on. Richardson, like others, had his pioneers, some notable, many forgotten. That his work can be so far resolved into its prime factors is no detraction to any literary creator, no reason for any stinting of the praise due to his original contributions. Just as the Tatler shows signs of transition, so Pamela displays but partial emancipation from the essay form. It resembles the letters of the Tatler and Spectator, but with the difference that all are made to revolve round a fixed centre. Even in Fielding's fondness for essay interludes there is a trace of the novel's origin, but Fielding stands to Richardson as the Spectator to the Tatler-the one carries on the other to an inevitable culmination.

None of the other periodicals conducted by Steele and Addison approach the Spectator in point of continuity of interest or brilliancy of execution. The Guardian, the most notable of them all, contains nothing by Steele that he had not already surpassed, and is interesting mainly for the contributions of Pope and for the celebrated critiques on pastoral poetry-critiques which are valuable, not only as illustrating the crafty intriguing of Pope, but as having furnished the foundation for the revival of Scottish poetry in the successful pastorals of Allan Ramsay. Pope's essays on Epic Poetry and on Dedications both smack most unmistakably of the Dunciad, and their author's own practice in the matter both of epic and of dedication hardly justifies the cheap irony and acrimonious wit. His letters, which with their careful workmanship and obvious insincerity present so vivid a contrast to the pathos of the Journal to Stella or to the un

affected candour of Steele's letters, hold an important place in the history of letter-writing; but his essays are only imitations, and not even strikingly brilliant as that. Keenly alive to the foibles of his time, and with powers of observation carefully trained by practice, Pope failed as an essayist for lack of sympathetic humour and of ability to conceal his art. The same reasons partially hold good for the comparative failure as an essayist of a greater contemporary. They hold good only partially, for while it is undeniable that Swift's humour is generally devoid of any touch of sympathy, there is no author of whom it can be more confidently Isaid that he never obtrudes his art. What he invited the Tatler to become, he was in large measure himself, "the instrument of introducing into our style that simplicity which is the best and truest ornament of most things in life". He has left the best definition of style, but the key to his own success, and the key to all good writing, is contained in his admirable injunction to make use on all occasions "of such words as naturally occur on the subject". It is needful to remember that simplicity like every other quality of style is subordinate to the greater law of relativity, that simplicity when affected or overdone defeats its own end, and that restraint, which is the sign of the true artist, may easily pass into weakness. Swift was happy in avoiding these extremes and in realizing his own ideal. He could easily sustain his style for any time at the same pitch, he could always closely accommodate his manner to his matter, and he could convey his ideas clearly and forcibly without

distracting the reader's attention to the excellence of their vehicle of expression. Yet, great as were his powers of shrewd penetration into character, Swift wanted the lighter graces necessary to the essayist. He loved to wage war on man rather than to instruct him, and used wit not to "enliven morality" but to increase the venom of his sting. The Laputans were attended by flappers who awaked them from their day-dreams by gently striking them with a bladder. As contrasted with Swift's method, the methods of Steele and Addison are equally gentle, and yet, as an instrument of social and literary reform the laugh of Steele or the raillery of Addison was far more potent than the loaded bludgeon of Swift. Of some of his papers it is often hard to say whether they are so much essays as lampoons. The Vindication of Bickerstaff is thus open to question, but there is little need for justifying the insertion of so thoroughly typical a specimen of Swift's skill. The grave irony with which Partridge is furnished with proofs of his own death, and the drollery with which he is rebuked for refusing to see that the question of his existence is only a matter of ordinary speculation, are excelled by nothing in literature. It is unnecessary to charge Swift in this case with uncharitableness. Partridge was a quack, and did not live in vain to have given occasion to such a brilliant jeu d'esprit.

It is almost a commonplace of criticism to remark on the difficulty of imitating Swift, so free is he from those mannerisms which are always apt to be mistaken for originality of style. Indeed the truest way to imitate him is to aim constantly at a perfect

naturalness of expression. There was one writer of the time who succeeded in this in a wonderful degree. Arbuthnot, who does not rank as an essayist, so faithfully copied the gravity of the irony and the ease of the style that it remains a difficult problem to disentangle his share from their joint productions. Though the most successful, he is not, however, the only understudy to be met with among the early essayists. Of the few who helped Steele and Addison, Budgell and Hughes deserve prominent mention, both for the quantity of their work and for the ability they showed in writing in conformity with the Spectator's design. In neither case is the illusion ever quite complete; the copy has certain characteristics of its own, and it has not all those of the original, but in the case of Budgell, at least, the resemblance is so good as to lend plausibility to the assertion made so often on Johnson's authority that the proofs were revised and amended by Addison himself. Little importance attaches to the minor periodicals of Steele and Addison which extend beyond the limits of Queen Anne's reign. Party passion ran so high that even the essayists with one accord rushed into the fray with political diatribes. The one interesting exception is Addison's Freeholder, and in it the one interesting character is the Tory Foxhunter, who furnishes an excellent comparison with Sir Roger de Coverley. The political motive here becomes plainly apparent, the same old skill in character delineation is equally marked; but there is no longer any button on the foil, and humorous exaggeration has broadened into caricature.

Ten years had elapsed since the appearance of the Tatler when Addison died and Defoe produced his immortal novel. This decade forms the first great period in the history of the essay, the period that comprises both its rise and its culmination. The essay form was now firmly established, thoroughly attuned to the genius of the language; and however great their diversity, all essays henceforth could trace their lineage back to the reign of Queen Anne. Defoe, whose meteoric incursions into the domain of letters during a period of forty years are so bewildering to the lover of an orderly historical outline, not only had helped to lay the foundation of the essay, but took the chief part after the close of this first great epoch in maintaining it during the interval that elapsed between the Spectator and the Rambler. In one of his last writings he refers ironically to the falling off in periodical essays. "Is there no wit or humour left, because they are gone? Is the spirit of the Spectators all lost, and their mantle fallen upon nobody? Have they said all that can be said? Has the world offered no variety, and presented no new scenes since they retired from us? Or did they leave off, because they were quite exhausted, and had no more to say? We think quite otherwise." Defoe did not allow sufficiently for the damping effect of the Spectator's excellence. A crowd of imitations follows in the wake of every striking literary success, but, if that success be a sufficiently prolonged one, imitation will gradually cease, and the literary energies of the time will revive some older form, or will strike out some new line of development,