Literary studies, volume 2 (of 2)

A wit said of Gibbon’s autobiography, that he did not know the difference between himself and the Roman Empire. He has narrated his ‘progressions from London to Buriton, and fro...

In this second education the childhood of Gibbon had been very defective. He had never been placed under any rigid training. In his first boyhood he disputed with his aunt, ‘tha...

The grave and erudite habits of Gibbon soon developed themselves. Independently of these abstruse theological disputations, he spent many hours daily—rising early and reading ca...

History, it is said, is of no use; at least a great critic, who is understood to have in the press a very elaborate work in that kind, not long since seemed to allege that writi...

It is no wonder that such a mind should have looked with displeasure on primitive Christianity. The whole of his treatment of that topic has been discussed by many pens, and thr...

About the close of the last century, some one discovered the wife of a country rector in the act of destroying, for culinary purposes, the last remnants of a box of sermons, whi...

Now of the poetic religion there is nothing in Butler. No one could tell from his writings that the universe was beautiful. If the world were a Durham mine or an exact square, i...

The fame of Butler rests mainly on two remarkable courses of reasoning, one of which is contained in the well-known Sermons, the second in the ‘Analogy.’ Both seem to be in a gr...

In the first place, so far from its being probable that Revelation would have contained the same difficulties as Nature, we should have expected that it would explain those diff...

‘The immortal “Analogy” has probably done more to silence the objections of infidelity than any other ever written from the earliest “apologies” downwards. It not only most crit...

There are certain persons whom taste guides, much as morality and conscience guide ordinary persons. They are ‘gentlemen.’ They revolt from what is coarse; are sickened by that...

Another most palpable defect—especially palpable now-a-days—in _Tristram Shandy_ is its indecency. It is quite true that the customary conventions of writing are much altered du...

In two points the _Sentimental Journey_, viewed with the critic’s eye, and as a mere work of art, is a great improvement upon _Tristram Shandy_. The style is simpler and better;...

And if both these systems be condemned as undesirable and prejudicial, there is no third system except that which we have—the system of _removable inequalities_, where many peop...

‘To him each lady’s look was lent; On him each courtier’s eye was bent; Midst furs and silks and jewels sheen, He stood in simple Lincoln green, The centre of the glittering rin...

Many other indications of the same healthy and natural sense, which gives so much of their characteristic charm to the Scotch novels, might be pointed out, if it were necessary...

The same limitation of Scott’s genius shows itself in a very different portion of art—in his delineation of his heroines. The same blunt sagacity of imagination, which fitted hi...

Men of genius may be divided into regular and irregular. Certain minds, the moment we think of them, suggest to us the ideas of symmetry and proportion. Plato’s name, for exampl...

‘Then the going on again—so fresh at first, and shortly afterwards so sleepy. The waking from a sound nap as the mail came dashing past like a highway comet, with gleaming lamps...

There is one class of Mr. Dickens’s pictures which may seem to form an exception to this criticism. It is the delineation of the outlaw, we might say the anti-law, world in _Oli...

There has been much controversy about Mr. Dickens’s taste. A great many cultivated people will scarcely concede that he has any taste at all; a still larger number of fervent ad...

But Bossuet is dead; and Cicero was a Roman; and Plato wrote in Greek. Years and manners separate us from the great. After dinner, Demosthenes _may_ come unseasonably; Dante _mi...

This is not in Macaulay’s way. It is not that he is sceptical; far from it. ‘Divines of all persuasions,’ he tells us, ‘are agreed that there is a religion;’ and he acquiesces i...

‘During the interval,’ he tells us, ‘between the Restoration and the Revolution, the riches of the nation had been rapidly increasing. Thousands of busy men found every Christma...

Macaulay’s ‘party-spirit’ is another consequence of his positiveness. When he inclines to a side, he inclines to it too much. His opinions are a shade too strong; his predilecti...

The characteristic deficiencies of French literature have no room to show themselves in this class of art. ‘Though France herself denies,’ says a recent writer, ‘yet all other n...

‘Vous, pauvres pleins d’envie, Vous, riches désireux, Vous, dont le char dévie Après un cours heureux; Vous, qui perdrez peut-être Des titres éclatants, Eh gai! prenez pour maît...

This shrewd sense gives a solidity to the verses of Béranger which the social and amusing sort of poetry commonly wants; but nothing can redeem it from the reproach of wanting _...

Mr. Clough’s fate in life had been such as to exaggerate this naturally peculiar temper. He was a pupil of Arnold’s; one of his best, most susceptible and favourite pupils. Some...

The same defect which prevented Mr. Claude from obtaining his bride will prevent this poem from obtaining universal popularity. The public like stories which come to something;...

‘At the Spring assizes of 1791, when I had nearly attained my sixteenth year, I had the delight of hearing Erskine. It was a high enjoyment, and I was able to profit by it. The...

There should be a word in the language of literary art to express what the word ‘picturesque’ expresses for the fine arts. _Picturesque_ means fit to be put into a picture; we w...

The definition of _pure_ literature is, that it describes the type in its simplicity—we mean, with the exact amount of accessory circumstance which is necessary to bring it befo...

That want is a want of ‘definition.’ We must all know landscapes, river landscapes especially, which are in the highest sense beautiful, which when we first see them give us a d...

This art works by contrast. It enables you to see, it makes you see, the perfect type by painting the opposite deviation. It shows you what ought to be by what ought not to be;...

‘All the little boys and girls, With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls, And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls, Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after The wonderful music with sh...

Natural theology, therefore, contains nothing to disturb the explanation we have given of our original difficulty. The most cursory examination of it would show as much. We have...

On the whole, therefore, the necessary ignorance of man explains to us much; it shows us that we could not be what we ought to be, if we lived in the sort of universe we should...

In one case, these causes of irrational conviction seem contradictory. Clearness, as we have seen, is one of them; but obscurity, when obscure things are interesting, is a cause...

The case is analogous to that of education. Every parent wisely teaches his child his own creed, and till the child has attained a certain age, it is better that he should not h...

Upon examination, therefore, the admission that certain truths are not gained by discussion introduces no new element into the subject. The discussion of such truths is as neces...

[17] ‘Since writing the above, Baron Rolfe has verified my prediction more strikingly by being created a peer, by the title of Lord Cranworth, and appointed a Vice-Chancellor. S...