BRITISH CRITICS.* THE British reviews and reviewers of the early part of the present century are closely connected with the history of English literature, not only on account of the influence they exerted on public opinion, but for the valuable contributions which a few of them made to literature itself. Some of the most masterly disquisitions in the whole range of English letters have appeared in the three leading periodicals of the time, -the Edinburgh Review, the Quarterly Review, and Blackwood's Magazine. Almost all systems of philosophy, theology, politics and criticism, have been vehemently discussed in their pages. They have been the organs through which many of the subtlest and strongest intellects have communicated with their age. In classifying historical events under ideas and principles, in tracing out the laws which give pertinence to seemingly confused facts, in presenting intellectual and historical epochs in vivid pictures, they have been especially successful. But 1. Contributions to the Edinburgh Review. By Francis Jeffrey, now one of the Judges of the Court of Sessions in Scotland. London: Longman & Co. 4 vols. 8vo. 2. Wiley & Putnam's Library of Choice Reading: Characters of Shakspeare. By William Hazlitt. New York. 16mo. 3. Imagination and Fancy. By Leigh Hunt. New York: Wiley & Putnam. 16mo. North American Review, October, 1845. although containing papers of the greatest merit, their general tone has been too much that of the partisan. Being political as well as literary journals, their judgments of authors have often been determined by considerations independent of literary merit. In criticism, they have repeatedly violated the plainest principles of taste, morality, and benevolence. Their dictatorial "we" has been assumed by some of the most unprincipled hacks that ever lifted their hoofs against genius and virtue. Though they did good in assisting to purge literature of much mediocrity and stupidity, it is questionable whether their criticism on contemporaries was not, on the whole, productive of evil. The rage for strong writing, which the success of their example brought into fashion, at one time threatened to destroy all discriminating criticism. An article was more effective by being spiced with sarcasm and personalities, and the supply was equal to the demand. The greatest poets of the day found themselves at the mercy of anonymous writers, whose arrogance was generally equalled only by their malice or ignorance, and by whom a brilliant libel was considered superior to the fairest critique. It is impossible to look over the current criticism of that day, and observe the meanness and injustice which so often characterize it, without a movement of indignation. This is mingled with surprise, when we discover in it traces of the hand of some distinguished man of talent, who has lent himself to do the dirty work of faction or prejudice. The great poets of the period were compelled to suffer, not merely from attacks on their writings, but from all that malice could bring against their personal character, and all that party hostility could bring against their notions of government. It was unfor tunate, that the same century in which an important revolution occurred in the spirit and character of poetry, was likewise that in which political rancor raged and foamed almost to madness. The exasperated passions growing out of the political dissensions of the time, which continually brought opposite opinions in a rude shock against each other, and turned almost every impressible spirit into a heated partisan, gave a peculiar character of vindictiveness to literary judgments. The critics, being politicians, were prone to decide upon the excellence of a poet's images, or a rhetorician's style, by the opinion he entertained of Mr. Pitt and the French Revolution. The same journal which could see nothing but blasphemy and licentiousness in the poetry of Shelley, could find matter for inexpressible delight in the poetry of John Wilson Croker. Criticism, in many instances, was the mere vehicle of malignity and impudence. Whigs libelled tory writers, tories anathematized whigs. Eminence in letters was to be obtained only by men gifted with strong powers of endurance or resistance. The moment a person became prominent in the public eye, he was considered a proper object of public contempt or derision. As soon as his head appeared above the mass, he was certain that some journal would deem him worthy of being made the butt of merciless satire or scandalous personalities. Every party and clique had its organ of "public" opinion; and, in disseminating its peculiar prejudices or notions, exhibited a plentiful lack of justice and decorum. The coarseness and brutality which party spirit thus engendered brought down the moral qualifications of the critic to a low standard. Every literary bully, who was expert in the trade of intellectual assassination, could easily find employment both for his cow ardice and his cruelty. The public looked admiringly on, month after month, as these redoubtable torturers in the inquisition of letters stretched some bard on the rack, and insulted his agonies with their impish glee. If the author denied, in meek or indignant tones, the justice of the punishment, the reply which they sometimes condescended to make was in the spirit of the taunt with which the judges in "The Cenci" mocked the faltering falsehoods of their tortured victim : "Dare you, with lips yet white from the rack's kiss, Speak false? Is it so soft a questioner, That you can bandy lovers' talk with it, From this insolence and vindictiveness few British periodicals have been free, though there are wide differences in the ability and learning of the contributors, and in the artistical form which their bad qualities have taken. No eminent man, of any party, has escaped criticism of the kind we have noticed, criticism having its origin in the desire to pamper a depraved taste, in envy, and hatred, and political bigotry, — a criticism which considered the publication of a book merely as an occasion to slander its author. Insignificance was the only shield from defamation. But perhaps the authors of the time suffered less vexation from those critical structures directly traceable to malevolence and political fanaticism, than from those which were dictated from a lack of sympathy with the spirit of their works. There can hardly be a more exquisite torture devised for a sensitive man of genius, than to have the merit of his compositions tested by canons of taste which he expressly repudiates, and dog matically judged by one who cannot comprehend the qualities which constitute their originality and peculiar excellence. If the critic has the larger audience of the two, and his decisions are echoed as oracular by the mob of readers, the thing becomes doubly provoking. The personal feelings of the poet are outraged, and his writings are, for the time, prevented from exerting that influence which legitimately belongs to them. As an earnest man, conceiving that he has a message of some import to deliver to the world, he must consider his critic as doing injury to society, as well as to himself. This impression is apt to engender a morbid egotism, which makes him impatient even of just censure, and to render the gulf between him and the public wider and more impassable. Much of the narrowness and captiousness, which we observe in ludicrous connection with some of the noblest thoughts and most exalted imaginations of the poets of the present century, had their source in the stings which vindictive or flippant reviewers had planted in their minds. Thus unjust or ignorant criticism subverts the purpose it proposes to accomplish, and makes the author suspicious of its capacity to detect faults, where it is so plainly incompetent to apprehend beauties. Besides, though it seems to annihilate its object, its effect is but transitory. That silent gathering of thought and sentiment in the minds of large bodies of people, which, when it has assumed distinct shape, we call public opinion, reverses the dicta of self-constituted literary tribunals; indeed, it changes the tone of the tribunals themselves. In 1816, the Edinburgh Review assumes an attitude of petulant dictatorship to Wordsworth, and begins a critique on "The Excursion" with, "This will never do;" in 1831, it prefaces an objection |