d

Come-and when 'mid the calm profound,

I turn those gentle eyes to seek,
They, like the lovely landscape round,
Of innocence and peace shall speak.
Rest here, beneath the unmoving shade,
And on the silent valleys gaze,
Winding and widening till they fade
In yon soft ring of summer haze.
The village trees their summits rear
Still as its spire; and yonder flock,
At rest in those calm fields, appear

As chiselled from the lifeless rock.
One tranquil mount the scene o'erlooks,

Where the hushed winds their sabbath keep,
While a near hum, from bees and brooks,

Comes faintly like the breath of sleep.
Well might the gazer deem, that when,
Worn with the struggle and the strife,
And heart-sick at the sons of men,

The good forsake the scenes of life,-
Like the deep quiet, that awhile
Lingers the lovely landscape o'er,
Shall be the peace whose holy smile
Welcomes them to a happier shore."

The time is fast coming when America and France will be the two countries, above all others, whose friendship England must cultivate, and whose manners and institutions she must the most accurately know. We will try to familiarize her already with that knowledge.

Editor++++

G—— could give us some papers on Jonathan, at once racy and

Ay, no man is better acquainted with what he writes about than G; a shrewd, a deep, a rare observer. So Boston has started the "New England Magazine." American criticism is very fast improving in its principles. The "Southern Review" puts forth an excellent review of Byron's "Manfred."

Editor ++++

What think you of our own Quarterlies in their last appearancethe "Edinburgh" and the "Westminster ?"

Editor

!

The Westminster falls into one vital error. Somebody said, long ago, it was too dull; and it now seeks to obviate the fault by three reviews on three several novels. This is not of a piece with the rest of the work, nor at all calculated to lighten the Review. The fact is, that books of a class so numerous as novels, ought to be reviewed sparingly by a Quarterly Journal. A notice of a novel in the "Westminster Review" ought to direct to that novel the eyes of all its readers: but to review novels by dozens, cheek by jowl, with the gravest of earthly matters, is like putting a collection of laws in the same case with a collection of butterflies. Dr. Bowring should consider this point. He has done wonders for the Review, and for his own broad and stern principles; but in criticism, as yet-genuine scientific criticism-the "Westminster Review" is palpably de

ficient. The best critical article it ever put forth was by Peacock, the Author of "Crotchet Castle," upon Moore's "Epicurean," albeit the criticism was much too harsh and sweeping; but then how much of true wisdom and true learning it embodied! But in these days, this fine and sturdy publication is about something better even than literary criticism. Its unbending principles, its staunch adherence to primitive truths, are suited to this age and this crisis. Men, especially in the lower and the middle orders-men of the people, among whom the "Westminster Review" chiefly circulates, want to have one steady point on which to fix their desires, and one peaceable line of conduct chalked out, by which they may attain them. Here, on the one hand, they have the broad politics of the "Westminster Review;" there, on the other, the philosophy, at once resolute and bloodless. Well said Boullanger, "Ce sont les fanatiques, les prêtres, et les ignorans qui font les révolutions; les personnes éclairées, désintéressées et sensées sont toujours amies du repos."

Good Heavens! to compare the difference in tone between the solemn warnings of the "Westminster Review," and the Claverhouse suggestions, flippant in murther, of" Blackwood's Magazine." Observe, for instance, this extract from the latter, noticed in the present number of the "Westminster Review!" It is worth quoting again for its cool ferocity:"By that time (the time when the Reform Bill is lost, and Peel makes up a cabinet,') the horrible stagnation in every branch of internal trade, for which the nation has to thank Lord Grey"-(oh! indeed; there was no excitement about Reform, the father to the said stagnation, before Lord Grey came in! How chanced it, then, that the Duke of Wellington is not still Premier?——— oh! indeed, the delayed Reform, and therefore the continued stagnation of trade, is that owing to my Lord Grey, or to the gentlemen on the other side of the question, who procrastinate-defeat they cannot -the Reform?)" will have come to such a pass as to command attention on all quarters to something much more interesting, as well as important, than any Reform!!! By that time, there will be no Peers in France, &c., and there will be war by land and war by sea; and there will be a bit of a dust in Manchester, or elsewhere, and it will be laid in blood, and the new Parliament will be chosen in peace and jollity, &c." Gracious God! and it is in this strain that the organs of the Tories, the defenders of the Bishops, the soi-disant upholders of Church and State, can talk of a conflict between the military and their fellow-subjects! "A bit of a dust in Manchester, or elsewhere, laid in blood, and a new Parliament chosen in peace and jollity!" This is the way the Carbonari legislate! They "make a bit of a dust, laid with blood," at Terracina, or elsewhere, and share the popular plunder "in peace and jollity." "in peace and jollity." And this stuff comes from men who cry out on the Reformers as the destroyers of peace and lovers of the sword! Will our humane and honest countrymen suffer this language?-will clergymen cherish a work that breathes such doctrines?-will men who love their neighbours and honour their God, tell us that these are the principles to propagate in a time awful and hazardous beyond precedent? One thing, however, this fire-and-sword indiscretion teaches us-the Tories know, the

