with a sentence

of condemnation.

We have not to

complain either of severity or of neglect.

Nor shall we be disposed to retract our praise of the contributors, although it should appear that we have allowed too much credit to the Reviews for the talent and information which they contain. And this is very possibly the case. A large proportion of the good ought perhaps to be attributed to the general spirit and intelligence of the times. The waters of knowledge, like every other stream, will not only find a level, but force a passage. The information which now flows into the Reviews, would in all probability, therefore, have discovered for itself, if they had not been in existence, another and a better channel: and it might easily have made its way into some reservoir equally ample and capacious, but neither polluted with so much filth, nor choked up with so much rubbish.

It must be also borne in mind, that talent is then only a good, when it is under the guidance of an honest heart, and employed upon some useful purpose. It otherwise

becomes a most frightful instrument of evil, and that evil attains an enormous and alarming magnitude exactly in proportion to the strength and greatness of the talent. Who is there indeed who must not deeply regret to see the pure ore of the soul mixed up with a quantity of alloy, and almost lost in the adulterating mass of baser metal? Who is there, who must not warm with anger, to perceive the highest abilities exerted in the nefarious attempt to mislead the public opinion, and pervert the public taste; to perpetuate party feuds, to throw discredit and disgrace on public men or measures, by dark and illiberal attacks; to strangle rising merit at its birth by impertinent and unfeeling witticisms. Whether the Reviews, or rather the writers of Reviews, have been guilty of such offences, we shall not take upon ourselves explicitly to determine: we shall state facts, and leave the nation to draw its own conclusions.

That it may be enabled to draw these conclusions with more certainty, we must enter upon a closer and more sifting examination of the whole matter. We must thoroughly penetrate the mysteries; we must obtain a

view behind the scenes. We must then strike at the root. We must probe the distemper to the bottom. In truth, the fault lies at the very foundation of the whole systema system in all parts corrupt:-in many respects abominable and monstrous. The particular instances too, which might be adduced in corroboration of the general assertions, which we shall feel it our duty to make, would be well calculated to excite at one and the same moment emotions of indignation, astonishment, and laughter.

But we must be methodical. In our inquiry, therefore, into this subject, we shall consider in the first place, the defects and disadvantages inherent in the very nature of a Review; and, in the second, those manifold errors and offences, which, in addition to the former necessary inconveniences, are observable in the management of all existing publications of the kind.

First then, that there are real and certain evils ever attendant upon Reviews which must more than counterbalance all the benefits which can by the remotest possibility result from their influence, is a theory which can assuredly be maintained with much plausibility and appearance of reason. As we are writing upon a topic of popular and immediate interest, which will engross at least as much space as we can afford to its consideration, we shall not here venture upon the great question of the advantages and disadvantages, the use and abuse, of criticism in general: although we are rather of opinion that from the days of the father of criticism to the present moment, it has been productive of no beneficial effects, at all commensurate with the imposing dogmatism with which its rules have been delivered, or at all answerable to the implicit deference with which they have been received. We are almost inclined to believe that Aristotle and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Quintilian, and Longinus, with the whole army of French and other modern critics, have rather retarded than advanced the progress of literature, and the march of the human mind. The golden age of poetry has always been an age before criticism flourished. The best poets have always preceded the arts of poetry. The rules of criticism have always been drawn

from bright antecedent examples; from previous bursts of genius, or flights of imagination; and they have consequently never yet been placed on the broad basis of universal nature, and eternal unalterable truth; but confined to mere deductions from the works of men, who have already lived, and already written. Poets and Poetry have absolutely given birth to criticism and critics: on the contrary, no critic with his precise laws and technical observances has ever formed a true poet, or even called into being one spark of poetic fire, one ray of poetic beauty. Critics, we really think, have either left poetry as they found it: or clogged and hampered its free wings with unprofitable fetters: or caused it to retrograde with painful and desponding steps; or sunk it into a sort of mechanical process, a slow, cold, artificial, elaborate performance, to be squared and measured by the rule and compass. But however all this may be, our business is only with contemporary criticism; and we deem it incontestably proved, that to this department of the art there are certain inconveniencies and evil tendencies as necessarily and inherently attached as shadow to substance, or saltness to the ocean.

