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an elevation and refinement of character peculiar to such situations, and tempering natural simplicity with habitual thoughtfulness-the plainness of living, and the regular and unceasing routine of exertion to which they are accustomed, and the self-respect and homely independence thus produced-combine to form a character singularly adapted to the purposes of impressive delineation. We think, too, that there is something in the subject remarkably fitted to the author's peculiar capacities. His genius is rather of the reflective than of the active kind. He takes no delight in the bustle of incidents, or in striking contrasts of character. He has a fine

and delicate eye for beautiful objects in nature or in human life; but it is to the " something far more deeply interfused," the spirit which lives in them, and the emotions they are calculated to excite, that his attention is instinctively directed. He cannot rest in externals; he regards them chiefly as introductory to an "inner court" of deeper and more enduring beauty. His descriptions always either terminate in, or are pervaded by, reflection; and, in the narration of events, he is less intent on relating what was said or done, than on tracing the secret impulses which led to the action, and the feelings which accompanied it. It is not so much a history of his hero, as of his hero's mind. His study is the inner man. Of this feature, which is more especially observable in his later publications, we shall have to speak more at large when we examine the scope and tendency of his writings. In the meantime we may take occasion to notice another point of resemblance between him and his master-one indeed which is in him more marked and more prominent than in Wordsworth; we mean the leaning which is manifest in his mind towards subjects of a mild and tranquil nature. And this remark will serve to limit and qualify some of our preceding observations. In the selection of his subjects, as well as in his management of them, he is guided almost exclusively by this principle. He dwells with fondness on all the gentler affections, and in every thing that either directly or indirectly ministers to them; and, accordingly, all his stories are either such as in themselves possess this tendency, or are capable of being made subservient to it by the tempering hand of genius. Nothing turbulent or impure, no restless speculations or unregulated fancies, can exist within this sphere; or, if admitted, it is only as the dark materials" out of which he may create something beautiful and happy. He loves to tell a gentle and heartsoothing tale-a tale of reconcilement, or brotherly affection, or innocent love, or repentant guilt, or quiet endurance. Even in his darkest pictures there is always something which redeems them from utter gloom. A mild charm is spread over all his delineations; scenery, characters, incidents, and reflections, are transmitted to us through a certain calm and softening medium, distinct alike from the dazzling frosty clearness of one writer, the stormy gloom of another, the cheerful vernal sunshine of a third, and the sultry glare of a fourth. Such a style of writing, however, has a tendency to mawkishness and cant, as the disposition of mind

which corresponds to it has to effeminacy; and we are far from saying that our author's good sense always keeps pace with his feelings and imagination. Some remains of the morbid sentimentality of his early writings are still visible. We do not mean that this is a prominent or obtrusive fault; it would indeed be difficult to specify any one individual passage in which it occurs; but its effect is not the less perceptible in the general impression which is left on the mind by the book. A more glaring error is the mixture of fact with metaphysics, which too often produces a most incongruous combination. The author overlays his descriptions with reflection, marring the simple beauty of the objects, and interrupting the pleasure of the reader, by philosophical suggestions which he superinduces upon them. His history and his comment jostle each other. Each would be good by itself, but the two do not harmonize. Speaking accurately, indeed, this error is more perceptible in the style than in the matter; the phraseology of reflection does not coalesce kindly with that of action, and the result is sometimes unpleasing, and sometimes even ludicrous. We fear we have not made our meaning so clear to our readers as we could wish; and we refer them, as the best illustration of our remarks, to the volume itself.