Tories confess, that if an efficient Reform be really and permanently rejected, if Peel do "make up a Cabinet" to succeed the present, there will be "a bit of a dust at Manchester, or ELSEWHERE, that must be laid with blood." Yes, but on which side shall the blood be most profusely, the most unavailingly shed?-a whole people on one side, a handful of fanatics on the other!

But a truce to fears and to threats, that will not, we trust, be realized. The "Westminster Review" has put forward an article of considerable talent-(but I doubt whether conceived in that large and passionless spirit with which a man, who practically knows the world, treats of human character)-upon Huskisson and Canning. It is absurd to the highest degree to tell us "that Canning, as an orator and a statesman, never reached beyond mediocrity." Pshaw! what the deuce does the man mean by mediocrity? Is Brougham a mediocre orator?—and how many times has Canning, front to front, and foot to foot, excelled and eclipsed Brougham? Let every one who heard, answer! Canning was an adventurer, but a brilliant one-an intriguer, but possessed noble and kindly qualities. He was not, though he might have been, a man of the people-and the people do right to reject, but not to malign him. As to Huskisson, we intend, some day or other, to let the world know the gross errors, the blunders, at once so puerile and so dangerous, into which that puling economist, feeble politician, and truckling senator, has seduced his party. But enough of him now! For the rest, the present number of the "Westminster" is good and various; it only wants to imbibe the indulgent spirit of Bentham, and the profound worldly knowledge and graceful taste of Helvetius, as well as such of the principles of both as are far more easily acquired, in order to be worthy of its wise school and accomplished editor.

Editor tttt

The present "Edinburgh" contains one especially fine piece of criticism, and of late it has rarely contained more than one fine piece of criticism in each number,-shining exceedingly, "like a good deed in a naughty world!"

Editor *****

The "Edinburgh Review" in its best days has never put forth an article equal in point, in brilliancy, in critical genius, to that on Croker's edition of Boswell, and though most unmitigated in its severity, the severity is exceedingly just: I could not think it was just when I first saw the review. I imagined there must be some want of candour in blame so unaccompanied by praise. I thought the faults might be fairly satirized, but I doubted whether the merits had not been unfairly forgotten. I sent forthwith for the book; I have looked it through; there it is on the table, and by the shade of Dr. Busby, I think the reviewer has been only too merciful in applying the scourge ;-such an ostentation of slip-slop such a pomposity of twaddle, as the editor has added in the way of notes, no man with a tithe of Mr. Croker's talent, ever before dreamt of obtruding into print. If anything could spoil so entertaining a book as Boswell, it is the impertinence of having one's attention suddenly jerked to the bottom of the page by a little fool of an asterisk that has nothing better to say than what the reader shall now judge of.

Text.

"About the same time of life, Meeke was left behind at Oxford to feed on a fellowship, and I went to London to get my living. Now, Sir, see the difference of our literary characters!"

Note.

“Curis acuens mortalia corda. Poverty was the stimulus which made Johnson exert a genius naturally, it may be supposed, more vigorous than Meeke's, and he was now beginning to enjoy the fame of which so many years of distress and penury had laid the foundation. Meeke had lived an easy life of decent competence; and on the whole perhaps as little envied Johnson as Johnson him. The goodness and justice of Providence equalize to a degree not always visible at first sight, the happiness of mankind, “ nec vixit malè qui natus moriensque fefellit.""

And now, after all this wisdom, with the two scraps of Latin to boot, what the deuce is there in that note that excuses its appearance?" Any thing new, Mr. Higgs?" "No, but the 'poticary is shaking his head quite gravely-like. He's a mighty learned man."

