gina thoughts and fine observations with which it abounds. As a mere narrative there is not so much to be said for it. There are but few incidents; and the account which we have of them is neither very luminous nor very complete. If it be true, therefore, that the only legitimate business of biography is with incidents and narrative, it will not be easy to deny that there is something amiss, either in the title or the substance of this work. But we are humbly of opinion that there is no good ground for so severe a limitation.

Biographies, it appears to us, are naturally of three kinds-and please or instruct us in at least as many different ways. One sort seeks to interest us by an account of what the individual in question actually did or suffered in his own person: another by an account of what he saw done or suffered by others; and a third by an account of what he himself thought, judged, or imagined-for these too, we apprehend, are acts of a rational being and acts frequently quite as memorable, and as fruitful of consequences, as any others he can either witness or perform.

Different readers will put a different value on each of these sorts of biography. But at all events they will be in no danger of confounding them. The character and position of the individual will generally settle, with sufficient precision, to which class his memoirs should be referred; and no man of common sense will expect to meet in one with the kind of interest which properly belongs to another. To complain that the life of a warrior is but barren in literary speculations, or that of a man of letters in surprising personal adventures, is about as reasonable as it would be to complain that a song is not a sermon, or that there is but little pathos is a treatise on geometry.

The first class, in its higher or public department, should deal chiefly with the lives of leaders in great and momentous transactions -men who, by their force of character, or the advantage of their position, have been enabled to leave their mark on the age and country to which they belonged, and to impress more than one generation with the traces of their transitory existence. Of this kind are many of the lives in Plutarch; and of this kind, still more eminently, should be the lives of such men as Mahomet, Alfred, Washington, Napoleon. There is an inferior and more private department under this head, in which the interest, though less elevated, is often quite as intense, and rests on the same general basis, of sympathy with personal feats and endowments-we mean the history of individuals whom the ardour of their temperament, or the caprices of fortune, have involved in strange adventures, or conducted through a series of extraordinary and complicated perils. The memoirs of Benvenuto Cellini, or Lord Herbert of Cherbury, are good examples of this romantic sort of biography; and many more might be added, from the chronicles of ancient paladins, or the confessions of modern malefactors.

The second class is chiefly for the compilers

of Diaries and journals-autobiographers who, without having themselves done any thing memorable, have yet had the good luck to live through long and interesting periods; and who, in chronicling the events of their own unimportant lives, have incidentally preserved invaluable memorials of contemporary manners and events. The Memoirs of Evelyn and Pepys are the most obvious instances of works which derive their chief value from this source; and which are read, not for any great interest we take in the fortunes of the writers, but for the sake of the anecdotes and notices of far more important personages and transactions with which they so lavishly present us; and there are many others, written with far inferior talent, and where the design is more palpably egotistical, which are perused with an eager curiosity, on the strength of the same recommendation.

The last class is for Philosophers and men of Genius and speculation-men, in short, who were, or ought to have been, Authors; and whose biographies are truly to be regarded either as supplements to the works they have given to the world, or substitutes for those which they might have given. These are histories, not of men, but of Minds; and their value must of course depend on the reach and capacity of the mind they serve to develope, and in the relative magnitude of their contributions to its history. When the individual has already poured himself out in a long series of publications, on which all the moods and aspects of his mind have been engraven (as in the cases of Voltaire or Sir Walter Scott), there may be less occasion for such a biographical supplement. But when an author (as in the case of Gray) has been more chary in his communications with the public, and it is yet possible to recover the precious, though immature, fruits of his genius or his studies,— thoughts, and speculations, which no intelligent posterity would willingly let die,-it is due both to his fame and to the best interests of mankind, that they should be preserved, and reverently presented to after times, in such a posthumous portraiture as it is the business of biography to supply.

