But as the eye can see everything but itself, so an Editor is very likely to see everybody's mistakes but his own, and we shall certainly quarrel with no good natured friend who reminds us of our slips (BJ, I, 2).

Our first review shall be of an American author, what one we shall determine by lot, to save us from a partial feeling in the outset, when we have concluded our prefatory remarks (BJ, I, 2).

It would ill become us, then in the outset of our career as reviewers,(1) to enter upon our duty with a narrow feeling of partiality for our own authors, to the unjust exclusion of foreigners, from our sympathies. But this liberal feeling will compel us to give our first attention and widest space to the authors of our wan country, because they have the greatest odds to contend with, having a forestalled opinion against them in the minds of their own countrymen, and the boat paid and most, fertile authors for competitors, whose works are imported sect free to our markets (BJ, I, 2).

... we have no inducements to indulge in the luxury of puffing; but as entertain so kindly a feeling towards the whole brood of unfortunates, called American authors, that we can never find it in our hearts to treat them otherwise than with honest candor (BJ, I, 1).

... if the Northern slaves — as the South Carolina statesmen call our honest laborers, who live by the sweat of their own brows — can produce a work like this ... (BJ, I, 3).

... but the pleasure derivable from it (Pilgrim's Progress), in any sense, will be found in the direct ratio of the readers capacity to smother its true purpose, in the direct ratio of his ability to keep the allegory out of sight, or of his inability to comprehend it (GLB, XXXV, 254; H, XIII, 149) ;

In this instance, so far as the allegorical instruction and argumentation are lost sight of, in the upper [page 523:] current — so far as the main admitted mention of the work is kept out of view — so far only is the work a poem worth notice, or worthy its author (BJ, I, 7; H, XII, 11-12).

... perhaps there is no article of food so universally eaten as eggs, and none so necessary to eat fresh (BJ, I, 15).

No one who has had the good fortune to eat at Mr. Bement's table — his public one, we mean — will doubt this. His treatise is accordingly a labor of love; and to those who have ever been engaged in the pleasant business of rearing poultry, it will read like a fairy tale (BJ, I, 15).

The accomplished author of them never uses her pen in vain, because she never uses it with a sinister motive ..... These ‘Flowers for Children’ have all the freshness and unpretending beauty of the flowers for children which God sprinkles in the high ways and fields, and we think that children must love them as well, for they come iron the hands of one who has unbounded love for them ... As the child is the father of the man, his mental food should always be of the same quality, though given in different quantities. No book is fit for a child that is not profitable for a man ... Many of these unpretending ‘flowers’ are as fit for even who are just on the verge of second childhood, as for those who are yet in their first (BJ, I,15).

... a paper on the inequalities of wealth which has merit enough to sanctify all its other contents ... Among all our M.P's (as George Cruikshank calls the monthly periodicals,) the Knickerbocker is the oldest. This nobody will deny. The London Literary Gazette says it is the best, which somebody probably will dispute, for it is the fate of every body and everything in this world to have enemies as well as friends. If old age is in evidence ... (BJ, I, 15).

... he will find a plenty of American pens that could be employed in his service, for a very moderate compensation (BJ, I,15).

As I thought your letter contained more of the bright side of criticism than the ‘Broadway Journal’ I sent it to my friend Miss Barrett. She return (ed) it with a note — half of which I tear off, and send you (confidentiall (y) ) that you may see in what a good and noble spirit she receives the critique — in which, as you say, the shadows do certainly predominate.(3)

But I am uncomfortable about mat message to Mr. Pose lest it should not be grateful enough in the sound of it. Will you tell him what is quite the truth, that in my opinion he has dealt with me most generously, and that I thank him for his candour as for a part of his kindness. Will you tell him also that he has given my father pleasure, which is giving it to me more than twice. Also the review is very ably written — and the [page 526:] reviewer has so obviously and thoroughly read my poems, as to be a wonder among critics. Will you tell Mr. Poe this, or to this effect, dear Mr. Horne ... (1)

We have been told, by one who should know, that Mr. James’ habits of composition are peculiar. — for exile, that, while walking to and fro hurriedly, he dictates, in an excited manner, to, an amanuensis; and that it is impossible for the latter, although a practised penman, and chosen principally an account of his rapidity of hand, to keep pace with the improvisation of the novelist. We hear, moreover, from a different source, that the MSS. thus furiously indited are committed to the press, and issued, without farther intervention on the part of the author (BGM, V, 114).

We know a gentleman, who once, for lack of better business, sated as Mr. James's amanuensis, and put upon pager some half a dozen of his romances. He says that Mr. James used to pour them out like a mountebank pulling ribbons from his mouth, and apparently with as little mental exertion (BJ, I, 21).

We took up a book a few months since ... We have seen ... We knew a gentleman ... We also know a country gentleman ... We know a gentleman ... (BJ, I, 20-21),

The first chapter in either of Mr. James's(1) books will afford a good example of the manner in which he makes up his volumes (BJ, I, 21).

Mr. James has one very great merit; he never makes use of foreign term but employs only words that can be found in English dictionaries (BJ, I, 2l).

We do not notice this important work to make its merits known to the profession or the public, but to point out one of the many evils which we inflict upon ourselves, by denying to foreign authors the rift to control their own works (BJ, I, 29).

We have only time this creek to notice the outside of this new book ... Its contents may be safely trusted in without criticism (BJ, I, 29).

I shall think better of you myself for knowing that you can feel so strongly and write so harshly, it justifies the opinion that I expressed of you in my notice of your ‘Conversations’ ... (1)

We can afford but little space in our Journal to dramatic affairs. Indeed, we believe there are few things which the public cares so little about, as the gossip of the Theatres ... But we intend, nevertheless, to devote a portion of our columns to the amusements of this city, and the Theatres will, of course, be included among them. Whatever interests the people is the legitimate object of our study, and the less creditable the object may be, the greater is the necessity of its being looked after (BJ, I, 30).

A good natured friend, who seems to labor under a very erroneous impression, that we have an idea of setting the North River on fire, has entirely misunderstood the moaning of our initial remarks on the Theatres ... The critic of the Mirror, asked the other day, ‘Are our Theatres worthy of support?’(2) But that is not the important question. ‘WHY ARE THEY NOT? is the great question. We said that the Theatre had not been a reputable profession since the time of Queen Elisabeth (BJ, I, 58). [page 530:]

With us the stage has never boon indigenous. There have been but few American actors and not one American dramatist. The whole atmosphere of our Theatres is essentially English. All the plays present English scences [[scenes]], English characters, English thoughts, delivered in English accents ... If a cockney should fall asleep in the Haymarket and awake in the Park Theatre, he would be hardly conscious of a change (BJ, I, 30).

It was popular in London, after the first night (when it was not very warmly received,) and of course is popular hero. The success of a play like this, proves the truth of our view on the state of the stage (BJ, I, 35).

Mr. Goldsmith has almost elevated his art into the upper region of they fine arts ... It is a thousand pities that all who write; and they include nearly all of the population of our country, could not main some apprach [[approach]] to the perfection which Mr. Goldsmith has attained in the use of the pen (BJ, I, 35).

The Democratic Review for January, contains, as we have already noticed, as admirable paper on the social qualities of our condition (BJ, I, 45). [page 532:]

The age of this Magazine tolls the whole story of its excellence. Nothing short of real merit could have kept it in existence ..... (BJ, I, 45) ;

If old age is evidence of a good constitution in a man, it is no less so in a magazine. The Knickerbocker must have something good about it, or it never could have lived to its present age (BJ, I, 45).

(We give place to the above communication with a good deal of pleasure; if we misunderstood the author of the pamphlet on the re-organization of the Navy, we regret it, and will cheerfully correct our mistake ... We shall recur to the subject again. — ED.) (BJ, I, 86).

We can hardly open a book on any subject, which does not contain a dash of satire. The gravest lessons are [page 533:] now taught in a vein of humor, and all our philosophers are professed jokers. There seems to be nothing serious but fun, and. nothing funny which is not serious ... Upon our own side of this water, we have, as yet no didactic humorists ... (BJ, I, 50).

We protestants [[Protestants]] are so much used to speak of Ignatius Loyola in no very devout terms ... His work is, of course, the labor of a loving and reverent heart ... (BJ, I, 52).

These essays have merit, unquestionable, but some person, in an article furnished ‘The Broadway Journal’, before my assumption of its editorship, has gone to the extreme of toadyism in their praise. This critic (possibly Mr. Briggs) thinks that John Waters ... (GLB, XXXIII, 18; H, XV, 67).

In a well written memoir of him, furnished for the ‘Broadway Journal’, the writer says ..... (H, XVI, 94).(1)

We determined to give wood engravings in our paper with the sole view of giving encouragement to this art among [page 535:] among us ... But we think it the only legitimate method of illustrating printed matter. It partakes of the quality of typography, and creates no incongruous feelings as the smoothness and delicacy of steel and lithographic engravings must do (BJ, I, 63).

The only method of illustration that has been employed for many year in Europe, in periodicals, has been by wood cuts.(1) And it is the only style of art that can be fitly employed with letter press ..... steel engravings ... these smooth inanities ..... (BJ, I, 61).

We trust that the undertaking of our artists to got out an illustrated edition of Bryant's Poems, which we gave a hint of in our heat number ... (BJ, I, 61).

The only article in the Magazine that will ever be read a second time, except by the writers of them, is the New Arabian Night's Tale by Mr. Poe. The idea of this tale is a very happy one, and it afforded the author a wide scope for displaying his exact knowledge and lively imagination: two qualities that we rarely find united in the same person ..... It has ... something which is called a portrait of Edgar A. Poe. It is poor as a work of art, and something much worse as a portrait. It is a gross wrong to Mr. Poe, and a fraud upon the purchasers of the Magazine. It bears no more resemblance to that gentleman than to any other of Mr. Graham's Contributors. But if it were much worse then (sic) it is, which is hardly conceivable, it would be amply compensated by the fine sketch of Mr. Poe's genius, by Lowell ... (BJ, I, 61). [page 536:]

The publishers have done the public a service in reprinting this book; and we hope to see the practice followed by other publishers, which they have here introduced, of giving the editions from which the work is republished (BJ, I, 61).