Now really lugging us out of the text to the margin at every inopportune opportunity, (and scarce a page in this edition passes without some such gratuitous impertinence) is exactly like Teague calling his master out of his easy-chair by the warm fire into the hall, and then whispering him with prodigious importance-" Augh, Sir, and the cat's kitted at last!" Before we dismiss this slovenly book-the abortion of so many years' labour-this collection of "solemn inaccuracies" and pharisaical nothings, we must make two remarks: the first is the fact that the sillier the man who meddles with Johnson's life, the greater success he seems to have. Croker is not, as any one would suppose in reading this book, a heavy, prosing, tasteless, stupid fellow; but a man ready, bold, intellectual, happy as a wit, caustic as a critic, adroit, nay eloquent as a speaker-and yet, but just read that work-that's all! The second thing worthy of remark is, that glaringly inaccurate and elaborately empty as Mr. Croker's labours have been, the Edinburgh Reviewer is the first critic who has shown them to be so. Everywhere else he has been eulogised to the skies for the very qualities in which he is most conspicuously deficient. In monthly-in quarterly Reviews, is this pardonable? What a melancholy proof of the spirit and state of existing criticism!

Editor +++ t

It is very true. In existing criticism praise is generally the result of private acquaintance, and no one thinks it necessary that a knowledge of the subject should precede a judgment on a book.

Editor** ***

It shall not be so with us; but let us now, dismissing this fine and striking criticism in the Edinburgh, which stands quite apart from the rest of the Review, glance for a moment over the Review itself. We do so for this reason. In another part of this number, viz. in our Address, we have hinted that these are not the times for a Quarterly Review-affecting at least to unite literature and politics. We call in as a witness to that fact, the contents of the present number of the Edinburgh. Consider the character of the period, the

stormy events, the fiery and intent excitement, the rapid varieties that colour existent affairs, and then read the list of subjects in the Edinburgh Review.

ART. I. The Life of Samuel Johnson, &c.

II. Remarks on the supposed Dionysius Gorginus, &c.

III. Attempts, in verse, by John Jones, an old servant, with some account of the writer, &c. By Robert Southey, Esq.

IV. An Essay on the distribution of Wealth and the Sources of Taxation.
V. The Drama brought to the test of Scripture and found wanting.
VI. Moore's Life of Lord E. Fitzgerald.

VII. Natural Theology.

VIII. The Life and Writings of Fuseli.

IX. Traité du droit penal.

X. The State of Protestantism in Germany.

XI. What will the Lords do?

Here then Art. XI. is the sole paper that treats on the present times! being somewhere about twenty pages out of two hundred and seventy-five! And in this very paper, the subject treated of "What will the Lords do?"-is already in the tomb of the Capulets, was dead, and was buried, within a day or two of the very time that the article sprung to life! So here stands the unfortunate politician for the next three months prophesying, and declaiming, and moralizing, and ratiocinating about a matter that all the rest of the world have already settled.

Mob. Bring out the dog, Monsieur Chabot.

Monsieur Chabot. Gentlemens, de dog is dead!

T

Now this is the fault not of the editor who better adapted to his arduous office than Mr. Napier? Not of the writers-who ever writes half so well as Mr. Macaulay? It is the fault of the plan. The Edinburgh Review, in fine, is a quarterly collection of Essays,-sometimes of admirable Essays,-but, (save by a lucky confluence of incidents, and then only in one, or at most two articles, i. e. scarcely a fifth part of the whole,) has no more to do with the times to which it plays the monitor, than the Seven Sleepers had to do with what was going on while they were buried in their memorable repose.

Editor ttt t

It is singular how many works in a high and valuable department are silently and noiselessly springing forth, even amidst all the excitement of politics. We have here two little works not for sale, one by Mr. Hayward, the accomplished and able editor of the Law Magazine-a translation from the German of Frederick von Savigny, "On the vocation of our age for Legislation and Jurisprudence." It is a work, no doubt, of considerable interest to those who enter into the subject of general law; for my own part, viewing it as an unprofessional reader, it seems in the original to want succinctness and clearness. But the spirit of it is broad and inquisitive. The next is a little pamphlet by Lord Mahon, "On the History of the Holy Cross." It shows considerable reading, a graceful mastery of language, and is well worthy of the author of Belisarius: a remarkable work for so young a man.