remark is without truth, but our language and sentiments are colored by our condition: a soldier is distinguished not only by his look, but by his language, from a lawyer; the manners of a rustic are not those of a courtier; we need not multiply instances; it is enough that the characters of the great novelist are natural and unborrowed

The taste of Scott was that of his times; the taste of Shakspeare was that of his times also: they both wrote for the world; they walked the way they found the world walking; they made no attempt to form new schools, and yet they are founders in the truest sense of the word. They both loved home subjects, and delighted in working up the ordinary occurrences of life or of history in a spirit and shape at once natural and rational. It was the fault of Shakspeare's age to overrate rank and high descent, and to regard all as "base, common, and popular" beneath the condition of a gentleman. It was the glory of Scott's day to honor man as God made him; to think, with Burns, "A man's a man for a' that," and to look with respect and affection on the humble children of the cottage. To this difference we owe the pie-coated fools and heroes of Eastcheap, and the utter absence of the bold yeomen of England, in the Southern poet; and the presence of the Dinmonts, the Headriggs, and the Ochiltrees, in the novels of the bard of the North. Both poets were men of large souls and wide sympathy; but were we to account for this difference by supposing that Scott had more of these qualities than Shakspeare, we should say more than we feel; yet it is not the less true, that the great dramatist has failed to give a faithful picture of social English life as it was in his day; he was more of a courtier, we fear, than Scott, and though a striker of deer himself, he had no hearty love for "Hob, Dick, and Hick, with clubs and clouted shoon," his country companions.

Shakspeare and Scott resemble each other, too, in never exhausting either subject or character, and in the full command they hold over both. That monster of wit, Falstaff, is evidently killed by his maker out of mere wantonness, and not because he was exhausted, for some of his latest sallies are his best; and we know that the author had to bridle in and restrain himself, both in Ochiltree and Dalgetty, lest their humors should overwhelm their companion characters. Their handling, too, is in the easiest and happiest manner imaginable; nor is their sense of propriety less visible than their ease; all is in its right place; nothing is out of keeping, and the unity of their performances is wonderful, since they seem not to have studied it. But a man who follows nature will seldom break rules, for rules came from nature; a VOL. X., No. XLVI.-45

truth acknowledged by Walpole, when he said, Gil Morice ob'served all the rules of Horace, but in such a way as showed that the writer had never heard of either Horace or his rules. Let us now see how the chief characteristics of the genius of Scott assimilate and contrast with those of Shakspeare.

One of the chief attributes of the genius of Shakspeare, and that which has always been allowed him, under some mode of expression or another, is his universality. This term is of so comprehensive a nature, that the reader will perhaps be startled at our claiming the same excellence for Scott. We mean to express by it, the power of identifying himself with every kind and condition of existence.

This felicitous power of the mind has been the theme of panegyric with all the writers on Shakspeare, and in it we recognise the great charm of Scott's productions; its great characteristic is fitness, and to its exercise we owe the admirable impersonations of both our authors; the splendid procession of princes, nobles, simple citizens, and peasants, with all their general and particular attributes, each clothed in his proper garb, and each speaking the sentiments of his kind. Nor is this vivid and distinct representation confined to vague generalities, or generic distinctions; it deals equally with individual features and specific differencessuch as are to be found in the moral as in the natural world.

In this general sympathy with man, in all his natural and social relations, we recognise the very essence of the dramatic character; and how it can be said that the genius of Scott is not dramatic, we cannot divine. His romances are dramas in everything but the precise form. Nor is this sort of spontaneous metempsychosis confined to the moral condition of man, and his relations to external things; we may observe the exercise of the same many or rather every-sidedness in relation to things themselvesthe same fitness, propriety, and verisimilitude; and circumstances and scenes are ever as much before the mind of the reader as the persons who move in them.

If this be conceded for Shakspeare-and we can hardly bespeak anything for his genius that will not be conceded-it is only necessary to call to mind such scenes in the most popular works of Scott as are represented in "Old Mortality," "Marmion,” “Ivanhoe," and indeed any other. Or, to be more particular, take for example the magnificent opening of "The Talisman," the graphic scene in the desert, and the single combat of the two heroes of the tale; or the escape of Sir Walter Wardour and his daughter from the sea, and ascent from the cliffs, in "The Antiquary;" or the more familiar but spirited scene in the Clocksmith's shop in

Fleet-street, in the commencement of "The Fortunes of Nigel;" or the tragic end of the poor usurer Trapbois, in the same tale; or any of those living pictures in which the actors and the natural accompaniments harmonize with the features of surrounding objects, like all the parts of the finest performances of the sister art. But the best test of this power of delineating the thoughts, actions, and passions of human nature, in their various phases, is, as we have before hinted, to be found in the manner in which the same passions, the same virtues or vices, are made to operate differently in different persons, according to their several constitutional casts of character, situation in life, or other ruling circumstance. Take for instance, in Scott, his various modifications of religious enthusiasm. In Beaumanoir, the rigid adhesion to prescribed forms, the devotion to the preservation of the privileges of his order; a bigotry grounded in selfishness and constitutional soundness of heart. In the Abbot Eustace, the same objects operating with warm and kindly affections. The religious enthusiasm of David Deans, again, is homely, steadfast, and patient in suffering. In Balfour, selfish, superstitious, and brutal. But we have in that chef d'œuvre of Scott, the tale of "Old Mortality," in illustration of this test of universality, a whole tribe of fanatics, in which the same general features are preserved with an individuality of form and coloring that makes each a distinct and perfect portrait ; and the whole together is one of the finest exemplifications of the crimes and follies of men, who mistake the vain workings of their own imaginations, and the impulse of their own selfish passions, for the dictates of the divine spirit. The maniac Mucklewrath, the sav age Burley, the gentle but energetic Macbriar-after these come the shallow and wordy Kettledrum, and the prudent and conforming Poundtext; not to mention the well-imagined dogged ignorance of Mause, and easy faith of Cuddie Headrigg, whose religion rests upon the means of a comfortable subsistence, and deals rather in the realities of life than the abstract questions of doctrine and church government: in all these we recognise a certain individuality which makes them species of the same genus; and all drawn with a correctness and form that are truly wonderful.