The first time that we ever saw Mr. Schoolcraft personally, was at Michilimachinas, surrounded by a company of noble looking fellows, of the race whose history is so fully elucidated in the work before us ... Oneota is a work of a very miscellaneous character, but all its miscellanies tend to the elucidation of one subject (BJ, I, 61).

It must have been very quietly conducted, for we do not remember ever having heard it spoken of, or of seeing it in any of our bookstores or reading rooms ... Any literary publication that narrows itself down to so small a compass as South Carolina prejudices must, of course, be exceedingly narrow in its moral dimensions (BJ, I, 61-2).

Something at once cheerful and mysterious, radiates from the bright arabesque designs that glow like missals of old (BJ, I, 62).

A more dainty and appropriate style for works of elegant literature can scarcely be imagined ... (BJ, I, 62).

The illustrations ... The illustrations ... If the remainder should contain an many illustrations from good pictures, the work would be worth having for the illustrations alone (BJ, I, 62).

To name so humble an instance as ourselves, after these illustrious names may sound absurdly(1), but no one is too humble to illustrate a principle; never could [page 538:] get through with a tithe of Robinson Crusoe, perhaps the most universally read book in the language. Many an idle hour have we loitered away in our summer days with Dr. Doddridge or one of the dramatists of Charles Second's time, but we never could get up an intimacy with Robinson Crusoe (BJ, I, 66).

How fondly do we recur, in memory, to those enchanted days of our boyhood when we first learned to grow serious over Robinson Crusoe! — when we first found the spirit of wild adventure enkindling within us, as by the dim fire light, we labored out, line by line, the marvellous import of those pages, and hung breathless and trembling with eagerness over their absorbing — over their absorbing — over their enchaining interest (SLM, II, 127; H, VIII, 169).

The Carol was a bright bubble, a perfect sphere with all the primitive colors playing upon its surface; the Chimes is nothing more than a painted shell ... No one can read it without feeling that Dickens is a thorough good fellow ... You(1) are conscious of having before you the first conception of the author, in its original integrity, without having been submitted to the emasculating correction of osculating prudence, or the refinements of a fastidious taste. His copy goes from his hand to the printer before the ink is dry. It is this freshness which distinguishes all his writings, that gives them one of their chief attractions ... We have heard a good many wonderful stories of miserly hearts being melted, and churls made amiable, by the mere reading of the Christmas Carol, but we fear that the good done by the Chimes will not be as great (BJ, I, 67).

As this book is not likely to be placed in the hands of our reading public, we give a few more extracts free it, to show more fully than our notice of last week could do, the general spirit which pervades it (BJ, I, 68).

The article upon Mr. Dana, written by Mr. Jones and published in an early number of this (the Broadway) Journal .....” (BJ, II, 183).

We heard a very eloquent sermon a Sabbath or two since ... who has ever troubled himself in inquirer into the nature of the mental food which is nightly administered to the young care-for-nought, who fill the pit and galleries of this theatre? ... These boys possibly go to church once a week, but they go to the theatre every night (BJ, I, 74).

We could not but feel vexed that the author had so spoilt an admirable moral, am so well adapted to benefit an audience of apprentices, in misrepresenting the true story open which his drama was founded ... The whole teaching of the play is mischievous, read the sentiment of it exceedingly mawkish. As a work of art, the Lady of Lyons does not rise above the low standard of the conventionalities of the stage (BJ, I, 74). [page 540:]

A hundred criticisms to the contrary notwithstanding. I must regard ‘The Lady of Lyons’ as one of the most successful dramatic efforts of modern times ... It abounds in sentiments which stir the soul as the sound of a trumpet (GM, XXIX, 246; H, XVI, 109).

This cannot fail to be a profitable publication, for even though the publisher should reap no profit, the public will. We have but one charge to prefer against the publication. It does not inform us where the translation was made (BJ, I, 77).

... the materials for a book are as abundant in our high-ways, as in the by-ways of the west (BJ, I, 77).

their high mightinesses, the editors of the pictorial magazines. It is not a little remarkable that these gentlemen are extremely fond of tales of love, seeing they generally have so little of that commodity themselves, excepting for themselves (BJ, I, 77).

We have always felt exceedingly mortified to hear him abused by our countrymen, who appear to have strangely misunderstood his character ... There's nothing about him but suffers a sea change ..... As a delineator of the sailor character, he has never been approached ... We read them (his stories), not for the sake of the plot, but for the characters which they contain, as we read Shakeapeare's historical tragedies (BJ, I, 77).

His books are essentially ‘mediocre’. His ideas are the common property of the mob ... We look throughout his writings in vain for the slightest indication of originality ... (GM, XIX, 142; H, X, 197-98).

If the author had accomplished no other goal by writing this book, it was enough to have made a simple-hearted old man perfectly happy ... he looks as smiling as one of his own perennials (BJ, I, 77-8).

Mr. Hall's book was a very costly one, and probably the best specimen of illustration in wood cuts ever published in England; and we have no doubt but that a republication of the prints would have been profitable here (BJ, I, 78).

Such characters, if held up in a proper light, may do good after their execution, to others besides the surgeon; but when made the heroes of romance, there is too much danger that their evils will live after them (BJ, I, 78).

If such a project for impressing men with an idea of God's power were carried out, as that proposed in the Bridgewater treatises, and other works of a similar kind, every object in creation from an ant to an elephant, and every member of every animal would require a separate volume, before the plan could be complete. But are trust that the perception of mankind is not yet so completely blunted, as to require this kind of pointing to the wisdom of God, as displayed in his works (BJ, I, 78).

He is emphatically one of the ‘men of passions’ ... urged by a rabid ambition to do much ... Something he has done (BJ, I, 82).

In the following passage Mr. Rocchietti echoes a thought which we have expressed elsewhere; it will appear heterodox to many, no doubt, but it contains more truth than at first blush will appear evident. ‘If the English Theatre has not yet reached the Italian or French perfection, it is owing to a national religious veneration for everything written by Shakespeare; and when the English critic will not be awed by the great Shakespeare; and really Shakespeare is great, I do not see why the English Theatre will not to be as good as any (BJ, I, 83).

This is a very imposing title page, in more senses than one, for it is a gross imposition upon the reader, since the contents of the book do not offer any reasons why a National Literature cannot flourish in the United States. A work on a purely literary subject should, at least, be tolerably grammatical, but this book sets all conventional rules of composition aat defiance ..... We judge from the following remarks that among the other virtures [[virtues]] of Italians. In a very strict regard for the fifth commandment; Mr. Rocchietti is the first gentleman we ever knew, who considered it an honor to have an acquaintance with his own mother. It is putting a very literal construction upon ‘honor thy father and mother’ ..... We have read Mr. Rocchietti's book on account of its title, which has a very taking look; but the first page of it is enough to show that he has no qualification for the very serious labor which he has undertaken (BJ, I, 82-3).

Our remarks about the illustrations are such as we feel ourselves bound to make. It is a work that we could not slobber it over with the unmeaning praise of those who feel themselves bound to say something kind in return for a presentation copy ..... Our strictures were written without any knowledge of these facts, and we shall not, therefore, qualify what we have written. But we feel ourselves bound to repeat ... (BJ, I, 85).

The three dollar species have pinkish coloured covers, fifty leaved,(1) and are of both sexes; while the five dollar species are generally males, have a hundred leaves, and care bluish or brown covered (BJ, I, 93).

The Editor's Table, which has a marked idiosyncracy, has the customary set out of pleasant dishes,(2) among which every taste is sure to find something to its liking (BJ, I, 93).

We regard this brief sketch as the most remarkable piece of writing that we have ever encountered in any Magazine, whether three dollar or five dollar (BJ, I, 93).

It contains ... a poem by Mr. Poe, which is not ascribed to that gentleman, for what reason we are at a loss to conceive, for it is a piece of verse which the best of our poets would hardly wish to disown. The prefatory remarks of the Editor are rather mystifying, and seem to tend to the disparagement of the poem as principally recommended by its versification (BJ, I, 93).

There is too little material, In this delicate volume to base an opinion of the author's poetic ability upon ..... The author says that ‘these compositions appear is compliance with the wishes of many of the writer's friends’, We cannot conceive of a better reason for publishing a volume of poems, or one better calculated to disarm criticism (BJ, I, 94).

It would be idle to look for any thing new in a book professing to give the observations of a looker-on in Rome ..... We find nothing that is objectionable; saving a few remarks on classic Art ..... In external appearance it is one of the neatest specimens of book-making that we have encountered since we began to look into books, with the special design to discern their defects and merits (BJ, I, 94).

We have not met the Baron before for many a long year,(1) and we welcome him back to us now, as we would any other old friend who had entertained us in our youth (BJ, I, 94).

Southern Reviews not being articles of prime necessity, like rice and turpentine, will not be sought after with the sane perseverance that those commodities are by northern speculators. It the South would have us talk her literary productions she must send them to us. The only food that the north has ever sought at the South is food for the body(1) (BJ, I, 94).

Holding these opinions is regard to ‘Woman in the Nineteenth Century’, I still feel myself called upon to disavow the silly, condemnatory criticism of the work which appeared in one of the earlier numbers of ‘The Broadway Journal’. That article was not written by myself, and written by my associate Mr. Briggs (GLB, XXXII, 72; H, XV, 75).

‘... we travel to very little purpose if we do not learn charity to every sincere belief, however it may seem to [page 548:] us; remembering that our own may seem equally so to a more enlightened order of beings’. This in neither sense nor benevolence ..... Let us hold on to what we have, and call ignorance ignorance and delusion delusion (BJ, I, 98).

There has been too such nonsense uttered on this last subject. There is no country in the world, we believe, where there is less of this tyranny of public opinions than in the United States (BJ, I, 90).

I liked your article, for instance, on Lanman's nonsense, it was kind and yet conclusive.(1)

We have been importuned to follow up our portraits of ‘Mi Boy’, and the ‘Brigadier’, with the portraits of the other prominent editors of the New York press; and we shall endeavor to do lest we be accused of partiality towards our friends of the Mirror (BJ, I, 105).

