has in him the spirit of philosophy; while in the animation of his descriptions of every important event, is to be seen the clearest indication that he is gifted with the eye of poetic genius. Russia may well be proud of such a work; and it is disgraceful to the literature of this country that no English translation of it has yet appeared. We must, in conclusion, add, that the elevated sentiments with which it abounds, as well as the spirit of manly piety and fervent patriotism in which it is conceived, diminish our surprise at the continued progress of an empire which was capable of producing such a writer.

THE HISTORICAL ROMANCE

[BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE, SEPT. 1845]

WE are constantly told that invention is worn out; that everything is exhausted; that all the intellectual treasures of modern Europe have been dug up; and that we must look to a new era of the world, and a different quarter of the globe, for new ideas or fresh views of thought. It must be confessed, that if we look to some parts of our literature, there seems too good reason for supposing that this desponding opinion is well founded. Everything, in some departments, does seem worked out. Poetry appears for the time wellnigh extinguished. We have some charming ballads from Tennyson, some touching lines from Miss Barrett; but where are the successors of Scott and Byron, of Campbell and Southey? Romance, in some branches, has evidently exhausted itself. For ten years we had novels of fashionable life, till the manners and sayings of lordlings and right honourables had become familiar to all the haberdashers' apprentices and milliners' girls in London. That vein being worked out, literature has run into the opposite channel. Action and reaction is the law, not less of the intellectual than the physical world. Inventive genius has sought out, in the lower walks of life, those subjects of novel study and fresh description which could no longer be found in the higher. So far has this propensity gone, so violent has been the oscillation of the pendulum in this direction, that novelists have descended to the very lowest stages of society in search of the new or the exciting. Not only have the manners, the selfishness, and vulgarity of the middle ranks been painted with admirable fidelity, and drawn with inimitable skill, but the habits and slang of the very lowest

portrayed with prurient minuteness, and interest sought to be awakened in the votaries of fashion or the Sybarites of pleasure by the delineation of the language and ideas of the most infamous wretches who ever disgraced society by their vices, or endangered it by their crimes.

Whatever," says Dr Johnson, "makes the PAST, the DISTANT, or the FUTURE predominate over the present, exalts us in the scale of thinking beings." The words are familiar till they have become trite; but words are often repeated when the sense is far off. It is in the general oblivion of the thought of the philosopher, while his words were in every mouth, that the cause of the want of originality in modern works of imagination is to be found. The tendency to localise is the propensity which degrades literature, as it is the chief bane and destroyer of individual character. It is the opposite effect of engendering a disposition to expand, which constitutes the chief value of travelling in the formation of character. If the thought and conversation of individuals are limited to the little circle in which they live, or the objects by which they are immediately surrounded, we all know what they speedily become. It is in the extension of the interest to a wider circle, in the admission of objects of general concern and lasting importance into the sphere of habitual thought, that the only preservative against this fatal tendency is to be found. It is the power of doing this which forms the chief charm of the highest society in every country, and renders it in truth everywhere the same. A man of the world will find himself equally at home, and conversation flow at once with equal ease, in the higher saloons of London or Paris, of Rome or Vienna, of Warsaw or St Petersburg. But he will find it scarcely possible to keep up conversation for a quarter of an hour in the bourgeois circle of any of these capitals. It is the same with literature, and especially that wide and important branch of literature which, aiming at the exciting of interest or delineating of manners, should in an especial manner be guarded against the degradation consequent on a narrow restriction of its subjects to matters only of local

concern.

The prodigious success and widespread popularity which have attended some of the most able novels of this new

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school of romance in late years, as well as the great ability which their composition evinces, must not blind our eyes to the degrading tendency of such compositions upon the national literature. Immediate circulation, great profit to the bookseller, a dazzling reputation to the author, are by no means to be relied on as the heralds of lasting fame. cases innumerable, they have proved the reverse. Still less are they to be considered as proofs that the writer, be his abilities what they may, has worthily performed his mission, or elevated himself to the exalted level of which his art is susceptible. The most pernicious romances and poems that ever appeared have often been ushered into the world by the most unbounded immediate applause: witness the Nouvelle Heloise of Rousseau, and Pucelle of Voltaire. It was just their dangerous and seductive qualities which gave them their success. Rousseau knew this well. He addressed himself with skill and perfect knowledge of the age to its passions and vices :-"J'ai vu les mœurs de mon temps, et j'ai publié ces lettres," were the first words of his Nouvelle Heloise. the school we have mentioned, there is nothing immoral or improper; but is there anything elevating or improving? The true test of real excellence is not immediate success but durable fame; it is to be found not in the popularity of circulating shops or reading clubs, but in the shelves of the library or the delight of the fireside. When a work suddenly attains great immediate celebrity in a particular circle or country, it is generally, though not always, an indication that it is not destined to enjoy any lasting reputation. The reason is, that it is addressed to local feelings, temporary passions, and particular desires; and it rises to eminence from interesting or gratifying them. But that is not the way permanently to attract mankind. Nothing can do so but what is addressed to the universal feelings of our nature, and has penetrated to the inmost chords, which are common to all ages and countries. The touching them alone can secure durable fame.

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Where now are all the novels portraying fashionable life with which the shops of publishers teemed, and the shelves of circulating libraries groaned, not ten years ago? Buried in the vault of all the Capulets. Where will the novels portraying manners in the lowest walks of life be ten years

hence? He is a bold man who says they will be found in one well-selected library. We do not dispute the ability of some of these productions. We are well aware of the fidelity with which they have painted the manners of the middle class, previously little touched on in novels; we fully admit the pathos and power of occasional passages, the wit and humour of many others, the graphic delineation of English character which they contain. But, admitting all this, the question is-have these productions come up to the true standard of novel-writing? Are they fitted to elevate and purify the minds of their readers? Will the persons who peruse, and are amused, perhaps fascinated, by them, become more noble, more exalted, more spiritual beings, than they were before? Do not these novels, able and amusing as they are, bear the same relation to the lofty romances of which our literature can boast, that the Boors of Ostade, or the Village Wakes of Teniers, do to the Madonnas of Guido, or the Holy Families of Raphael? These pictures were and are exceedingly popular in Flanders and Holland, where their graphic truth could be appreciated; but are they ever regarded as models of the really beautiful in painting?

The doctrine now so prevalent is essentially erroneousthat the manners of the middle or lowest class are the fit object of the novelist, because they are natural. Many things are natural which yet are not fit to be exposed, and by the customs of all civilised nations are studiously concealed from the view. Voltaire's well-known answer to a similar remark when made in regard to Shakspeare, indicates, though in a coarse way, the true reply to such observations.

If everything that is natural, and we see around us, is the fit object of imitation, and worthy of being perpetuated in literature, it can no longer be called one of the Fine Arts. It is degraded to a mere copying of nature in her coarsest and most disgusting, equally as her noblest and most elevating aspects. We protest against the doctrine, that the lofty art of romance is to be lowered to the delineating the manners of cheesemongers and grocers, of crop-head charity boys, or smart haberdashers' and milliners' apprentices of doubtful reputation. If we wish to see the manners of such classes,