Take again, for instance, his exemplifications of loyalty. We mean, by loyalty, a steady adherence to personal opinions, regardless of the accidents of fortune; a virtue so various in its character, as to seem in some cases like mere animal instinct; in others, a principle rising to the highest pitch of moral excellence. In Flora Mac Ivor, or Kenneth, or Sir Henry Lee, high-minded, disinterested, secret, and valiant. In Leicester and Varney, base and selfish. In Caleb Balderstone a warm and heartfelt, but almost

brute impulse. In Andrew Fairservice, mercenary, cowardly, and loose. In Dalgetty, crafty, calculating, and easily transferable. In Wamba, (the prince of jesters,) fearless and romantic, and suiting the character of one of Scott's happiest creations. To all these you will find no parallel in our literature but in the writings of Shakspeare, who has, with the same power of universal sympathy, and the same discrimination, shadowed forth his living portraitures, different and yet the same.

Akin to what we have called the universality of Scott, which makes him, like Shakspeare, always at home, from the cottage to the throne, is his genius of appropriation; the happy use of the scattered materials of history and tradition, and of the popular poetry and superstition of his day. Of the obligations of Shakspeare to contemporary literature, and of the freedom with which he seized upon everything that turned to his own purpose, few persons can have any conception, who have not made themselves a little conversant with the labors of his numerous commentators. Whole passages from the chronicles, tales, sorgs, and popular works of the day can be traced to their several sources; and much of the most admired dialogue of his most impassioned scenes, is a literal transcript from those authorities. To this power of appropriation we owe many of the beauties and excellences of both our authors.

In conclusion we will only add, that to Sir Walter Scott belongs all the credit of having given to the literature of English fiction a poetic form and pressure, reduced it to a clear and consistent system, and crowned it with that glory which has made it the wonder of Christendom. In his novels he has invaded the province of the epic poet and dramatist, and discussed topics which the muse contemplates with fear, and in which the tragic bard dreads the taste of the galleries. Fielding, and Smollett, and Richardson, contented themselves with delineating the domestic manners, individuals, characters, and passions of social life; and though Smollett, particularly, more than approached the poetic, none of them touched the historic, or presumed to color the waters of truth with the fascinating hues of fiction. Sir Walter Scott rose, and by a series of magnificent creations, he led the herd of novelists and writers of all kinds to fresh pastures, and awakened a desire in the public for that kind of pleasing reading. All the qualities which pleased us in his poetry reappeared in his romances, with the addition of the dramatic drolleries and humbler humanities of rustic life. No writer since the days of Shakspeare has created so many fine, healthy, life-like, and original characters. L. F. T.

A SECOND SLAP AT THE LOGGERHEADS.*

IN our December number, we told a few truths to the new sect of the Loggerheads, or Home-Leaguers, as they prefer to call themselves, although the difference is only in sound yet they go on with their proceedings with as much effrontery as ever. They put forth their stale arguments as though they had never been refuted; they run through the regular catch-phrases about "home interest" and "native production," as though the silly clap-trap had not been long since exposed and they arrange and pile up their masses of statistics and figures with as much complacency as if they were not open violations of all the principles of experience and science. Are they not aware that Adam Smith, Say, Ricardo, and Franklin have lived? Now, when a set of men make fools of themselves for the first time, we are disposed to forgive them; we feel, indeed, a sort of sympathy with one who has at some time or other fallen into error, for we remember to have done so ourselves when we were very young; but that individuals or associations, for year after year, in the face of the whole teaching of history, with dreadful demonstrations of their wrong-headedness staring them in the eyes, with the philosophy of politics and economy as dead against them as the north wind, should go on, from week to week, and month to month, deliberately asserting the most preposterous paradoxes; that they should prove themselves to be fools, not only once, but three times and for ever, exhausts our stores of patience, abundant as they are, and compels us to call things by their right names. Nor let any one be inclined to think that we are naturally severe. Bless their souls, we are as gentle as a sucking dove. We are possessed even with a genuine respect for the genius of Nonsense; but then it must be that little sprite, upon whom, as Miss Edgeworth says, Reason condescends to smile, even when Logic frowns and chops him on the block," and not that monstrous hideous Nonsense, which outrages all common sense. The Home-Leaguers themselves, we should think, as much as they fondle and nourish the imp, must soon grow tired of him, for he is in the end a terrible and dangerous fellow. Or if they take to him naturally, why not confine their liking to their own houses, why flout it in other people's noses? Above all, why do they put it in print? tion, why do people who are bit with an

We repeat the quesabsurd scheme or a

Address of the Home-League to the People of the United States. New

York, Van Norden & Co., 1841.