Perhaps no paper in the country has exercised a more extended or a healthier influence, upon the public morals. No ordinary man could by the more force, of industry and [page 549:] integrity gain the position of a leading editor, in a political party, at a time like the present, when intelligence is so universally diffused, and men are so exacting of those who labor for them ... The suspicion of eating bran-bread has gained Mr. Greeley more enemies than his eating up the substance of a dozen widows and orphans in luxurious dinners, could have done (BJ, I, 105).

In the meantime Mr. Briggs in this paper — in the ‘Broadway Journal’ — did as the honor of taking me to task for what he supposed to be my insinuations against Mr. Aldrich (BJ, I, 148; H, XII, 44).

It appears to us that the surest way for women to gain their rights — always supposing that they do not enjoy them — is to train up their children properly, and they will sea that their mothers suffer no wrong. When women dissipate their days and nights is idle amusements, and squander their incomes in dress, while their sons are entrusted to the keeping of hired servants, or sent away from home to distant schools, they must not blame men that they have no clearer perception of what is due to women. It is true that men make the laws by which women are governed, but the women make the men who govern them (BJ, I, 110).

We omitted by accident, to mention this excellent periodical in our last week's Review (BJ, I, 110).

We could enter upon the topic con amore, but that its nature renders it unfit for extended notice in our columns ..... They have done much towards rendering agriculture a favorite pursuit among liberal minds, showing that it is not only the most useful of the Arts, for an Art it is, nor nothing, but one of the most elegant (BJ, I, 110).

since English Reviews must be republished in this country, our a writers and publishers being precluded from undertaking the publication of American works of this class, by the absence of a copyright law, we are glad that the enterprise has fallen its such good hands ... (BJ, I, ???)

Gentlemen who have moved over upon Long Island, after living many years in the city, find that they make a very great saving in their doctor's bills (BJ, I, 113).

... his feature, in tones and thought, might have been written by the poet Dana. There was the same inward depth and command of the outer world, the same profound constructiveness and freedom form [[from]] were dogmatism ..... The thinking was of the right manly sort ... (BJ, I, 123-4).

Antithesis is his end — he has no other. He does not employ it to enforce thought, but he gathers thought from all quarters with the sole view to its capacity for antithetical expression ... No man living could say what it is that Mr. Hudson proposes to demonstrate ... (GLB, XXXI, 123-3; H, XVI, 83).

and in the Journal, December 13:

He did not favorably impress us ... His bad points are legion — ant of concentration. — want of consecutiveness — want of definite purpose — want of common school education. — utter incapacity to comprehend a drama out of its range of mere character ... (BJ, II, 360; H, XIII, 26-7).

We have no expectation that Mr. Jay's pamphlet will be the last which the unhappy trial of Bishop Onderdonk will call forth, but it is the last one we shall notice in our Journal (BJ, I, 125).

The harm done to the community by filling the minds of the young with filthy details of scandalous transactions, and exciting their passions by the bitter personalities of men who are looked upon as heralds of peace, is greater, we fear, than the good which many Bishops will be likely to effect in many years (BJ, I, 125).

The freedom of the press has put an end to satire. When men have the privilege to abuse wrong-doers in plain prose, there is no inducement to insinuate abuses against them under the cover of assumed names in rhyme (BJ, I, 126).

It is womanly, gentle, and gossipping [[gossiping]]; full of little pathetic episodes, and sketches of in-door humble life (BJ, I, 126).

The subject of the present paper is Gray, for whom Mr. Tuckerman evinces a strong fellow-feeling, and a very thorough appreciation of his character and genius (BJ, I, 126).

The scroll work shows a better taste and a higher degree of knowledge in this kind of design, than we have before seen in an American publication (BJ, I, 126).

This, we believe, is Cour (sic) de Leon, one of Mr. James's(1) popular novels; it will probably be found quite equal, under its new title, to a new novel by the same author (BJ, I, 126).

We also know a gentlemen, who lives in a gothic castle somewhere in New Jersey, who always enquires (sic), whenever he comes to town, which is about once a fortnight, whether there is anything new by James? The last time he asked the question, we replied ‘yes, a new title’ (BJ, I, 21).

The condition of the inmates of this well known Institution are(2) pleasantly set forth in this report, that the term unfortunate hardly seems applicable to them (BJ, I, 126).

It is not our intention, of course, at this late day, to say anything critically of a work whose preeminent merit is as definitely settled, and as generally admitted as that of any history is existence. It would be difficult indeed, to urge anything, with a show of reason, against the book, smoldered with reference to Mr. Prescott's intention in undertaking it ..... We are guilty of a sheer truism in maintaining that ‘Ferdinand and Isabella’ is a thorough, elaborate, tell arranged, well-toned, and original record of an epoch replete with events of importance ..... (BJ, I, 129-30).

very brief and compendiuos; neither of them equalling in bulk one of our ordinary novel volumes. Their authors refer only to the most accessible materials, and main no claim to research (BJ, I, 130).

It will be a happy time for the world, but especially happy for the reading part of it, when people shall be content to accomplish, in the shortest time possible, whatever they may feel themselves called to do. TIME FLIES, should be inscribed on the door-posts of every author's dwelling (BJ, I, 130).

‘The use of history is not to load the memory with fact; but to store the mind with principles’, says Dr. Taylor, in his preface; but if this were true, it would be as idle labor to compress a world of facts into the compass that he has done in his manual; principles alone would have answered a better purpose. But it is an unmeaning sentence. The principles of history, the principles of chemistry, are facts: we have need of nothing else ... Happily for us, Dr. Taylor has not acted on his own theory, but has given use many historical facts as could well be disposed of in 800 pages; and it is this, not his principles, which gives so high a value to his manual. There is yet no settled principle in regard to the best manner of pursuing historical studies ... As a manual of history it will be found one of the most useful, and at the same time most readable compends, that have been published (BJ, I,142).

Welby Pugin has done more to review the lore of medieval art, than any other man of his time; he is a devout Catholic, as every genuine enthusiast in ecclesiastical architecture must be ... (BJ, I, 146) ;

Rudeness of execution and a poverty of invention, a meagreness of details in imitation, distinguished the gothic style as much as profuseness of ornament, and grandeur of feeling; we cannot in a refined age imitate the barbarisms of a semi-civilized one (BJ, I, 146).

... snug little chapels of ease, where pious ladies may exhibit their elegant dresses, and their husbands enjoy a quiet map of a warm Sunday afternoon, as proof that we do not depend upon the past for everything (BJ, I, 147).

We would advise the genius who furnishes the ornaments of a certain ‘illuminated’ work, to procure the book and study it, not only the letter press, but the magnificent scroll work and diapering of the plates (BJ, I, 143). [page 559:]

In a reply to a letter signed ‘Outis’, and defending Mr. Longfellow from certain charges supposed to have been made against him by myself, I took occasion to assert that ‘of the class of willful plagiarists nine out of ten are authors of established reputation who plunder recondite, neglectful, or forgotten books (GM, XXXII, 130; H, XVI, 132).

Mr. Seeley's lecture is too purely technical for popular reading ... as smooth and flashy as a review by Macaulay ... Mr. Seeley's lecture is not written ... with the copiousness of detail and illustration which we find in the lectures of Davy, but he has crowded as many facts into his lecture as we remember to have seen in the same space. We extract one sentence, merely to show how unacceptable truth itself may be made by conveying it in an unseemly shape (BJ, I, 155).

It has been a too frequent fault with children's books that they have been badly got up, but these volume [page 560:] are sufficiently elegant for the most fastidious amateur in bibliography (BJ, I, 155).

Mr. J. H. Green, who is doing essential service to the cause of humanity by his labors in a field which has long remained without the husbandman, though it has been many years white for harvest. — There are few besides those whose who suffer from gambling who know to what a fearful extent the vice prevails among as ... This dreadful vice ..... Every father who has a son just entering upon business should put one of Mr. Green's books in his hand, and every merchant when he first receives a new clerk into his employment should see that he has a copy of the ‘Miseries of Gambling’ (BJ, I, 155).

The gentle author of this ‘Tragic Drama’ has given her book to the world from a very amiable motive, namely, a desire to counteract the prejudices which Shakespeare's delineation of Richard the Third has created in the minds of mankind. But her intention is better than her gift ... The world will never forgive him his tyrannies, or forgot that he murdered the infants in the Tower. The blood of the innocent will always make an immortal outcry against those who shed it ..... Whatever doubts may be entertained of the descent from the husband of the daughter of the earl of Berkshire (which the author claims), there can be none in the world that the descent from the Poet Dryden to the author of the ‘Last of the Plantagenets’ is not only very real but very great (BJ, I, 155-56).

This comfortable old Magazine ... a quaint poem from John Waters which would be beautiful if it were not quaint; and some amusing bits in the editor's table (BJ, I, 156). [page 561:]

is known principally as the twin brother of the late Willis Gaylord Clark ... Mr. Clark once did me the honor to review my poems, — and I forgive him ... As the editor has no precise character, the magazine, as a matter of course, can have none. When I say ‘np precise character”, I mean that Mr. C., as a literary man, has about him no determinateness, no distinctiveness, no saliency of point; an apple, in fact, or a pumpkin, has more angles. He is as smooth as oil or a sermon from Doctor Hawks; he is noticeable for nothing in the world except for the markedness which he is noticeable for nothing (GLB, XXXIII, 32; H, XVI, 114-15).

However it was not our intention to pronounce a panegyric ... but to vindicate ourselves from a vile aspersion on our critical honesty which the paper contained last Saturday, in a notice of our review of Bulwer's Minor Poems ... Do not, we beseech of you, Messieurs of the Emporium, accuse us of making attacks upon people when we simply utter our opinions and fortify them with reasons (BJ, I, 156).

We have had to be sure, Trumbull's clumsy ‘McFingal’, Halleck's ‘Croakers’, the “Vision of Rubeta’, with its sequel, and one or two similar things, inclusive of a late volume of poems by William Ellery Channing, which we take to have been intended for satire or burlesque, on the ground that it in impossible to comprehend them as anything else. But beyond these ... nothing (BJ, I, 161; H, XII, 107). [page 563:]

‘The Vision of Rubeta’ by Laughton Osborne, is probably our best composition of the kind? but, in saying this, we intend no excessive commendation. Trumbull's clumsy and imitative work is scarcely worth mention — and then we have Halleck's ‘Croakers’, local and ephemeral ... Park Benjamin has written a clever address, with the title ‘Infatuation‘(1) ... some matters we have produced, to be sure, which were excellent in the way of burlesque — (the Poems of William Ellery Channing for example)... (SLM, XV, 189; H, XIII, 165).