The best and most satisfactory memorials of this sort are those which are substantially made up of private letters, journals, or written fragments of any kind, by the party himself; as these, however scanty or imperfect, are at all events genuine Relics of the indivi dual, and generally bearing, even more authentically than his publications, the stamp of his intellectual and personal character. We cannot refer to better examples than the lives of Gray and of Cowper, as these have been finally completed. Next to these, if not upon the same level, we should place such admirable records of particular conversations, and memorable sayings gathered from the lips of the wise, as we find in the inimitable pages of Boswell,- -a work which, by the general consent of this generation, has not only made us a thousand times better acquainted with Johnson than all his publications put together, but has raised the standard of his intellectual

do by being caught in undress: but all who are really worth knowing about, will, on the whole, be gainers; and we should be well content to have no biographies but of those who would profit, as well as their readers, by being shown in new or in nearer lights.

character, and actually made discovery of large provinces in his understanding, of which scarcely an indication was to be found in his writings. In the last and lowest place-in so far, at least, as relates to the proper business of this branch of biography, the enlargement of our knowledge of the genius and character The value of the insight which may thus of individuals-w -we must reckon that most be obtained into the mind and the meaning common form of the memoirs of literary men, of truly great authors, can scarcely be overwhich consists of little more than the biogra- rated by any one who knows how to turn pher's own (generally most partial) descrip- such communications to account; and we do tion and estimate of his author's merits, or of not think we exaggerate when we say, that elucidations and critical summaries of his in many cases more light may be gained from. most remarkable productions. In this divi- the private letters, notes, or recorded talk of sion, though in other respects of great value, such persons, than from the most finished of must be ranked those admirable dissertations their publications; and not only upon the which Mr. Stewart has given to the world un- many new topics which are sure to be started der the title of the Lives of Reid, Smith, and in such memorials, but as to the true characRobertson, the real interest of which con- ter, and the merits and defects, of such pubsists almost entirely in the luminous exposi-lications themselves. It is from such sources tion we there meet with of the leading specu-alone that we can learn with certainty by lations of those eminent writers, and in the candid and acute investigation of their originality or truth.

what road the author arrived at the conclusions which we see established in his works; against what perplexities he had to struggle, We know it has been said, that after a man and after what failures he was at last enabled has himself given to the public all that he to succeed. It is thus only that we are often thought worthy of its acceptance, it is not fair enabled to detect the prejudice or hostility for a posthumous biographer to endanger his which may be skilfully and mischievously reputation by bringing forward what he had disguised in the published book-to find out withheld as unworthy, either by exhibiting the doubts ultimately entertained by the authe mere dregs and refuse of his lucubrations, thor himself, of what may appear to most or by exposing to the general gaze those crude readers to be triumphantly established,—or conceptions, or rash and careless opinions, to gain glimpses of those grand ulterior specuwhich he may have noted down in the pri- lations, to which what seemed to common vacy of his study, or thrown out in the confi- eyes a complete and finished system, was, in dence of private conversation. And no doubt truth, intended by the author to serve only as there may be (as there have been) cases of a vestibule or introduction. Where such such abuse. Confidence is in no case to be documents are in abundance, and the mind violated; nor are mere trifles, which bear no which has produced them is truly of the highmark of the writer's intellect, to be recorded est order, we do not hesitate to say, that more to his prejudice. But wherever there is power will generally be found in them, in the way and native genius, we cannot but grudge the at least of hints to kindred minds, and as suppression of the least of its revelations; and scattering the seeds of grand and original are persuaded, that with those who can judge conceptions, than in any finished works which of such intellects, they will never lose any the indolence, the modesty, or the avocations thing by the most lavish and indiscriminate of such persons will have generally permitted disclosures. Which of Swift's most elaborate them to give to the world. So far, therefore, productions is at this day half so interesting from thinking the biography of men of genius as that most confidential Journal to Stella? Or barren or unprofitable, because presenting few which of them, with all its utter carelessness events or personal adventures, we cannot but of expression, its manifold contradictions, its regard it, when constructed in substance of infantine fondness, and all its quick-shifting such materials as we have now mentioned, moods, of kindness, selfishness, anger, and as the most instructive and interesting of all ambition, gives us half so strong an impres- writing-embodying truth and wisdom in the sion either of his amiableness or his vigour? vivid distinctness of a personal presentment, How much, in like manner, is Johnson raised--enabling us to look on genius in its first in our estimation, not only as to intellect but personal character, by the industrious eavesdroppings of Boswell, setting down, day by day, in his note-book, the fragments of his most loose and unweighed conversations? Or what, in fact, is there so precious in the works, or the histories, of eminent men, from Cicero to Horace Walpole, as collections of their private and familiar letters? What would we not give for such a journal-such notes of conversations, or such letters, of Shakespeare, Chaucer, or Spenser? The mere drudges or coxcombs of literature may indeed suffer by such disclosures-as made-up beauties might

elementary stirrings, and in its weakness as well as its strength,-and teaching us at the same time great moral lessons, both as to the value of labour and industry, and the neces sity of virtues, as well as intellectual endow ments, for the attainment of lasting excellence.

