by the feeling of kindness, but it will acquire severity from the habitual fear of self-deception. His manner will be earnest, and perhaps vehement; but it will be the tendency of his representations, not to hold up an individual culprit to ridicule, but to make us weep over human nature itself, and feel that against the lowest or the vilest participant in that nature, we have not the right to cast the first stone. Whatever exceptions the reader may take against particular parts of this little volume, we are much deceived if the impression left by an impartial perusal of the whole volume, will not be equally in favour of the Author's design, and of the genius displayed in its execution. In some instances her satire may seem severe; as when she is describing the pompous imbecility of a retired country grocer and his dame in the year of his mayoralty. And this severity may only amuse, when we do not feel ourselves implicated in the raillery. At other times, when the attack is unexpectedly turned against our own party, when some mortifying truth is pressed home in open disclosure, or we find our secret misgivings put into plain language, this severity may not appear absolutely inoffensive: but still the conviction will remain, that the Author is right. 6 The first Essay is entitled Prejudice. It opens with a bumourous description of the personages above alluded to, as an exemplification of vulgar prejudice, the lowest kind.' The Author's design, in this frontispiece to the Essay, is obviously to take an extreme case; one in which the full dominion of prejudice is so obvious, as to appear simply ridiculous to minds of intellectual pride; and then to argue that prejudice, how different soever be the form it assumes, as we rise higher in the scale of intellect, is essentially the same; that prejudice being the most pernicious which sometimes infects minds of high native powers, and which 'Lies in thinking that themselves are free.' The infidel, the worldling, and the material philosopher, are introduced as being the dupes and the victims of prejudice'As hopeless as can bind 'The meanest, most illiterate of mankind.' • Could you but show by demonstration clear, pp. 15-16. But mere assertion of a future state, By unknown writers, at a distant date, If this be all its advocates advance, It is but superstition and romance.' The inveterate operation of prejudice, in the case of those who associate some darling errors with essential truth, is then slightly but keenly exposed. The prejudices of men of taste are beautifully illustrated, by imagining the effect which the preaching of Paul at Athens would produce in contrast with the surrounding scenery. • When Paul the walks of beauteous Athens trod, Heard that new doctrine, how would he reply? -Those awful forms that hold their silent sway, Of that "strange thing," which after all-was true.' pp. 18-20. Our readers will probably have in recollection some remarks which were made in our review of Eustace's Travels, on the genius of Heathenism, and on the influence of the Arts, as an instrumental cause of the Romish corruptions of Christianity. The following lines place the subject in a very striking aspect. 'When Luther's sun arose, to chase away The "dim religious light" of Romish day, Opposing, only, to the mellow glare Of gold and gems that deck the papal chair, Good sense, plain argument, and sound research,-- Here taste, again, would prove a dangerous guide, -Behold the slow procession move along! That barb'rous, tasteless heretic-was right.' pp. 20—21. The party-man, the ecclesiastical dogmatist, and the true sectarian, are portrayed with unsparing freedom. We were, for our own part, particularly well satisfied to have the bad spirit which often brings disgrace on a good cause, exposed in the instance of the party Dissenter, and to meet with the remark, that 'while Nathaniels stand on either side 'Experience is the title of the second Essay. It is not perhaps desirable that the anticipations of youth should be lowered down to the melancholy colouring of such a retrospect; but indeed there is no danger of our being led to expect too little from the world. We never recollect, however, to have had the utter insufficiency of earthly pleasures and possessions, brought home to the feelings with so affecting an emphasis, as in this simple, unexaggerated tale of the heart. It is not by the 'complaint' of disappointed ambition, by weeping monodies, or by philosophic declamations on the nothingness of grandeur, that the mind can be made to renounce its own peculiar projects of happiness. Those writers who throw all the blame of our disappointment on the objects of life, only betray their ignorance of the true seat of unhappiness; while those who represent life as altogether gloomy, shew that they have ill performed its duties, and that they have not appreciated in the spirit of gratitude, these common mercies' which fall to the lot of all. The view of life which is given in this Essay, will appear gloomy to those only who have never known what is to be awakened out of the day-dreams of romance to the encountering of tasteless cold reality;' from whom grief has never extorted conviction, or whom the pressure of present evil has never forced to exert the energies of prayer. The picturesque of fancy, and the real of truth, are admirably contrasted in the following lines. 'A tatter'd cottage, to the view of taste, And yield delight that modern brick and board, To every object it has never tried.' pp. 43, 44. The tenor of this Essay is adapted, not to encourage any feelings bordering upon disgust with the world, but rather to shew the unreasonableness of our expectations. This is instanced in the romantic estimates of early friendship; and we could not perhaps select a passage more strikingly displaying the refined correctness of sentiment and the experimental wisdom, which characterize these moral dissertations. 'Blind to ourselves, to others not less blind, Free from those meaner faults, that most conspire Some fault, perhaps, less prominent alone, We shall make room for one more extract from this Essay. Every real sufferer must feel how just is the following representation. When hope her seat to memory has resign'd, Then shall we learn, perhaps too late, to know And what slight efforts had restrain'd their pow'r, How bitter the remembrance to this hour! pp. 54, 55. The tale which closes this Essay, will disappoint readers who are interested only by incident. It portrays a person of an or |