Indeed we have rarely read an essay in which the writer has contrived so completely to overshadow himself in the greatness of his theme. Mr. Mapes is too much of an enthusiast in the cause of science to waste his own, or his hearer's time, with any superfluous flourishes of rhetoric, or by introducing in a practical discourse any extrinsic subject. He is plain, driest, and impressive ... The importance ... is but imperfectly understood (BJ, I, 173).

Although Cruikshank's name is very nearly a synonym for fun, yet his designs are not pure fun, for life the words of genius they use tinged with a dash of melancholy (BJ, I, 174). [page 564:]

The first articles on Tyler, which we hope is from the pen of the editor, because it will induce us to read his political speculations hereafter, if it be, is the best paper in it; and may be read with pleasure by any one, without regard to political prejudices, merely for the easy strength of the style and the confident impudence (we know no other word that will exactly express our meaning) of its tone (BJ, I, 174).

We cannot allow this opportunity to escape us of rebuking the aristocratic and exclusive spirit ... which is manifested in the dedication of this book; of making a distinction between the officers and the rank and file of the army ... If we should ever again be involved in war, all this nonsense will, of necessity, be abolished, for it is idle to expect that the citizens of the republic will serve in either department of the public defence, to be treated as more automata, and be excluded from all the honors and emoluments which their valor might win. God grant that the experiment may never be tried; but it requires no spirit of prophecy to foresee, that under the present system of conferring office, disgrace and defeat would be the result of every engagement with an enemy (BJ, I, 174).

... a chef d‘oeuvre in art worthy to accompany a chef d‘oeuvre in publication, as this Bible is (BJ, I, 174).

But these offices might be increased to a very great extent, and the country would be a gainer, as well as political adventurers. Since Mr. Polk will be freed from the troublesome business of securing his re-election, we trust he will look about him to see what abuses of the government he can rectify, and we have no doubt of his attention being called to the subject of the Consular agents to begin with (BJ, I, 174).

But for fear of disparaging the ‘Broadway Journal’ ... Not to mention the more solid qualities which render him a good editor, editorially considered, Mr. Eames is one of our most vigorous and original thinkers; and unlike original thinkers whom we have in our mind's eye, he has the faculty of imparting to his readers, through an accurate and exceedingly graceful style, a full consciousness that he does think berth vigorously and originally, and keens wall what he is thinking about — a very great deal to say of any man, as times go (BJ, I, 174).

... the aim, however, as regards externals, being to reconcile the utmost possible cheapness with a proper attention to the mechanical execution ... The editorial conduct of the whole is entrusted to a gentleman whose fine taste and great ability are matters not to be questioned ... The introductory essay is in Irving's best style; and contains some rich veins of thought and eloquence of a high order ..... (BJ, I, 174).

If the days of ‘cheap and nasty’ literature are not ended, we have proof before us that the day of cheap and elegant literature has at least dawned (BJ, I, 176).

... it shows very plainly their own want of intelligence or want of faith in the intelligence of the people, the Native Americans, for whose benefit they publish their Countess Faustinas and Wandering Jews ..... Legally speaking, book-publishers have an unquestionable right to put forth only such books as they like, as a baker has an unquestionable right to sell nothing but sour bread, and we have no doubt that there are people all ready to snub us up, for pretending to insinuate that anybody, but especially publishers of books, should be called to account for doing what the law allows. To submit to the snub, merely begging the privilege of hinting that there are two kinds of law, the law of God, and the law of man, and that it is possible to break one while you observe the other ... It puts life into the mummies that have been brought to us from the Orient, and puts words into the mouths of the mummies from whom we have been trying to gather knowledge of [page 567:] a country that we cannot visit (BJ, I, 177).

We have encountered, during the past week, some half a dozen notices of our review of Miss Fuller's book, which strangely misrepresent the opinions we expressed of that lady (BJ, I, 182).

There is one kind of employment ... which we hope to see introduced among them — wood engraving. It has already been done in England and France (BJ, I, 183).

This political journal contains but one political article ... it will probably be quite as acceptable to the majority of its readers as though it contained more (BJ, I, 193).

The majority of the people, in spite of mass meetings and daily papers, care hardly more about the characters of their rulers than do the subjects of the sultan, The last election of our President is sufficient proof of this. Those she knew Mr. Polk best gave him the fewest votes; at the most distant points from his own home he mustered the greatest number of adherents (BJ, I, 183). [page 568:]

a very able article an our light house system from H. I. Raymond, which we regard as the most important is the magazine. The subject is very justly handled, and the improprieties of our system forcibly exposed (BJ, I, 183).

At the beginning of the seventh month(1) one of the present editors of the ‘Broadway Journal’ made an arrangement to edit the ‘Messenger’ ... Its subscribers are almost without exception the elite, both as regards wealth and intellectual culture, of the Southern aristocracy ..... The influence of the work ... has always been exerted, we sincerely believe, in behalf of the chivalrous, the tasteful and the true ... In the aristocracy of its friends it in quite an anomaly in the literary world.

Mr. Minor is about to make some important improvements in the work, with a view of extending the circulation among ourselves here in the North and East, and we shall not fait. to do our part in this endeavour. The New York agent is Mr. John Bisco ..... (BJ, I, 183).

has been engaged in the business of rearing and breeding horses on his own far, for the past ten years, and in his recent trip to England he had abundant opportunities by personal inspection of gaining much valuable information on every subject relating to the horse. He has also availed himself of all the discoveries made by the eminent philosophers ... (BJ, I, 184).

A neat little pamphlet of sixteen pages, containing some prettily written essays and, verses, of such a character as might be looked for frm the pens of well educated young ladies (BJ, I, 110).

A very neatly printed little Magazine of 16 pages, of the precise quality that might be expected from its contributors; gentle, romantic and purely written (BJ, I, 184).

Charming days of youth and innocence, when young ladies can find amusement in writing and reading romantic tales about Knights and Castles. How it is managed in the bustling city of Albany with the scream of Steam Engines all the time tearing away at ones's ears, we do not comprehend. But everything is possible with the young and innocent (BJ, I, 184). [page 570:]

We quote at random a stanza or two, not hoping, of course, to convey any just idea of the skill manifested in the general conduct of the poem ... The rhythm here is anapaestic — by no means an usual one with us, and requiring much art in the handling (BJ, I, 190).

Erratum. In our notices last week of a poem by Mrs. Nicholls (sic), we spoke of her rhythm as anapaestic. We meant to say dactylic, of course (BJ, I, 207).

We are rejoiced to learn that this new lecturer on Shakespeare, has met with sufficient encouragement to induce him to commence another course of lectures in New York ... it is encouraging to know that there is a sufficient number of people in our community grilling to patronize genius, when genius will tabs the pains to make itself known ..... Such was the peculiar effect of his dreading enunciation an our nerves, that after sitting fifteen minutes in the sound of his voice, the narrow in our bones began to dissolve, our teeth were scat an edge an by the filing of a saw, and chills crept over us like an ague fit; to have listened a moment longer would have induced paralysis, or something worse; and we did not recover our usual serenity until we had been jolted in an omnibus from the Stuyvesant Institute to Bowling-green ..... He is a quack without question; [page 571:] such a quack as Shakespeare himself was, and such a quack as every man, of genius must be, who is not a regular practicioner (sic) (BJ, I,191).

Our remarks, which the Editor of the Knickerbocker has quoted, were want to apply solely to Mr. Hudson's mower, and not to his matter ... we were strongly impressed with a feeling of respect for Mr. Hudson's opinions ... (BJ, I, 297).

It so happen we have never seen more than three numbers of it, the last of which contained an imputation upon our editorial honesty, which we felt bound to answer (BJ, I,191).(2)

However, The Emporium says it prefers the calumet of peace, to the tomahawk of war. Very good. Then put this in your pipe and smoke it; and when you copy anything from our columns again, have the kindness to give us credit for, it (BJ, I, 191). [page 572:]

... two works so perfect in their kind as an Eothen and the Amber Witch ..... Anything savoring of dispraise in respect of this beautiful work be entirely new and startling; for we believe no critic has yet had the temerity to risk his own reputation by under-valuing a production whose merits ..... Not only is the moral(1) of the narrative destroyed by the denouement,(2) but the moment we begin to suspect that she will be rescued from the flames, the conviction that we are reading a true narrative begins to be shaken. It is, unquestionably, a more delightful romance for ending as it does ..... (BJ, I, 193).

Mrs. Child has, unconsciously we suspect, drum the portrait of a perfect woman, a wife and mother, is OEnome, a very different being from the Glumdalclitches who form the ideal of Miss Fuller's women (BJ, I, 193).

The clairvoyance of OEnome is not in the least startling can on Mount Ida; it harmonizes with the old Greek legends, as naturally as though it had sprung from Greece, proving that the fables of her mythology had a deeper foundation to rest upon than the chimeras of barbarous ignorance (BJ, I, 193).

Mrs, Child is too pure and gentle a spirit to harrow the soul by pictures of remorse and suffering, but she has employed an incident of daily occurrence ... to produce a catastrophe (BJ, I, 193). [page 573:]

A company was projected in Wall Street, the past winter, to which several men of capital embarked, which was hardly more explicit in its objects than one ... (BJ, I, 193-94).

If the mania for “companies” to do every thing, should ever return to this city, we hope to see a company started for keeping the streets free from mud (BJ, I, 194).

If M. Arago should ever chance to see a copy of this work it would, probably, cause him as such surprise as the last comet did, which caught him napping (BJ, I, ???).

But we trust it will be a long time before any comet shall think of annexation with an eye to our own planet; and we have no doubt that even our friends at the South, as zealous they are (sic) for annexation of another kind, would sturdily oppose this (BJ, I, 194).

Perhaps we are a little too strict in regard to the publication, of other people's property without their permission, but there are so few in the country who err in this manner, that we may be forgiven for erring on the same side (BJ, I, 194).

