3 John J. Latting, Esq. John McAloney, Esq. W. Curtis Noyes, Esq. Daniel Oakey, Esq. Alfred Pell, Esq. J. W. Platt, Esq. G. W. Pratt, Esq. John W. Quincy, Esq. Robert Ray, Esq. Charles B. Richards, Esq. Thomas F. Richards, Esq. A. T. Sackett, Esq. G. T. Strong, Esq. J. H. Titus, Esq. R. H. Tucker, Esq. G. G. Van Wagenen, Esq. Ch. Zabriskie, Jr., Esq. Other names had unfortunately not been received in season to be included in the above list, the omission of which occurs for that reason, and is much regretted by the publisher. V-Poems by Clement C. Moore, LL. D. VI.-American Verse-Ralph Hoyt. VII.-The Literary Character of R. H. Dana. XI.-Sir Philip Sidney's "Defense of Poesy" XII.-Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy. 18 23 CHARACTERS AND CRITICISMS. I. ESSAY WRITING. THE CHAMPION. "TEN censure wrong for one who writes amiss," sang Pope, and a juster line he never wrote himself. We have daily evidence of its truth, especially in this era of multifarious and indiscriminate criticism. Every man is a reader, and a critic, of course; the corollary follows the proposition as closely as demonstration upon mathematical reasoning. To be a tolerable author requires some brains and tact in writing; but to become a regular critic, nothing is needed but the not uncommon union of arrogance, ignorance, insolence, and stupidity. To praise judiciously the rarest works (the verdict of love and knowledge combined) appears tame and insipid, to those who love the slashing style, who consider abuse, satire; and presumption, boldness; who vote ribaldry, wit; and give the palm of copious, manly eloquence to coarse, declamatory invective. In a late notice of Chambers' Essays in the London Spectator, we find the writer, who gives the author his fair share of praise, speaking of the decline of the Essay, and of its gradual extinction, as if the shortest, the most direct, the most personal, the most natural, form of prose-writing could ever become extinct, any more than letters, or songs, |