In these general remarks our readers will easily perceive that we mean to shadow forth our conceptions of the character and peculiar merits of the work before us. It is the history not of a man of action, but of a student, a philosopher, and a statesman; and its value consists not in the slight and imperfect account of what was done by, or happened to,

the individual, but in the vestiges it has fortunately preserved of the thoughts, sentiments, and opinions of one of the most powerful thinkers, most conscientious inquirers, and most learned reasoners, that the world has ever seen. It is almost entirely made up of journals and letters of the author himself; and impresses us quite as strongly as any of his publications with a sense of the richness of his knowledge and the fineness of his understanding and with a far stronger sense of his promptitude, versatility, and vigour.*

lections of all who had most familiar access to him in society. It was owing perhaps to this vigour and rapidity of intellectual digestion that, though all his life a great talker, there never was a man that talked half so much who said so little that was either foolish or frivolous; nor any one perhaps who knew so well how to give as much liveliness and poignancy just and even profound observations, as others could ever impart to startling extravagance, and ludicrous exaggeration. The vast extent of his information, and the natural His intellectual character, generally, can- gaiety of his temper, made him independent not be unknown to any one acquainted with of such devices for producing effect; and, his works, or who has even read many pages joined to the inherent kindness and gentleof the Memoirs now before us; and it is need-ness of his disposition, made his conversation less, therefore, to speak here of his great at once the most instructive and the most knowledge, the singular union of ingenuity generally pleasing that could be imagined. and soundness in his speculations-his perfect candour and temper in discussion-the pure and lofty morality to which he strove to elevate the minds of others, and in his own conduct to conform, or the wise and humane allowance which he was ready, in every case but his own, to make for the infirmities which must always draw down so many from the higher paths of their duty.

Of his intellectual endowments we shall say no more. But we must add, that the Tenderness of his domestic affections, and the deep Humility of his character, were as inadequately known, even among his friends, till the publication of those private records: For his manners, though gentle, were cold ; and, though uniformly courteous and candid in society, it was natural to suppose that he was not unconscious of his superiority. It is, therefore, but justice to bring into view some of the proofs that are now before us of both these endearing traits of character. The beautiful letter which he addressed to Dr. Parr on the death of his first wife, in 1797, breathes the full spirit of both. We regret that we can only afford room for a part of it.

These merits, we believe, will no longer be denied by any who have heard of his name, or looked at his writings. But there were other traits of his intellect which could only be known to those who were of his acquaintance, and which it is still desirable that the readers of these Memoirs should bear in mind. One of these was, that ready and prodigious Memory, by which all that he learned seemed to be at once engraved on the proper "Allow me, in justice to her memory, to tell compartment of his mind, and to present you what she was, and what I owed her. I was itself at the moment it was required; another, my youth. I found an intelligent companion, and guided in my choice only by the blind affection of still more remarkable, was the singular Ma- a tender friend; a prudent monitress, the most turity and completeness of all his views and faithful of wives, and a mother as tender as children opinions, even upon the most abstruse and ever had the misfortune to lose. I found a woman complicated questions, though raised, without who, by the tender management of my weaknesses, design or preparation, in the casual course of gradually corrected the most pernicious of them. She became prudent from affection; and though of conversation. In this way it happened that the most generous nature, she was taught economy the sentiments he delivered had generally and frugality by her love for me. During the most the air of recollections-and that few of those critical period of my life, she preserved order in my with whom he most associated in mature life, affairs, from the care of which she relieved me. She could recollect of ever catching him in the gently reclaimed me from dissipation; she propped my weak and irresolute nature; she urged my inact of making up his mind, in the course of dolence to all the exertions that have been useful the discussions in which it was his delight to or creditable to me, and she was perpetually at hand engage them. His conclusions, and the grounds to admonish my heedlessness and improvidence. of them, seemed always to have been pre- To her I owe whatever I am; to her whatever I viously considered and digested; and though shall be. Such was she whom I have lost! And I have lost her after eight years of struggle and dishe willingly developed his reasons, to secure tress had bound us fast together, and moulded our the assent of his hearers, he uniformly seemed tempers to each other, when a knowledge of her to have been perfectly ready, before the cause worth had refined my youthful love into friendship, was called on, to have delivered the opinion and before age had deprived it of much of its origi of the court, with a full summary of the argu-nal ardour, I lost her, alas! (the choice of my ments and evidence on both sides. In the youth, and the partner of my misfortunes) at a mowork before us, we have more peeps into the ment when I had the prospect of her sharing my preparatory deliberations of his great intellect that scrupulous estimate of the grounds of decision, and that jealous questioning of first impressions, which necessarily precede the formation of all firm and wise opinions.-than could probably be collected from the recol

