writers, was born in Glouces ter, Mass., March 8, 1819. When four years of age, his family removed to Salem, where he attended various schools until he was fifteen, when he entered the Bank of General Interest in that city as a clerk. In his eighteenth year, he went to Boston, where he has ever since been occupied mainly with commercial pursuits. Although, from the age of fourteen, Mr. Whipple has been a writer for the press, occasionally writing remarkably well, he was only known as a writer to his few associates and confidants until 1843, when he published in the Boston Miscellany a paper on Macaulay, rivaling in analysis, and reflection, and richness of diction, the best productions of that brilliant essayist. He has since published, in the North American Review, articles on the Puritans, American Poets, Daniel Webster as an Author, Old English Dramatists, British Critics, South's Sermons, Byron, Wordsworth, Talfourd, Sydney Smith, and other subjects; in the American Review, on Beaumont and Fletcher, English Poets of the Nineteenth Century, etc.; and in other periodicals, essays and reviewals enough to form several volumes. He has been an important contributor to the Atlantic Monthly. Among his more recent works are "Character and Characteristic Men," in 1866; "The Literature of the Age of Elizabeth," in 1869; and "Success and its Conditions," from which the above is adapted, in 1871. As a critic, he writes with keen discrimination, cheerful confidence, and unhesitating freedom; illustrating truth with almost unerring precision, and producing a fair and distinct impression of an author. His style is sensuous, flowing, and idiomatic, abounding in unforced antitheses, apt illustrations, and natural grace. 1 Milton, see sketch, p. 295. at Reggio, Sept. 8, 1474, and died June 6, 1533. Ο III. 62. THE CANDID MAN. PART FIRST. NE bright laughing day, I threw down my book an hour sooner than usual, and sallied out with a lightnèss of foot and exhilaration of spirit, to which I had long been a stranger. I had just sprung over a stile that led into one of those green shady lanes, which make us feel that the old poets who loved and lived for nature, were right in calling our island "the měrry England"-when I was startled by a short quick bark on one side of the hedge. I turned sharply round; and seated upon the sward was a man, apparently of the peddler profession; a great deal box was lying open before him; a few articles of linen and female dress were scattered round, and the man himself appeared earnestly occupied in examining the deeper recesses of his itinerant warehouse. 2. A small black terrier flew toward me with no friendly growl. "Down," said I; "all strangers are not foes-though the English generally think so." The man hastily looked up; perhaps he was struck with the quaintnèss of my remonstrance to his canine' companion; for, touching his hat civilly, he said— "The dog, sir, is very quiet; he only means to give me the alarm by giving it to you; for dogs seem to have no děsʼpicable insight into human nature, and know well that the best of us may be taken by surprise." 3. "You are a moralist," said I, not a little astonished in my turn by such an address from such a person. "I could not have expected to stumble upon a philosopher so easily. Have you any wares in your box likely to suit me? if so, I should like to purchase of so moralizing a vender!"-" No, sir," said the seeming peddler, smiling, and yet at the same time hurrying his goods into his box, and carefully turning the key-"no, sir, I am ōnly a bearer of other men's goods; my morals are all that I can call my own, and those I will sell you at your own price." 4. "You are candid, my friend,” said I, and your fraǹknèss, alone, would be inestimable in this age of deceit, and country of hypocrisy."-"Ah, sir!" said my new acquaintance, "I see already that you are one of those persons who look to the dark side of things; for my part, I think the present age the best that ever existed, and our country the most virtuous in Europe." 5. “I congratulate you, Mr. Optimist,' on your opinions," quoth I; "but your observation leads me to suppose that you are both a historian and a traveler: am I right ?"—" Why," answered the box-bearer, "I have dabbled a little in books, and wandered not a little among men. I am just returned from Germany, and am now going to my friends in London. I am charged with this box of goods: God send me the luck to deliver it safe!" 6. "Amen," said I; "and with that prayer and this trifle I wish you a good morning."-"Thank you a thousand times, sir, for bōth—but do add to your favors by informing me of the right road to the town of -,” replied the man. "I am going in that direction myself: if you choose to accompany me part of the way, I can insure your not missing the rest." وو 7. "Your honor is too good!" returned he of the box, rising, and slinging his fardel across him-"it is but seldom that a gentleman of your rank will condescend to walk three paces with one of mine. You smile, sir; perhaps you think I should not class myself among gentlemen; and yet I have as good a right to the name as most of the set. I belong to no trade-I follow no calling-I rove where I list, and rest where I please: in short, I know no occupation but my indolence, and no law but my will. Now, sir, may I not call myself a gentleman ?"-"Of a surety!" quoth I. "You seem to me to hold a middle rank between a half-pay captain and the king of the gipsies." 8. "You have it, sir," rejoined my companion, with a slight laugh. He was now by my side, and as we walked on, I had leisure more minutely to examine him. He was a middle-sized, and rather athletic man; apparently about the age of thirty-eight. He was attired in a dark-blue frock coat, which was neither shabby nor new, but ill-made, and much too large and long for its present possessor; beneath this was a faded velvet waistcoat, that had formerly, like the Persian ambassador's tunic, "blushed with crimson, and blazed with gold;" but which might now have in nature is ordered by Providence for the best. 1 Op' ti mist, one who holds the opinion or doctrine that every thing been advantageously exchanged in Monmouth Street for the lawful sum of two shillings and ninepence; under this was an inner vest of the cashmere shawl pattern, which seemed much too new for the rest of the dress. 9. Though his shirt was of a very unwashed hue, I remarked, with some suspicion, that it was of a very respectable fineness; and a pin, which might be paste, or could be diämond, peeped below a tattered and dingy black kid stock, like a gypsy's eye beneath her hair. His trousers were of a light gray, and the justice of Providence, or of the tailor, avenged itself upon them for the prodigal length bestowed upon their ill-assorted companion, the coat; for they were much too tight for the muscular limbs they concealed, and, rising far above the ankle, exhibited the whole of a thick Wellington boot, which was the very picture of Italy upon the map. 10. The face of the man was common-place and ordinary; one sees a hundred such, ěvèry day, in Fleet Street, or on the 'Change; the features were small, irregular and somewhat flat; yet, when you looked twice upon the countenance, there was something marked and singular in the expression, which fully atoned for the commonnèss of the features. The right eye turned away from the left, in that watchful squint which seems constructed on the same considerate plan as those Irish guns, made for shooting round a corner; his eyebrows were large and shaggy, and greatly resembled bramble bushes, in which his fox-like had taken refuge. Round these vulpine retreats was a labyrinthean maze of those wrinkles, vulgarly called crow's feet, deep, intricate, and intersected: they seemed for all the world like the web of a Chancery suit. eyes 11. Singular enough, the rest of the countenance was perfectly smooth and unindented; even the lines from the nostril to the corners of the mouth, usually so deeply traced in men of his age, were scarcely more apparent than in a boy of eighteen. His smile was frank-his voice clear and hearty-his address open, and much superior to his apparent rank of life, claiming somewhat of equality, yet conceding a great deal of respect; but, notwithstanding all these certainly favorable points, there was a sly and cunning expression in his perverse and vigilant eye and 1 In`ter sect' ed, cut into one another; mutually crossed. |