An exceedingly neat pocket volume, the contents of which fulfill the promise of the title, imposing as it is. One of the chapters, ‘The Genius of the world’ is quite novel in its way. The time from Moses to 1840 is compressed into five pages; all the genius of the world in so small a space! Alas for genius! (BJ, I, 194).

(I regret that) I have not a more legible manuscript of the Comedy to submit to your perusal — ..... your criticism will be prized — I am sorry that they could not have been made before preparations for the performance of the Comedy had progressed so far.(1)

The above remarks were written before this Comedy's representation at the Park, and were based on the author's original MX ... (BJ, I, 205; H, XII, 121).

A story so begot and so brought forth, must needs be wild, mysterious, and startling. An aura like a witch-element pervades the pages, and as we turn over the leaves a sensation of terror is imbided, seemingly, at our fingers’ ends. The tale opens with the following wild and startling chapter (BJ, I, 209).

This is an attempt to give a History ... in a form adapted to popular tastes, although we infer from the author's preface ... The present volume relates solely to the ..... The author intimates that in a second part ... The book is distinguished by the external beauty peculiar to all the publications of Messrs. Wiley & Putnam (BJ, I, 210).

Those who wish to example all sides of a question would do well to dip into some medical works of authority before forming an opinion on such topics. In the case of Miss Martineau we beg leave to prefer to the ‘London Lancet’, for March, 1845, page 215 of the edition published by Burgess & Stringer (BJ, I, 210).

Here is a book of ‘amusing travels’ which is full enough of statistics to have been the joint compositions of Messieurs Busching, Hassel, Camabitch, Gaspari, Gutsmuth and company. Spun out line Wollaston's wires, or the world in the Peutingerian Tables (GLB, XXXI, 30; H, XVI, 71).

Some of Mr. Mancur's novels have been very naturally mistaken for those of James, to whom both in manner and in his material generally, he bears even too remarkable a resemblance ... ‘The Palais Royal’ is ... a novel of far more than ordinary interest and value. Its great defect is the total lack of originality (BJ, I, 210). [page 577:]

‘Liberal Christianity’, according to the showing of Mr. Parker, does not differ very materially from the liberalism exercised by the followers of St. Ignatius (BJ, I, 210).

We shall not be surprised ... to hear next that the raised numeric in Charleston has been rebuilt and converted into an Inquisition on the conservative principle of the good old times; or that some of our liberal friends have been indulging in the old fashioned pastime of an auto da fe (BJ, I, 210).

This is the title of one of the freshest, most piquant, we altogether most agreeable volumes which have been written by an American — for an American we take the author to be ... professedly, his design is that of sketching now incidents ... but these incidents are in fact but a nucleus for very amusing gossip of all kinds, intermingled not unfrequently with some matter of far loftier pretension than gossip. The book is that of a thoughtful, polished and well-informed man (BJ, I, 210-11).

The older members of the party serve only as make-weight to the true design, which is that of depicting the influence to be exercised over a youthful and highly sensitive mind by the beautiful in itself ... The danger to be apprehended from too habitual an indulgence even on the sentiment of Beauty — that is of physical beauty — is imagined to be counteracted by encouraging an appreciation of moral loveliness. In all this there is much to be disputed — but no one can dispute the interest ... (BJ, I, 211).

The lieutenants of the navy receive some home thrusts in this well-written pamphlet, in which author stoutly and rightly reasserts the claims of surgeons, as well as of all other officers, to a definite rank in the service (BJ, I, 211).

The merits of Mr. Halleck have been long definitely settled, at least so far as regards the poems now before us. We have only to wish that in writing a new poem he would give us an opportunity of praising him anew (BJ, I, 211).

... one of our most judicious and indefatigable compilers ... entitled to high consideration for an much originality as is consistent with history — for thoughtful comment ..... Its object is thoroughly detailed in its title ... It is designed as a pendant to the ‘Book of the Navy’ (BJ, I, 311).

... Re-arrangements from the valuable text of Milne Edwards and Achille Comte (BJ, I, 211).

This is an ingeniously conceived and well managed narrative of ordinary life — without any thing of that pure namby-pamby, or rather pure drivel which we have been ashamed to see applauded, of late days, on the ground, forsooth, of being natural or truthful. Mrs. Hale is a woman of great force of thought and remarkable purity of style. She writes invariably well (BJ, I, 211).

We have already awarded is Mr. Hudson the claim of a Genius. His peculiarities are very striking, and his manner provincial to the extremest degree (BJ, I, 216).

... it is encouraging to know that there is a sufficient number of people in our community willing to patronize genius, when genius will take than pains to make itself known ... Mr. Hudson's very peculiar manner ... the peculiar effect of his drawling ... the worst provincial drawl that war wounded a human ear (BJ, I, 191).

We are enabled, however, to say but little either in contradiction or in amplification of our last week's remarks — which were based it will be remembered upon the original MS. Of the fair authoress, and upon the slightly modified performance of the first night ... In what we then said ... in one respect, perhaps, we have done Mrs. Mowatt unintentional injustice (BJ, I, 219; H, XII, 124).

Mrs. Osgood contributes the best poem she has yet written — a more exquisitely graceful thing (Grace is Mrs. Osgood's quoendom in which she reigns triumphant) we have rarely seen (BJ, I, 220). [page 581:]

It is (in) this irresoluble charm — in grace — that Mrs. Osgood excels any poetess of her country — or, indeed, of any country under the sun (GLB, XXXIII, 126; H, XV, 98).

I can never read Mrs. Osgood's poetry without a strong propensity to ring the changes upon this indefinite word ‘grace’ (SLM, XV, 220; H, XVI, 144).

We regard this little song — ‘Where Hudson's Wave’ — ‘Woodman Spare that Tree’ — and ‘Near the lake where Droops the Willow’, as undeniably four of the truest and sweetest poems ... ever published in America ... (BJ, I, 220).

too many and too devoted friends, who now and then do him injury by permitting their personal feelings to appear above the current of their critical opinion. We really believe that but for this fault in the General he would have attained even a higher rank in the literary world than he actually possesses ... the nature of that merit which is peculiarly General Morris'(1) own, has a tendency to increase the evi1 effect on which we comment — for this merit is that of rich and vigorous simplicity — a quality of an others in they world the least likely to be estimated at its full value. The world is too apt to think the critic guilty of exaggeration in praising [page 582:] with enthusiasm that which (however effective) appears easy of execution; — and simplicity has always this air (BJ, I, 220).

There is an indication of durability about the Lady's Book which is not to be mistaken — an air of quietude — of simplicity — and therefore of strength ... the vigor which is always inseparable from originality of away kind. We do not mean to say, and we do not suppose that Mr. Godey means to assert, that the ‘Lady's Book’ belongs to a high order of literature, but of its kind it is our nearly perfect as can well be. It addresses itself principally to ladies, and addresses these as ladies wish to be addressed. The secret of its wonderful, because long-continues success, is tact (BJ, I, 220).

contains several good articles, two or three very good ones, and we good ones. No will let the readers of the magazine find out for themselves. We do not remember that we ever looked at the editor's table without finding something to laugh at; and very rarely any thing to pish at (BJ, I, 221).

One of the great merits of this unique history consists of a vein of intense national feeling that pervades the entire work ..... His sole idea of a country, in his history, is France; his sole idea of France is Paris. In this he is a genuine Frenchman — a Parisian of Paris; and his history is all the better for it. It is what it professes to be ..... While the novelist strives to give his tale the appearance of history, by solemn generalizations and pedantic descriptions, M. Michelet adopts the true novelesque style in his history, rapid, brilliant, and minute. He is the most picturesque, imaginative, and familiar of historians. There is a picture in every page, and something to startle the thoughts in every sentence (BJ, I, 225).

We must defer to another time a fink notice of the merits of this very excellent work ... a just appreciation in the public of a work of unpretending utility (BJ, I, 226).

A very neat and unpretending volume, containing much of the truest poetry (BJ, I, 216).

A very important book ... Its objects are fully explained is the title (BJ, I, 226).

... a translation and abridgement from the various grammars of Kuhner — presenting a compend of all that is essential for the student. The work has the novel feature of frequent reference to the Sanscrit and other cognate languages — without which reference no Greek grammar can be considered complete. This is decidedly, for American Students, the best book of its class extant. It is published in the peculiarly neat and durable form which distinguishes all the classical works of its author (BJ, I, 226).

We must repeat once more the testimony which we have already borne to the merits of this edition of the Bible, which we are happy to find has been sustained by the universal opinion of the press (BJ, I, 226).

It is, unfortunately, quite a matter of course to puff an illustrated edition of the scriptures ... But me shall never lend our columns for any such mercenary purpose ... There is delight is the more contemplation of the typography (BJ, I, 226).

Among the cheap historical publications of the day, it assumes a very favorable position (BJ, I, 227).

The two volume are very comprehensive — indeed complete — and embody a vast amount of invaluable knowledge, quite independent of that rich interest which always appertains to books of travel — especially of travel by sea (BJ, I, 227).

We doubt if in the there exists in the same compass, for anything(1) like the same price, the same amount of excellent light reading ... The Improvisation is a peculiar work, and effects the reader with a singular sense of the new in letters: — this feeling results from our want of acquaintance with the Danish turn of thought and expression (BJ, I, 229).

With the exception of ’Some Words with a Mummy’ which has the misfortune to be written by ‘one of us’, there [page 586:] is only one really bad article in the number ... (BJ, I, 235).

The review of Miss Barrett will be well received by the unpoetical alone. The critic merely shows that her poetry is no poetry to him. She is unquestionably, in spite of her numerous faults, the most glorious woman of her age — the queen of all female poets ... The Critical Notices are brief, and to the point — although in many particulars we disagree radically with the opinion of the critic ... If not written by Dr. Nichol, this work (Vestiges of Creation) is st least worthy that(1) gentleman (BJ, I, 235).

... a characteristic article by Hawthorne, — a semi-critical essay in which he has prolonged the lives, to the present day, of all the dead authors ... (BJ, I, 235).