A short account of Sir James' parentage, education, and personal history is here omitted.

better days!

"The philosophy which I have learnt only teaches me that virtue and friendship are the greatest of human blessings, and that their loss is irreparable. It aggravates my calamity, instead of consoling me consolation, Governed by those feelings, which under it. But my wounded heart seeks another have in every age and region of the world actuated the human mind, I seek relief, and I find it, in the soothing hope and consolatory opinion, that a Benevolent Wisdom inflicts the chastisement, as

well as bestows the enjoyments of human life; that Superintending Goodness will one day enlighten the darkness which surrounds our nature, and hangs over our prospects; that this dreary and wretched life is not the whole of man; that an animal so sagacious and provident, and e pable of such proficiency in science and virtue, is not like the beasts that perish; that there is a dwelling-place prepared for the spirits of the just, and that the ways of God will yet be vindicated to man."

We may add part of a very kind letter, written from India, in 1808, in a more cheerful mood, to his son-in-law Mr. Rich, then on a mission to Babylon,-and whose early death so soon blasted the hopes, not only of his afflicted family, but of the whole literary world.

In the same sad but gentle spirit, we have this entry in 1822 :

"Walked a little up the quiet valley, which on this cheerful morning looked pretty. While sitting on the stone under the tree, my mind was soothed by reading some passages of- in the Quarterly Review. With no painful humility I felt that an enemy of mine is a man of genius and virue; and that all who think slightingly of me may be right.”

But the strongest and most painful expres sion of this profound humility is to be found in a note to his Dissertation on Ethical Philosophy; in which, after a beautiful eulogium on his deceased friends, Mr. George Wilson and Mr. Serjeant Lens, he adds

"And now, my dear Rich, allow me, with the The present writer hopes that the good-natured liberty of warm affection, earnestly to exhort you reader will excuse him for having thus, perhaps to exert every power of your mind in the duties of unseasonably, bestowed heartfelt commendation your station. There is something in the serious-on those who were above the pursuit of praise, and ness, both of business and of science, of which your the remembrance of whose good opinion and goodvivacity is impatient. The brilliant variety of your will helps to support him, under a deep sense of attainments and accomplishments do, I fear, flatter faults and vices." you into the conceit that you may indulge your genius,' and pass your life in amusement; while

you smile at those who think, and at those who act. But this would be weak and ignoble. The success of your past studies ought to show you how much you may yet do, instead of soothing you with the reflection how much you have done.

The reader now knows enough of Sir James' personal character to enter readily into the spirit of any extracts we may lay before him. The most valuable of these are supplied by his letters, journals, and occasional writings, while enjoying the compara"Habits of seriousness of thought and action are tive leisure of his Indian residence, or the necessary to the duties, to the importance, and to the dignity of human life. What is amiable gaiety complete leisure of his voyage to and from at twenty-four might run the risk, if it was unac- that country: and, with all due deference to companied by other things, of being thought frivo. opposite opinions, this is exactly what we lous and puerile at forty-four. I am so near forty-should have expected. Sir James Mackinfour, that I can give you pretty exact news of that dull country; which yet ought to interest you, as you are travelling towards it, and must, I hope, pass through it.