His characters (to resume the thread of our observations, which has been for a moment interrupted) are exactly such as might have been expected from an author writing under such prepossessions, and for such a purpose. They are for the most part simplehearted, affectionate, uncalculating creatures, guided only by the instinct of natural piety, combined with the influences of a simple religion, which, being implanted in infancy, has interwoven itself with the whole frame of the mind, so that its dictates are not distinguishable from the voice of nature. They belong to the class of beings described by the poet, in his Ode to Duty:

66

"There are who ask not if thine eye

Be on them; who, in love and truth,
Where no misgiving is, rely
Upon the genial sense of youth;
Blest hearts! without reproach or blot!
Who do thy will, and know it not! "

It never occurs to them to inquire into the expediency of what they are doing. Instead of stopping at every third step, to consider the consequences of their proceedings, they follow the light within them, and require no better guide. They are the very reverse of sophisters, economists, and calculators." They manifest throughout a culpable ignorance of Paley's Moral Philosophy. If they were required to give a reason for any one of their actions, they would probably be as much at a loss as the little girl of Miss Edgeworth, when her mamma (a disciple of the school of utility) asked her why her birth-day should be a day of rejoicing, rather than any other in the year-a perplexity which the poor thing would probably have felt in an equal degree, had she been called upon to give a reason for her preference of a

plum-cake or a wax-doll. They never speculate on their own internal sensations, after the fashion of many modern heroes and heroines, who seem to have little to do but to describe themselves, and to trace the sources of their own actual emotions-emotions of which, if they really existed, the individual could not possibly be sensible, except in their effects; a mode of proceeding which suggests the idea of a man anatomizing himself. They leave all this to the author. They think no more of defining what they are, what they are not, and how they came to be what they are, than a nightingale thinks of writing a treatise on music. We make no apology for such characters. They are at war with the " spirit of the age;" the "march of intellect" has not reached them. In these thinking and enlightened times, when every thing is handled, and examined, and subjected to the test of palpable experiment; when an attachment to, or reverence for, any object beyond the sphere of the five senses is justly regarded as enthusiasm, and morality itself has been rendered intelligible, and reduced to a sober business-like calculation of profit and loss, it must be a little provoking to our well-founded self-satisfaction, to hear of beings who are good without being conscious of it, and happy without knowing why; who find their account in transgressing the commonest rules of expediency, and persist in drawing fortitude, and comfort, and moral renovation, from sources which our stronger reason has long since discovered to be nonentities. It is, we own, mortifying-but there is no help for it. Such beings are made for poetry-and poetry is too wilful and obstinate a thing to be easily divorced from its favourite subjects. Speaking seriously, indeed, we doubt whether this scheme of heart, head, and conduct, which we have been describing-this systematic unconsciousness (to use a word which expresses our meaning better than perhaps any other) is compatible with the state of things as it at present exists; whether, however natural it may have been in other and simpler times, and however indispensable some of its elements may be to the formation of a truly good character, it is, as a whole, either right or (to speak more properly) practicable in the present age. This, however, is matter for abler and more prepared pens; and all that we have to do, with regard to the characters before us, is to trace their general lineaments, and to point out their subserviency to the author's prevailing purpose.

It may be supposed, from the above definition, that there are certain lights and situations in which he is more especially fond of contemplating the human heart. He delights in pourtraying the unconscious graces of childhood, its sportiveness, its engaging simplicity, and those occasional gleams of thought and feeling which betray the mysterious depth of the yet undeveloped soul beneaththe joyous season of youth, luxuriating in its own life, and in the flow of natural affections; but he is most in his element when describing the female character. It is the subject which, of all others, accords with his peculiar style of painting. Those qualities, by.

which his leading characters are particularly distinguished, are the very qualities which sit with peculiar grace on women. Here, accordingly, he is in his element. His women are, in truth, most delicate and beautiful creations; invested with angelic purity and sweetness, and yet not a whit

too bright and good,

For human nature's daily food;

throwing their hearts into the discharge of their daily duties; the most graceful in the scenes of gaiety, where all is graceful, yet comforting the afflicted, watching by the bed of sickness, and reclaiming by mild and unwearied love the guilty and self-tortured spirit, as if they were born for nothing else. Religion in them appears, as through a translucent medium, in its true lustre; not discoloured by bigotry, nor turbid with worldly passions, but adorned with its own proper garniture of a meek and quiet spirit, blending, in amicable union, the most inflexible purity of principle with the most uncomplaining gentleness of manner, and forming, altogether, an image not to be contemplated without a mixture of delight and awe, than which nothing can be imagined more exquisite.