... Contains the full amount of valuable statistical matter which we have been accustomed to find in its pages, but it contains one article, the spirit of which should, in some form, always be found in a work intended, like this, for the eyes of the merchant, have created a mercantile immorality, and given rise to what are called debts of honor ..... It is a subject of great astonishment that men will not learn from this anomalous class of debts ..... (BJ, I, 236). [page 587:]

It is full of valuable natter. No medical periodical equals the Lancet (BJ, I, 587).

‘Quant a la creation (sic) complete d‘une chose, je la cross impossible. Dieu lui meme (sic), lorsqu‘il crea (sic) l‘homme, ne put on (sic) n‘osa point 1‘inventer: il le fit (sic) a son image’ (BJ, I, 252).

We should be unwilling to charge the author of the poem before us with the profane sentiment of the audacious plagiarist whom we have quoted, but it is very plain that the two authors entertain very similar feelings respecting des choses connues de ses peres (BJ, I, 252).

The author of Night has chosen an infelicitous title for his poem, for the work ‘Thoughts’ must pop into the minds of his readers as soon as they open his volume; yet it would have mattered nothing if he had chosen a different one, for the same title would have inevitably suggested by the poem itself. We can safely pronounce the author a good man and a scholar, which is higher praise than can be bestowed upon every good poet ... As an example of the author's art and feeling ... (BJ, I, 252).

His exquisite sensibility to all impressions of the beautiful his scholarship (by no means profound, yet peculiarly available) ; and his general vivacity of intellect — render him an admirable critic in all points within the compass of these qualities ..... In a word the forte of the author of Rimini in taste — while his foible is analysis. Of this latter quality — absolutely indispensible in all criticism that aims at instruction or reformation — he is radically deficient. He himself feels his own ability to construct a fine poem, and is content to be assured of the validity of the principles upon which he constructs it, without caring to understand the ultimate character of the natural laws (of the heart and intellect) — upon which the validity of the principles depends ... The reply to all this is that Thomas Babington Macaulay is not a man of genius. He in a critic, but no more than a critic ... The merit or demerit, in fact, int quite independent of any such understanding — the truth, after all, seeming to resolve itself into this — that the valve of the comprehension of which we speak, is in the direct ratio of the creative ability which employs or takes advantage of the comprehensive (BJ, I, 252-3).

we would rank him ... very far before Leigh Hunt, who was a dexterous but unanalytical, and somewhat confused prosodist ... Macaulay ... a man who, if he has not written the best criticism ever penned, has at least shown the capacity to write them (BJ, II, 28). [page 590:]

We have rarely seen a book that so fully redeemed the promise of its title ... one of the most novel among the recipes is directions for making bread out of pine bark (BJ, I, 253).

A neatly printed edition, in pamphlet form, of a book too universally known to require any comment (BJ, I, 253).

We have not read this work, but if any thing(1) could induce us to do so, it would be the name of the translator ... who has the rare art in his translations, of preserving the spirit of the original language, while he invests it with his own graceful and elegant style (BJ, I, 253-54).

... the popularity of the author's name will doubtless give them a wide circulation among readers in general (BJ, I, 254).

This exceedingly interesting report is from the pen of the philanthropic Director of the Asy1um .....These things were, perhaps, not further(1) beyond her comprehension than of the persons who talked to her about them ... She could hardly have fallen into better hands for her own happiness, or for the benefit of mankind. It in very apparent that important hints in education may be gathered in watching the advancement of a mind like Laura Bridgman's from tonal darkness into the light of comparative day (BJ, I, 261).

The Diary of Lady Willoughby is framed on the exact plan of the Amber Witch, and is quite as successful a composition in its way, although it is entirely unlike that remarkable production (BJ, I, 267).

A lady of our acquaintance, who is no great devourer of books, by the way, took it up by accident, and declared that she had never been so bewitched by a book before. It is evidently the work of a pious, tender-hearted mother (BJ, I, 267).

It is greatly to be deplored that publishers are too seldom influenced by any other motives in putting forth books, than mercenary considerations, but books should not be regarded as mere merchandise, and no publisher should allow his name to appear on a book of pernicious tendencies, who wishes to preserve the character of a good citizen, or establish himself in a profitable business (BJ, I, 257).

We believe that before the publication of Guy's book, there was no convenient text-book ... The voluminous work of Becks, although highly elaborate and meritorious, was for obvious reasons unadapted to the purposes of the student — nor, indeed, as a manual for the legal or medical practitioner,(2) could it be considered as suitable in any respect ... the main object has been to afford results — general conclusions — in a word, to make a practical and useful book (BJ, I, 267).

The first consideration forcing itself on the mind while looking over such a volume as this, is, what might have been thought, before the invention of printing ... The most astounding miracles of Mesmerism, if fairly examined, would be found scarcely more really marvellous than this. We observe that unusual care has been taken in getting up this edition (BJ, I, 267-8). [page 593:]

The manner of arranging the phrases differs materially from any other phrase book that we have seen (BJ, I, 268).

It is still a disputed point among certain critics whether America has produced a humorous writer, and we have heard the author at the book before us cited as the best example of a humorist that America can boast. But the Author of Major James’ Courtship is a comic rather than a humorous writer. The merit of his sketches lies in their felicity to the names described, and not in their wit and humour (BJ, I, 268).

Mr. Grund is one of the most remarkable men we have ever met, — possessing a wonderful faculty of observation, and a memory which stands in little need of Professor Gouraud.(1) His analytical power is also great, and as a critic few men are entitled to greater consideration ... The Gazelle of the Menagerie’, by Miss Gould is particularly happy ... In the Editor's Book Table there are some very just remarks on the subject of taking out copyright for Magazines (BJ, I, 268).

In the review of the ’Spirit of the Age’, although ‘Orion’ is heartily appreciated (and it is indeed one of the noblest poems of this or any age) some injustice is, upon the whole, done to its author. Mr. Horne is not, as supposed, the writer of all the papers in the ’Spirit of the Age’. Very many of them are neither his, nor worthy of him (BJ, I, 269).(1)

He comprehends, we think, the whole rationale of elecution as well as any man of his time, and his physical powers enable him to give effect to his conceptions (BJ, I, 271).

Halleck, I see, is about to publish a new edition, which I should like to write a notice of if you have made no other arrangement.(1)

This is a book at all points entertaining, and now and then imbued with a vivid and terrible interest. We quote some instances of Mexican vagruney and audacity: ... if these things were not known to fact, we should speak of them as capital romance ... (BJ, I, 284).

The manner of writing and punctuating the title-page of this pamphlet, is everything.(3) Obviously there is here a printing error. The remarks are certainly not by George P. Marsh. They are by some person anonymous, and are levelled against Mr. M. — a point [page 596:] which it is just as well to understand. The treatise its pungently written, but we disagree with it throughout in its estimate of Mr. Marsh's eloquence (BJ, I, 284).

Of the first series of the Table Talk we spoke so fully in a previous number, that it will be needless to say anything of the second ... (BJ, II, 210).

We cannot understand the notice of the author in affixing to a work of this kind such a ponderous joke as the absurd review of British poets which appeared is the North American Review a year ago ... It is attaching too much importance to that paltry jealousy or ill nature of an anonymous scribbler to make his niaiseries the subject of national recriminations (BJ, I, 284).

Count Ludwig is one of the most remarkable of its author's productions, as containing not the slightest evidence of his peculiar and brilliant genius (BJ, I, 284).

There is no evidence supplied by these two very short notices; they may be Poe.

This supplement to the large work on Hydraullics by Mr. Ewbank, will render that treatise the most learned and perfect one on that branch of science in existence (BJ, I, 285).

Some of the papers are exceedingly good — precisely what Magazine papers should be — vigorous, terse, and independent ... There is a long review or rather running commentary on Longfellow's poems. It is perhaps, a little course, but we are not disposed to call it unjust; although there are in it some opinions which, by implication, are attributed to ourselves individually, and with which we cannot altogether coincide (BJ, I, 285).

This is one of the series of ’School and College Classics’ which have attracted so general an attention, first, from their comprehensiveness, and admirable adaptation to their objects, and, secondly, from their punctilious accuracy and beauty of typographical execution ... The volume contains all of the Iliad which is usually read at school, as preparatory to a college course — sufficient to furnish the student with the principles of Homeric translation and analysis. The text is, in the main, that of Spitzner ... There is that of Richard Payne Knight, with the digamma restored according to his views. In fact, it is by no means improbable that this secondary text is at least a close approximation to the ancient orthography of Homer ... The commentary, as in all this series of classics, is peculiarly full and explicit — proceeding on the sole ground which is admissable in matters of scholastic instruction — [page 598:] the ground that the scholar is absolutely ignorant, and has need of information at all points, however seemingly trivial ... The materials of the Notes are derived, chiefly from ... The Glossary is separated from the Notes — a very judicious arrangement ..... one of the most important additions to classical literature which this country or any other has produced (BJ, I, 295).

... the letters of Mrs. Child make a direct appeal to every human heart ..... Nothing will so disarm reserve as confidence; ice can alone be melted by heat; hatred and anger must be overcome by love and kindness. Bitter, sarcastic writers can never hope for popularity, or at least love. We rarely see one of Swift's essays carried about as a pocket companion, but the good natured genial writings of Goldsmith are oftener bound as pocket volumes than the works of any other author ... The sympathies of men are more wide than we are apt to believe. The stories of washerwomen, of streetsweeps are little beggar children, interest us beyond the most elaborate histories of merely official personages (BJ, I, 296).

The sunshine which falls upon it is English sunshine; it has lighted up an object three thousand miles away and now shines as brightly on our desk as it did a yea ago in Somersetshire, or in pleasant Kent, for the locality of the haystack is not given (BJ, I, 296).

‘The Reverend Arthur Coxe's ’Saul, a Mystery’, having been condemned in no measured terms by Poe, of ‘The Broadway Journal’ ...

... I say that at the data of its first appearance, I had expressed no opinion whatsoever of the poem is which it refers ... Whenever a book is abused, people take it for granted that it is I who have been abusing it. Latterly I have read ’Saul’ and agree with the epigrammatist, that it ‘will do’ — whoever attempts to wade through it. It will do, also, for trunk-paper (SLM, XV, 294-5; H, XVI, 154-55).