"I hope you will profit by my errors. I was once ambitious to have made you a much improved edition of myself. If you had stayed here, I should have laboured to do so, in spite of your impatience; as it is, I heartily pray that you may make your self something much better.

tosh, it is well known, had a great relish for Society; and had not constitutional vigour (after his return from India) to go through much Business without exhaustion and fatigue. In London and in Parliament, therefore, his powerful intellect was at once too much dissipated, and too much oppressed; and the traces it has left of its exertions on those "You came here so early as to have made few scenes are comparatively few and inadequate. sacrifices of friendship and society at home. You In conversation, no doubt, much that was decan afford a good many years for making a hand-lightful and instructive was thrown out; and, some fortune, aud still return home young. You do not feel the force of that word quite so much as I could wish: But for the present let me hope that the prospect of coming to one who has such an affection for you as I have, will give your country some of the attractions of home. If you can be allured to it by the generous hope of increasing the enjoyments of my old age, you will soon discover in it sufficient excellences to love and admire; and it will become to you, in the full force of the term,

a home."

We are not sure whether the frequent aspirations which we find in his private letters, after the quiet and repose of an Academical situation, ought to be taken as proofs of his humility, though they are generally expressed in language bearing that character. But there are other indications enough, and of the most unequivocal description-for example, this entry in 1818 :

has, I think, a distaste for me. I think the worse of nobody for such a feeling. Indeed I often feel a distaste for myself; and I am sure I should not esteem my own character in another person. It is more likely that I should have disrespectable or disagreeable qualities, than that should have an unreasonable antipathy.

Vol. ii. p. 344.

for want of a Boswell, has perished! But, though it may be true that we have thus lost the light and graceful flowers of anecdote and conversation, we would fain console ourselves with the belief that we have secured the more precious and mature fruits of studies and meditations, which can only be pursued to advantage, when the cessation of more impor

tunate calls has "left us leisure to be wise."

With reference to these views, nothing has struck us more than the singular vigour and alertness of his understanding during the dull small cabin, in a tropical climate, in a state progress of his home voyage. Shut up in a of languid health, and subject to every sort of annoyance, he not only reads with an industry which would not disgrace an ardent Academic studying for honours, but plunges eagerly into original speculations, and finishes off some of the most beautiful compositions in the language, in a shorter time than would be allowed, for such subjects, to a contractor for leading paragraphs to a daily paper. In less than a fortnight, during this voyage, he seems to have thrown off nearly twenty elabo rate characters of eminent authors or states

men in English story-conceived with a justness, and executed with a delicacy, which would seem unattainable without long meditation and patient revisal. We cannot now venture, however, to present our readers with more than a part of one of them; and we take our extract from that of Samuel Johnson.

both extremes are condemned to perpetual revolu. tion. Those who select words from that permanent part of a language, and who arrange them according to its natural order, have discovered the true secret of rendering their writings permanent; and of preserving that rank among the classical writers of their country, which men of greater intellectual power have failed to attain. Of these writers, whose language has not yet been at all superannuated, Cowley was probably the earliest, as Dryden and Addison were assuredly the greatest.

"The third period may be called the Rhetorical, and is distinguished by the prevalence of a school of writers, of which Johnson was the founder. The fundamental character of this style is, that it employs undisguised art, where classical writers appear only to obey the impulse of a cultivated and adorned nature, &c. 66 As the mind of Johnson was robust, but neither

