and it was impossible that written stories should advance beyond this limit till the invention of the art of printing.

This opened an entirely new field, and facilitated the circulation of a class of works which before had no opportunity of putting in their claim to popularity. Not that its effects were immediately visible, for at the time of its introduction the world was only just emerging from a second state of wildness, and it was long before the corruptions consequent on a general taste for literature again showed themselves under an exaggerated form.

The second dawn of literature, though under very different auspices from the first, still bore many essential marks of resemblance to it, and its second deterioration is clearly traceable to the same cause. Shakespeare may in many respects be considered the Homer of the second age; and though it would be childish to go far in attributing their remarkable similarity to the circumstances in which they lived, yet to these circumstances we may fairly ascribe one point in their similarity, i. e. their negligence of all sources of interest which they themselves would have been precluded from enjoying. These two great poets seem more than any other poets who have dedicated their talents to works of fiction, to have written for their own gratification, and to have followed the train of their own wild and romantic thoughts, instead of attending to what others would most favourably receive.

But as the taste for literature has become more general, the temptation to court popularity has increased; the unlimited extent to which books may be multiplied has made the writers of works of fiction entirely independent of the theatre, and the simple narrative is now universally adopted by them; the taste for the drama is quite supplanted by the taste for novels, and the certain road to literary fame is the power of giving five hours of amusement to all that are too stupid to amuse themselves, or too idle to be of use to others.

It is true that this way of viewing the subject offers us a very discouraging prospect as to the probable character of future works of imagination. But at the same time that it represses expectation, it suggests an answer to discontent. If it is the essential distinction between Poetry and Fiction that the merit of the latter consists in the suddenness, and that of the former in the permanence, of its effects, then novelty is as superfluous with the votaries of the one, as it is necessary to the dependants on the other; and while the former have no reason to complain, the latter have every reason to be grateful. While an everlasting succession of novels will continue to glut the craving of posterity, those who have a relish for higher pleasures, few as they may be, will never be insulated while enjoying the sympathy of those immortal companions, Homer, Shakespeare, Lucretius, and Virgil.

LETTERS TO FRIENDS.

I. FROM 1823 TO 1827.

1.

(y. 1.) 1823.-I will pledge my own peculiar veracity to the following statement:-The situation is, I am confident, and on this matter experience has peculiarly qualified me to judge, far the most beautiful place in the world, the focus of irradiated perfection, the favoured haunt of romance and sentiment, the very place which, if you recollect the circumstance, you taxed me with a disposition to romanticity for encomiazing, when I informed you, that I had destined it for my konopúуerov, where unmolested "flumina amem silvasque inglorius." The parsonage is situated in a steep and narrowish glen, which intersects a long line of coppice that overhangs the Dart for the length of nearly a mile, and rises almost perpendicularly out of the river to the height of about 200 feet. The stream there is still, clear, and very deep; on the opposite side is Dartington, and a line of narrow, long, flat meadows, interspersed with large oak and ash trees,

forms the bank of the river. The steep woods on the Little Hempston side are in the form of a concave crescent (thereby agreeing with Buckland). From the parsonage to the river is a steep descent through a small orchard; at the bottom of which, on turning the corner which the glen aforesaid makes on its north side with the course of the stream, you come at once on a sort of excavation, of about half an acre, which, terminated by an overhanging rock, forms a break in the line of coppice aforesaid. In this said rock young M. found the hawks' nests. I think they build there every year. On the opposite side, i. e. the Dartington side, is what was formerly a little island, but now no longer claims that proud title, in the oaks of which I am in hopes we shall soon have an heronry, as they haunt there all the summer.

After this I should not so utterly despair of success, if I felt less interested in the event; but as it is, I can hardly hope for so great a gratification.

2.

(y. 2.) 1824.—I am afraid you will think me a booby if I tell you that the cause of my not having made progress proportional to the time is my having made an attempt at the Latin versé. I comfort myself that it cannot fail to have improved my Latin scholarship, and may have been of some use in teaching me to arrange my ideas, in which latter province T. tells me I am lamentably deficient.

I look out my words in great style, but the

fatigue is excessive, so as to supply the place of out-of-door's exercise. By the by, I suppose you know the "Ancient Mariner," with which I became acquainted the other night, much to my gratification.

•

When I came home I found things looking most dismal. My father had cut all the laurels to the roots, in hopes of making them come up thicker. A field almost outside the windows, which had been put in tillage, was ploughed so extremely ill that we were afraid it would be forced to be tilled with turnips (Dî talem campis avertite pestem!) instead of clover. . . . The copse also which overhung the river by the Little Hempston rocks was in a great part gone," and the place thereof knew it no more." I hope the rest may be spared to bear witness to my veracity, which I fear would otherwise be called in question.

3.

(y. 3.) 1824.-I hope you have been so charitable as to suppose that some not inadequate cause can be assigned to that much-to-be-lamented effect, your not having heard from me according to promise. But little as is the doubt which à priori reasoning would have left on this subject, yet perhaps, as the subtilty of scepticism is such as to insinuate its influence even into the most necessary matter, it may not be ungrateful to find the same conclusion supported à posteriori. Be it known then hereby that a week and two days ago I filled