And this leads us more immediately to the scope and tendency of the Lights and Shadows. Its design appears to be to illustrate the influence of religion and the general affections in supporting the mind under calamities of all descriptions, and their restorative power in cases of guilt and error; and by thus exemplifying their effects, to promote their cultivation. We have named the two in conjunction, for with him they are always combined. It is his philosophy to consider the better feelings of the heart, and, we may add, the soothing influences of external nature, as subsidiary to religion, or, in other cases, as introductory to its higher operations-in fact, as an essential branch of religion itself. It may be doubted whether religion, in its fullest sense, can be considered the inspiring genius of this volume; but it is certain that the tendency is religious; or, to define it more accurately, a tendency of reconciliation. It is not easy to explain the full meaning which we attach to this word; but those who are familiar with the moral system of Wordsworth, as developed in his best works, will be at no loss to understand it. We refer more especially to the shorter narratives interspersed in the Excursion; the tale of Ellen, the "meek saint, by sufferings glorified on earth"-of the Deserted Wife-the Youthful Soldier-the poor Pastor and his Family-the Jacobite and the Hanoverian-and many others, evidently the models on which our author has worked, both as to the selection of his subjects, and the spirit in which they are treated. A design of kindliness runs through the whole; an evident wish to draw out " the soul of good which is in things evil;" to wean men from their bigotries and anti-social prejudices, without offending them by an open attack; to point out the beauty latent in many little accidents of daily life and local custom; in a word, to cherish all endearing ties and humanizing associations, and to reconcile man to himself by the same process which binds him to his fellow-men.

When the general design is so benevolent, and the execution so conformable to the design, it will not be expected that we should be disposed to cavil about particulars. An amiable man, engaged in promoting the welfare of others, is no object for light or cold-blooded censure. We shall, therefore, merely notice one of the objections which have occurred to us, with regard to the manner in which this part of the author's purpose is executed, and that rather in the way of doubt than positive opinion; it seems to us, that religion, in these volumes, is made too much a matter of impulse and excited feeling; that there are too many ecstasies, and horrors, and flights of imagination. Excess, indeed, is the besetting sin of this age; every thing must now be shown either in an unnatural glow, or in a calm, cold, unaffecting light; the healthy medium of nature is almost entirely lost sight of; nor is it either very extraordinary or very censurable, if, while some would reduce religion to a mere sapless husk of prudential ethics, or a skeleton of dry opinions, others should fall into the opposite extreme of considering the frequent recurrence of certain exalted emotions necessary to its being, and of representing it as the secrets of the other world were shadowed out in the Eleusinian mysteries-as an alternation of unnatural flashes and equally extravagant gloom. This, however, is only in a qualified sense the case with our author, whose error lies rather in bringing one part of the subject forward too prominently, than in a neglect of the rest.

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We cannot conclude these remarks, without thanking the author for the view which he has afforded us of the interior of Scottish life, in the middle and lower ranks of the country population. If some features of the picture are repulsive, and uncongenial to our associations (which we are not disposed to deny), the general effect is such as to gratify, in no common degree, all who rejoice in the virtue and well-being of a community. It is impossible to rise from these volumes without a feeling of affectionate respect for those whose manners it describes; and in this view our author may be considered as having rendered a service to his countrymen in general. Nor ought we to leave wholly unnoticed the fine touches of local scenery which abound in these volumes, although these are in a great measure cast into shade by the living figures which accompany them.

We cannot say much for our author's style; it is florid, inelegant, and diffuse. It is, indeed, remarkable, that while some eminent Scottish writers (more especially of the last age) have been betrayed by their study of correctness into a style, smooth, specious, concise, and polished, but dry, artificial, and devoid of power and animation, others, through want of judgment or desire of immediate effect, have addicted themselves to a manner of writing, spirited, indeed, and brilliant, but vicious, tasteless, bloated, and nearly analogous to that which, as a modern critic says, is called poetical because it is not prose, and which might with equal justice be styled prosaic because it is not poetry. Our author's great error consists in imagining that figures and phrases proper to a certain species of poetry, may be transferred without impropriety to the prose narrative. He has learned about half-a-dozen peculiar forms of expression from

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