"In early youth he had resisted the most severe ests of probity. Neither the extreme poverty nor the uncertain income to which the virtue of so many men of letters has yielded, even in the slightest degree weakened his integrity, or lowered the dignity of his independence. His moral principles (if the anguage may be allowed) partook of the vigour of his understanding. He was conscientious, sincere, determined; and his pride was no more than a steady consciousness of superiority in the most valuable qualities of human nature. His friendships nimble nor graceful, so his style, though sometimes were not only firm, but generous and tender. be- significant, nervous, and even majestic, was void neath a rugged exterior. He wounded none of those of all grace and ease; and being the most unlike feelings which the habits of his life enabled him to of all styles to the natural effusion of a cultivated estimate; but he had become too hardened by se. mind, had the least pretensions to the praise of eloious distress not to contract some disregard for quence. During the period, now near a close, in those minor delicacies which become so keenly senwhich he was a favourite model, a stiff symmetry sible, in a calm and prosperous fortune. He was a and tedious monotony succeeded to that various Tory, not without some propensities towards Jacob-music with which the taste of Addison diversified itism; and a High Churchman, with more attachment his periods, and to that natural imagery which his to ecclesiastical authority and a splendid worship, beautiful genius seemed with graceful negligence to than is quite consistent with the spirit of Protestant- scatter over his composition.' ism. On these subjects he neither permitted himself to doubt, nor tolerated difference of opinion in others. But the vigour of his understanding is no more to be estimated by his opinions on subjects where it was bound by his prejudices, than the strength of a man's body by the efforts of a limb in fetters. His conversation, which was one of the most powerful instruments of his extensive influence, was artificial, dogmatical, sententious, and poignant; adapted, with the most admirable versatility, to every subject as it arose, and distinguished by an almost unparalleled power of serious repartee. He seems to have considered himself as a sort of colloquial magistrate, who inflicted severe punishment from just policy. His course of life led him to treat those sensibilities, which such severity wounds, as fantastic and effeminate; and he entered society too late to acquire those habits of politeness which are a substitute for natural delicacy.

We stop here to remark, that, though concurring in the substance of this masterly classification of our writers, we should yet be disposed to except to that part of it which represents the first introduction of soft, graceful, and idiomatic English as not earlier than the period of the Restoration. In our opinior. it is at least as old as Chaucer. The English Bible is full of it; and it is among the most common, as well as the most beautiful, of the many languages spoken by Shakespeare. Laying his verse aside, there are in his longer passages of prose--and in the serious as well as the humorous parts-in Hamlet, and Brutus, and Shylock, and Henry V., as well as in Falstaff, and Touchstone, Rosalind, and Bene"In the progress of English style, three periods dick, a staple of sweet, mellow, and natural may be easily distinguished. The first period extended from Sir Thomas More to Lord Clarendon. English, altogether as free and elegant as that During great part of this period, the style partook of Addison, and for the most part more vigorof the rudeness and fluctuation of an unformed lan- ous and more richly coloured. The same may guage, in which use had not yet determined the be said, with some exceptions, of the other words that were to be English. Writers had not dramatists of that age. Sir James is right yet discovered the combination of words which best perhaps as to the grave and authoritative wrisuits the original structure and immutable constitution of our language. While the terms were Eng-ters of prose; but few of the wits of Queen lish, the arrangement was Latin-the exclusive language of learning, and that in which every truth in science, and every model of elegance, was then contemplated by youth. For a century and a half. ineffectual attempts were made to bend our vulgar! tongue to the genius of the language supposed to be "Whenever understanding alone is sufficient for superior; and the whole of this period, though not poetical criticism, the decisions of Johnson are without a capricious mixture of coarse idiom, may generally right. But the beauties of poetry must be called the Latin, or pedantic age, of our style. be felt before their causes are investigated. There, "In the second period, which extended from the is a poetical sensibility, which in the progress of the Restoration to the middle of the eighteenth century, a mind becomes as distinct a power as a musical ear series of writers appeared, of less genius indeed than or a picturesque eye. Without a considerable detheir predecessors, but more successful in their expe- gree of this sensibility, it is as vain for a man of the riments to discover the mode of writing most adapted greatest understanding to speak of the higher beauto the genius of the language. About the same pe- ties of poetry, as it is for a blind man to speak of riod that a similar change was effected in France colours. But to cultivate such a talent was wholly by Pascal, they began to banish from style, learned foreign from the worldly sagacity and stern shrewdas well as vulgar phraseology; and to confine them-ness of Johnson. As in his judgment of life and selves to the part of the language naturally used in general conversation by well-educated men. That middle region which lies between vulgarity and pedantry, remains commonly unchanged, while

Anne's time were of that description. We shall only add that part of the sequel which contains the author's general account of the Lives of the Poets.

character. so in his criticism on poetry, he was a sort of free-thinker. He suspected the refined of affectation; he rejected the enthusiactic as absurd, and he took it for granted that the mysterious was