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INTRODUCTION.

ESSAYISTS, OLD AND NEW.*

IT is frequently said that periodical writing fritters away a man's intellectual energy; that, instead of concentrating himself on some congenial task, devoting a whole lifetime to it, and leaving it as a permanent possession of the race, a man is tempted to write hastily, and without sufficient meditation; that, in fact, we have articles now, more or less brilliant, whereas, under different circumstances, we might have had books. All this kind of conjecture is exceedingly unprofitable. Doubtless, under different circumstances, the results of a man's working would have been different more or less; but it does not of necessity follow that the results would have been more valuable. A man's power in literature, as in everything else, is best measured by his accomplishment, just as his stature is best measured by his coffin. It is a mistake to suppose that a man's largest work, or the work on which he has expended the greatest labour, is on that account his best. Literary history is full of instances to the contrary. When mental powers are equal, that is surest of immortality which occupies the least space; scattered forces are then concentrated, like garden roses gathered into one bouquet, or English beauty in the boxes at the opera. Leisure and life-long devotion to a task have often resulted in tediousness. Large works are often too heavy for posterity to carry. We have too many "Canterbury Tales." The "Faery Queen would be more frequently read if it consisted of only one book, and Spenser's fame would stand quite as high as it does. Milton's poetical genius is as apparent in "Comus" and "Lycidas" as in his great epic, which most people have thought too long. Addison's "Essay in Westminster Abbey" is more valuable than his tragedy. Macaulay's Essays on Clive and Warren Hastings are as brilliant, powerful, and instructive, as any single chapter of his "History"-with the additional advantage, that they can be read at a sitting. Certain readers have been found to admire Wordsworth's "We are Seven" more than the "Excursion." Coleridge talked of spending fifteen years on the construction of a great poem; had he done so, it is doubtful whether his reader would have

* Abridged from "Last Leaves: Sketches and Criticisms." By Alexander Smith, author of "A Life-Drama," "Dreamthorp," etc. W. P. Nimmo, London and Edinburgh.

A

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