It is almost a moral impossibility, in the first place, that contemporary criticism should be exempt from sentiments of partiality or rivalry, party-views, and personal motives. Moreover, as it is generally anonymous, it affords too tempting an opportunity for a safe exercise of bitter and malevolent emotions. Hence the dignity of literature is degraded; and its peaceful pursuits are converted into a complete system of envenomed hostility; hence arise the heart-burnings and resentments, the charges and recriminations; the suspicions and jealousies, and all the disgraceful acerbity of literary disputes. Hence, since the introduction and prevalence of modern Reviews, the genus irritabile," the touchy race of authors, have become a brood of wasps and hornets, for ever buzzing and stinging, and filling the whole world of letters with noise, confusion and strife.

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Secondly, a Review after all is only a book-a book too which, like all other books as well as the poor man's

razors, is made "to sell." It must, therefore be a saleable production. It must be accommodated, in a great measure to the taste and caprices of the age. It must be composed to captivate the attention, to please the humour, and gratify the passions of the reading mass of the community. Now the reading mass of the community, in all places and at all times, is a body sunk in idleness, and devoured by ennui: it has no relish for calm discussion, or plain didactic investigations; it cares nothing about immutable laws, or general principles; it is incapable of appreciating the niceties and delicacies of true discerning criticism; it wants no rational instruction; it neither purchases nor peruses a single treatise for the sake of intellectual improvement; it requires to be stimulated and roused, and excited, and amused. Α Review, then, which looks directly to immediate circulation, of which the main object is present notoriety, and which is consequently dependent, more than any other species of publication, upon the class of persons above mentioned, must be written for effect: it must strike at once its colours must be heightened; its lights and shadows exaggerated: its figures distorted and enlarged. A happy stroke of ridicule-no matter at whose expenseis in more request, and of more service than a chain of solid argument, complete in every link. Every thing must be shining and glaring: or sharp and poignant or facetious and laughable. Thus it is, that the reputation of an author is of less importance in the eye of the Reviewer than a sarcasm or a joke: his sensitive feelings are to be racked and harrowed up for the sake of a witticism; and his peace of mind must be sacrificed to a pun. What have been the effects of this system upon Cowper, or Kirke White, or Keates? It has imbittered life and accelerated death. What have been its effects upon Lord Byron? His proud spirit and conscious ability sank not under the infliction, however intensely he must have felt it. But his nature was changed and perverted; he was provoked and maddened into misanthropy: his pen was dipped ever afterwards in gall or poison: ever afterwards he mixed with the beautiful aspirations of his poetry a scorn and

detestation of his kind; a mockery of all that is on earth most lovely or most consecrated: he has become, partly we have no doubt from that early severity of criticism, a nuisance instead of an ornament to society; and the disgrace, almost as much as the pride, of the literature of England.

Thirdly, the strictures of anonymous Reviewers have often had an influence, even perhaps without their consciousness or volition, in misleading the judgment of the people. Too much weight and credit have been generally attached to their decisions. Nine men out of ten, throughout the world, are glad to take their opinions at second-hand from their neighbours, and save themselves the trouble of examination and reflection. They are ready to place implicit reliance on the "ipse dixit" of any individual scribbler, who writes, forsooth, "in a collective capacity." The" omne ignotum pro magnifico" will apply with peculiar force to some insignificant creature, who sends his nameless contributions to a Review. He is a Delphic oracle upon the instant. He seems of lofty stature and awful presence from the dusky and indistinct uncertainty which surrounds him, and prevents his littleness from being seen. The pigmy half enveloped in darkness is as formidable as a giant in the light. He holds his rank among the old Goliahs of literature, compared with whom the most of our modern Reviewers are in point of fact "as that small infantry

Warr'd on by cranes."

Moreover, he becomes not only exalted, but multiplied; he is no longer singular, but plural: his name is Legion. He speaks with authority: he assumes the style and title of majesty itself. The word "we" is a most potent sound. It falls like a spell or magic upon vulgar ears: it is an enchanter's wand, which out of one paltry individual creates an imaginary host, yet invests it with real power.

If these remarks be true, the consequences cannot but be mischievous. It must be fraught with bad tendency, and bad example, that any man should be invested with unmerited influence, or possess undue means of spreading his opinions, and forwarding his private views.