Text: Edgar Allan Poe (?), Literary, Broadway Journal (New York), August 2, 1845, vol. 2, no. 4, p. ???, col. ?

[page 57, column 1, continued:]

Wiley & Putnam's Library of Choice Reading. No. XVI. Prose and Verse. By Thomas Hood. Part I.

This collection is designed to embrace Hood's more earnest writings — in the words of the editor, “those which were written most directly from the heart, which reflect most faithfully his life and opinions.” Heretofore his lighter effusions, his puns and quibbles, are all that the American public have had an opportunity of appreciating.

Part I. contains the Preface to Hood's own; The Pugsley Papers; The Dream of Eugene Aram; Black, White, and Brown; I remember — I remember; The Portrait; Literary Reminiscences; My Apology; The Lost Heir; An Undertaker; Miss Killmansegg; Fair Ines; A Ballad; Ruth; Autumn; A Song; and the Ode to Melancholy; — a very judicious selection. We shall speak of it again hereafter. In the meantime we quote a few well-considered words from the Preface of the American editor: [column 2:]

“The grand law of morality which protects the rights of the author, and distributes his works to the world in accordance with those rights, will be found to be the just measure by which his writings can be received with any advantage. A complicated system of checks and counter checks — all of them necessary — depends upon the recognition of that primary right. The due responsibility of the author, the force of his character depends upon it. A just competition, the sacred right to be free and equal” between the native and the foreign author, depend upon it. A proper Nationality in our case depends upon it. — Follow out the system where you will, it will be found, here as elsewhere, that only the just and right are profitable.”