We have expressed no opinion whatever of ’Saul’ ... Mr. Coxe has written some very beautiful poems, and ’Saul’ may be one of them for any thing we know to the contrary. As yet we have not found time to read the poem — which, to say the truth, is an exceptionally long (BJ, II, 143; H, XII, 243). [page 600:]

One of the simple little tales of every day life, written to enforce a pious lesson, which always proves popular ..... (BJ, I, 297).

The Knickerbocker presents its customary variety in its table of contents ... and its Editor's Table the usual variety of pleasant gossip (BJ, I, 297).

... in leaving Horace Walpole out of his Catalogue. This is like leaving Shakespeare out of the list of English dramatists, or Fielding from the Catalogue of Novelists (BJ, I, 297).

It is worth an infinite number of such Essays as that by Pycroft, a cheap edition of which has recently been published. The review of the ‘Vestiges of Creation’ is the most vigorous attack that has get been made on that much abused and much bepraised work ... and infinitely more exciting than any of the ‘mysteries’, not excepting Saul, that have recently been published (BJ, I, 297). [page 601:]

No magazine in this country has yet done anything for the interest of art, bid there is a growing appetite in the American people for works of artistic excellence (BJ, I, 298).

It contains eight papers of varied excellence, but all good ... is piquant exceedingly, and North's Account of Dryden (although disfigures with the usual carelessness and rant of Wilson) is an admirable essay. The continuation of the papers called ‘Confessions of an Opium Eater’ is better, we think, than the original — which was a lie throughout. There is yet room for a book was opium eating, which shall be the most profoundly interesting volume ever penned. It would be written, however, by no De Quincy (BJ, I, 298).

... this brilliant book of travel ... the beauty of styles the light-hearted novelesque manner ... the absence of such statistical matter as we generally find in books of travel ... Eothen brings the east to us more vividly than any other eastern traveller has ever done(1) (BJ, I, 298). [page 602:]

... the most brilliant book of travels ... the superior brilliancy of Eothen ... master of so fine a style and so lively as imagination ... It is just the work to put into the hands of those who have overburden their memories with the lifeless statistics of other travellers in the East ... It puts life into the mummies ... The liveliness of fancy and elegance of style (BJ, I, 177).

The following extract from the Professor's lecture on Memory, is a remarkable instance of fluent writing in a foreigner, who, three or four years since, was almost ignorant of our language. M. Gouraud's style is somewhat too luxuriant for these days of classic severity, but it has wonderful ease as the production of a foreigner (BJ, I, 299).

The author is neither a poet nor a cynic, but a good. natured scholarly gentleman, who is rather disposed to laugh the world out df its errors than to sneer at them; he is neither as startling nor as amusing as Swift, but he is infinitely more friendly and winning. One would not care to be on terms of intimacy with the Dean, but the most sensitive of men would never fear the genial humor of the guests of Headlong Hall (BJ, I, 311).

The French in Algiers is new and startling;(1) the name of Lady Gordon on the title-page, the ingenius [[ingenious]] translator of the Amber Witch,(2) should alone be sufficient ..... (BJ, I, 311).

If it contained but the one chapter on the Morality of Legal Practice; it would be enough to entitle it to a wide circulation (BJ, I, 314).

More ludicrous instances of incompetency were newer afforded ... Neither his discretion nor his education would have entitled him to the command of a fishing smack ... His grammatical blunders — the grossest obtusity combined with the most ineffable conceit and self-sufficiency (BJ, I, 316).

A criticism on they Poems of Christopher Pease Cranch is not particularly to our taste (BJ, I, 316).

About two years also a volume of ‘Poems by Christopher Pease Cranch’ was published by Carey & Hart. It was most unmercifully treated by the critics, and much injustice, in my opinion, was done to the poet (GLB, XXXIII, 18; H, XV, 69).

It is better, however, than the commentary on Miss Barrett which appeared in a late number of the Messenger, and which, as far as we can learn, excited no less decided a feeling universal contempt wherever it was perused by those who are themselves poetical (BJ, I, 316).

In the ‘Editor's Table’ is a page of comment on the death of Mrs. Willis — a page which we read with an interest the most painful — the most profound (BJ, I, 316).

Graham's:

We copy in full a characteristic poem of the most truly graceful, delicate, and yet impassioned of American poetesses — Mrs. Osgood (BJ, I, 317).

... does Mr. C. no more than justice, either in regard to his acquirements or character as a man (BJ, I, 316).

He was permitted, priest-like, to comprehend the counsels of God, that he might reveal to his fellow mortals the wisdom and benevolence of our heavenly Father ... There is room in the Anglo-Saxon race for thus happy influence of these kindly feelings which lead us on all occasions, to view the man of another clime as a brother, and deserving at our hands that regard to which humanity, civilization, and Christianity give him a title (BJ, I, 328).

There are two views to be taken of the life of man — first, as he makes one identity, standing out in distinct lineaments of society (sic) — next, as that identity sends out its roots into society in different directions, both to prop itself and strengthen the social framework (BJ, I, 328). [page 607:]

The grossest plagiarisms, indeed, abound. We would have no trouble, even, in pointing out a score from our most unimportant self (BJ, I, 330; H, XII, 156).

The two first in the volume are, we think, much overrated by the editor — they seem to us dull and forced. Many of the others are irresistably comic and fresh ... by our friend Field, of the inimitable ‘Reveille’ (BJ, I, 331).

Mr. Bourne has very vigorous talent ... The conception is a most forcible one, and the execution (with very slight exception) masterly (BJ, I, 331). [page 608:]

A reprint of a series of very pungent satirical papers — the point of which will not be so fully appreciated among us as could be desired (BJ, I, 331).

Zschokke's works have been very popular, and have in them all the elements of the best popularity (BJ, I, 331).

That first part is very properly devoted to architecture, the construction of a house being the first consideration towards house keeping ... Every man when he takes a wife, should also procure a copy of this valuable Encyclopaedia (BJ, I, 345).

There are two or three things about this edition of the great poet especially worthy of commendation(2) although there are others, which we shall point out next week, not to be passed over without reprehension. We particularly admire the illustrated corn ... (BJ, I, 345).

It contains, indeed, so much of that kind of practical information which amateurs must acquire, either through some such aid, or through the more tedious path of their own individual experience, and at the same time affords to persons of more matured taste such an insight into the state of connoisseurship on the Continent, that is is to be wondered that no one has, until now, endeavored to make it more generally acceptable by means of an English version ... yet no publication of a previous or later date, addressed itself so directly to the wants and wishes of amateurs, or supplies(1) ... (BJ, I, 345).

... but they seem to have fallen into suitable hands to prevent them to English readers (BJ, I, 345).

Wyoming is said to be the production of a lady, and it certainly contains nothing to indicate that it is from the pen of a man (BJ, I, 345).

‘The Knickerbocker’ also contains an original poem by Tennyson, which the editor received from the same gentleman (a Mr. Bristed) (BJ, I, 346).

The last number of the Knickerbocker contains a poem which an American gentleman in England obtained from him (Tennyson) in this manner ... we copy it for its novelty ... The correspondent of the Knickerbocker in Constantinople, says ... (BJ, I, 348).

... a truth which Excellent, witty, stout-hearted Thomas Hood has been rather playing with as a football or shuttlecock, any time these ten years, then receiving as so gloomy a missive. But alas, the time for skirmishing with so severe as antagonist, seems well nigh over ... His merits will appear to us greater when the light is withdrawn and we sit in darkness ... If Hood revives once more, he will be a sacred man while he lives. The sympathy of the good is with him (BJ, I, 347-48).

received at so late a period, that we have been unable to do more than announce it. We shall, of course, speak of it very fully hereafter. Our opinion of Mr. Willis is well known (BJ, I, 349).

A novel of American life is one of the greatest novelties in literature ... But hitherto nobody but Mr. Dickens and Mrs. Trollope, has made an attempt at American life. It certainly speaks little for the imagination of our twenty millions, that not one among them has been found capable of giving a sketch of their characters. We have [page 612:] not produced a singe book which can be pointed to as containing an insight into the peculiarities of the national character ... our American novelist is yet in embryo, and in embryo must remain until an international copyright law shall enable the genius of the nation to develope itself ..... Cheap reading, we mistrust,(1) produces cheap readers ..... A book needs the endorsement of a review to give it circulating value, but who will waste time in reviewing a work which is shabbily printed and sold for a shilling ... ‘Fleetwood’ is probably quite an good a book as of those that issue from our press and an eagerly read by the young and thoughtless, doing them no more harm than any other merely idle employment, and we should not have selected it from a mass of flimsy things for an extended notice, had not the presumption of the author, in putting ‘a Novel of American life’ in the title page, arrested our attention. American life is human life, and the author who aims to represent American men and women, must bear in mind the importance of making them, appear like human beings, if he would have them pass current with the rest of the world (BJ, I, 361-62).

(Under this heading we propose to give merely the title, or a succinct account, of all new works which may come to hand, and which are not reviewed at length in another portion of the Journal. Many of the publications here announced, however, will be made the subject of review hereafter. Those marked with an asterisk will certainly be noticed in full) (BJ, I, 362).

An admirable work. To give, for the present, merely its table of contents (BJ, I, 362).

It is wretchedly versified, and lacks point. Its philosophy, and even its truth, we regard as undeniable, but its decency may be well questioned — or, rather, its gross indecency cannot (BJ, I, 363).

Its composition in hurried and uneven — but the author gives unequivocal indication of genius (BJ, I, 363).

Its tone is good, and its style remarkably pure. We feel much interested is it for various reasons, and will probably recur to it hereafter. Can any one tell us who wrote it? (BJ, I, 363).

A long didactic poem (if there is such a thing as a didactic poem) in the blank Iambic Pentameter, awkwardly managed. There are many forcible thoughts tersely expressed; but, upon the whole, we dislike the work (BJ, I, 363).

A work which, of necessity, every thinking person must read ... Voltaire — a man who, with all his blemishes, was unquestionably the most powerful who ever existed (BJ, I, 363).

Religion books are too often ‘got up’ as though ... It is a sufficient indication of the character of Dr. Vinet, that he is called the Chalmers of Switzerland (BJ, I, 363).

The last of these neat little books has gained a popularity equal to that of Lindley Murray's ..... The author is second to Cruikshank only, among English humorists (BJ, I, 363).

It contains one of the first papers by Longfellow, and one of the last by Irving, which are well worth preserving, as showing what one great writer may rise from, and what another may end in (BJ, I, 363).

... a peculiarly unintelligible essay on Emerson by a ‘Disciple’ (BJ, I, 363).

The essay is written with vigor and, to a very great extent, with discrimination; but the writer betrays an inexcusable ignorance of his subject, or a very reprahsmibls prejudice against American authors ... This is decidedly cool, considering that the editor of the Review is himself the author of the longest American poem which has been published ..... We regret, for the Review's sake, that so absurd an article has been admitted into its columns (BJ, I, 363-64).

Though the present amber of this excellent work is less profusely illustrated with cuts than those that have proceded [[proceeded]] it, it is the most valuable of all, being occupied chiefly with the subject of food, which it treats very fully and discreetly (BJ, I, 376-77).

Something like thirty pages of the two last numbers are occupied by matter relating to domestic servants, which is mainly calculated to produce more harm than good in this country ... We doubt whether this was written by a gentleman who has ever had the honor, personally, to officiate as a domestic servant of any kind ... His picture of a nurse is particularly edifying; he has drawn a character of a more perfect monster than can be found in any novel (BJ, I, 376).

A work such as Mr. Bolles has here given us, was certainly much needed — that is to say, a complete English vocabulary with each word properly defined and its pronouncement distinctly exhibited. Walker's Sheridan has been long objectionable, of course ... (BJ, I, 377).

We mean to say that Mr. Bolles’ proposition is, in his preface, too loosely or too generally stated. In fact, that is to say in the body of his work, we perceive that he has confined his revivals within the proper limit — confined them to such authors as are essentially standard (BJ, I, 378).

If, upon the whole, we cannot regard this work as the most profound (a vague word often vaguely applied) we are at least disposed to consider it the most comprehensive, the most accurate, and by far the most practical — that is to say the most useful of its class (BJ, I, 378).

... no art can flourish is a country when it is not countenanced by the better classes of society, and it a not be denied that the theatre derives no aids with us, from the learned, the wealthy, or the professedly religious ..... Let half-a-dozen D. Ds be seen in that pit of the Park Theatre, and we should not see their congregations following them, but we should see our men and women of genius exerting their talents for the amusement and instruction of such fit audiences ... The Theatre exists send is likely to exist, and to exert an extensive influence of some kind in the community, and the only consideration should be, with good men, whether it would be better to leave it to grow in its enormities, or by giving it their countenance, convert it to a blessing instead of a curse to the people (BJ, I, 379).

Any species of amusement, which the professedly religious feel themselves compelled to avoid, can never be esteemed popular ..... The Theatre has long, always rather, been under the ban of what the world calls good men ..... It is very plain, then, that the [page 618:] professed philanthropist should look into this matter, and if he finds that the Theatre cannot be abolished, it is his duty to strive to render it as little injurious as possible, and by sometimes visiting it, to learn to counteract its influence (BJ, I, 30).

It is admitted that the stage is the most powerful method of enforcing a moral truth; and we do not see why some of these benevolent souls who bestow so much consideration upon the production of tracts ... should not give some attention to the amusements of the destitute youth of our city ... If some of the publication of the tract society were dramatized, we have so doubt that they would be highly popular ... a religious drama, divested of sectarian cant, would possess this charm in a high degree (BJ, I, 378).

A literary gentleman remarked the other day ... Ths wife of a popular tragedian in New York says ... She says ... (BJ, I, 378).

Probably Mr. Griswold will include these and many more of whom the country has never heard, in his forth-coming book can American prose writers(1) ... There is no objection among good people to pictures ..... The appearance of so respectable a person as Mrs. Mowatt on the stage, we trust, will not be without a purifying effect upon the atmosphere of the play-house (BJ, I, 378-9). [page 619:]

... we would be glad to see some of the productions of Beckford substituted in their place; the Memoirs of Old Painters for instance ... Mr. Redding's recollections are very agreeable reading for hot weather, but be was too much impressed by the externals which surrounded Vathek to be able to form a cool judgment of his character (BJ, I, 379).

True erudition is only certainly discoverable in its entire results. There is nothing written by Mrs. Gore, which is not within the reach of any decently educated person of ingenuity, having access to the large libraries of London. The same thing may be said even of the remarkable work, ‘The Doctor’, and of a great many other a similar publications (BJ, I, 379).

True erudition ... is certainly discoverable, is positively indicated only in its ultimate and total results ... (GM, XIX, 248; H, X, 216) ; [page 620:]

Erudition is only certainly known in its total results ... attainments within the reach of any well-informed, ingenious and industrious men having access to the great libraries of London (SLM, II, 506; H, IX, 68).

The general title of this book, as we give it am bare, includes all necessary information respecting it (SLM, II, 506; H, IX, 68).

Zschokke, of late, has become popular in America to an extent which neither his intrinsic merit nor his foreign reputation would appear to justify. We would not undervalue his genius, (if genius it can be called,) but we mean to say that there are numerous Germans whose works might be translated to better purpose (BJ, I, 379).

... that we may expound their meaning, for the benefit of our readers who happen to be uninitiated in the mysteries of Esculapius’ worship ... But for ourselves who have dabbled in these matters ... Unfortunately for mankind, we had too many men in the profession ..... We can speak here, with the assurance of personal [page 621:] experience, for in our own studios we have come to similar though not identical results, long before we ever heard of the Fallacies of the Faculty ... even to an unprofessional reader ... (BJ, I, 392).

... that he has drank (sic) at the very source of truth ... we can declare that we rose from the intellectual repast which the doctor cooked up, with a hungry stomach, for the quantity we have (sic) consumed proved but a few grains of truth in a bushel of chaff ... Without the aid of scholastic glasses he is incapable of looking upon nature, and marking her workings ... and they might have gone on still longer putting wrong questions to nature, and remain as ignorant an ever ... (BJ, I, 393).

No one can doubt the purity and nobility of the Platonian soul, or the ingenuity of the Platonian intellect. But if the question be put to-day, what is the value of the Platonian philosophy, the proper answer is — exactly nothing at all’. We do not believe that any good purpose is answered by popularizing his dreams; on the contrary we do believe that they have a strong tendency to ill — intellectually of course (BJ, I, 393).

For our own part, we vastly prefer even the noise of Bacon, the laws of Combe, or the nebular star dust of Nichols to what Dr. Lewis will insist upon [page 622:] terming ‘the clear,’ simple, common-sense philosophy of Plato’ — but these things are merely matters of taste. It would be as well, however, to bear in mind the aphoristic sentence of Leibnitz ... (BJ, I, 394).

We have already expressed a favorable opinion of this truly beautiful edition of Shakespeare; but the present issue comes to us with so liberal an enrichment of wood cuts, that we cannot refrain from expressing once more our opinion of its cheapness and beauty (BJ, I, 394).

It is a disgrace to American Art, that we have never been able to produce the shadow of an ornamental design ..... (BJ, I, 394).(1)

We have here another new book from the pen of an American(2) ... The author, a son of the Rev. Dr. Anthon(3) ... We do not mean to underrate Mr. Anthon's work because it was produced under circumstances so exceedingly agreeable. There are but few young gentlemen of his years and opportunities who ever think of producing a book at all ... Probably some [page 623:] readers if made acquainted with the realities of Hardenne would say that it was furnished in a style of the most superb and thrilling magnificence, for we saw in one of our morning papers, a day or two since, an allusion to a new Broadway Omnibus was styled ‘a truly palatial carriage’, and every newspaper reader knows that all the steamboats in our waters are ‘floating palaces’ (BJ, I, 394-5).

Satanstoe appears to be the first of a series of three tales written to illustrate a principle, the principle of anti-rentism, which Mr. Cooper considers a greater disgrace to the State of New-York than repudiation to Mississippi. We have but little faith in stories that are written to illustrate any other principle than the principle of human nature (BJ, I, 395).

Not the least interesting portion of the work is the Introduction, which embraces an account of the situation of Ephesus,(1) and the character of its people, as well as of the advent of the Gospel(2) among them ... This introduction is illustrated with two wood engravings ... (BJ, I, 395).

It is by no means as good a book as we have a right to expect from that author of ‘The Mysteries of Paris‘; its interest has been materially impaired by too close an adherence to historical fact ... an eccentric Dutch philosopher of great genius and erudition ... (BJ, I, 396).

A little more science and a little less prattle would have greatly enhanced its value as a book for the people, (1) but even in its present shape, it contains a great amount of knowledge in a very limited space (BJ, I, 396).

Who but a Pyrrhonist would doubt the existence of these hordes of Nomadic bibliophiles who haunt our railway stations and steamboat-wharves, arrayed, with emblematic propriety, in that last stage of cloth, ere it is translated into material for the author and the printer? ... Flocks of pamphlets on green and blue, and yellow wings, hover over the land — obscense volucres — to snatch at [page 625:] and beslime, like harpies, whatever is pure and healthfully nourishing for the soul. Under the very eaves of our churches and colleges, these filthy creatures hang their nests, prolific of infamy and vice; they perch upon the roofs of our lyceums and lecture rooms; they disturb the hitherto peaceful recesses of our hamlets and villages with hearse screams for their prey of garbage and ordure. Literature, in the true sense of the word, is dead. .... Bad food will produce disease as well in the spiritual as the material world ... The literature which really circulates among the masses, and steals through the gateway of our national morals for so cheap a toll, is the literature of the pickpocket, the burglar, and the bawd ... (BJ, I, 408).

But Schiller was no apostle of the ideal in the sense which those understand it who would make it an excuse for a weak dereliction from fidelity to the truth of absolute nature. By ‘ideal’ he meant that highest perfection of nature which only are inspired eye of the true artist can discorn (BJ, I, 409).

This is the most valuable of all the books which Mr. Downing has contributed ... Some idea may be formed of its completeness from the fact ... if there be people who are indifferent to pomological matters, we advise them to procure Mr. Downing's work and plunge into the midst of his pearmains, rare-ripes and dameons. All the true disciples of pomology will get the book as a matter of course (BJ, I, 410).