who have both leisure and means to bestow it. Nor are the Americans, as a people, inattentive to the progress of letters. Reading is a favourite amusement with them. In consequence, however, of their devotion to commerce, their studies are necessarily of the lightest nature, of which their attachment to periodical literature, and the reprinting of our English Reviews and Magazines, is a strong proof.

Another powerful cause which operates to retard the progress of America in these pursuits, is the facility with which her citizens are supplied with the productions of the English press. The public appetite only demands a certain portion of viands; and when all that is excellent and delicate is imported from a foreign country, the home-made commodity, especially if of an inferior quality, will with difficulty find a market. In some degree, however, this must have a favourable effect; for though it may tend for a time to depress the exertions of native merit, it must, if our literature be really valuable, improve the taste and correct the judgment of the Americans. The extent of this influence can only be known by comparing the number of English works republished in America, with that of their own authors. The most careless exami

nation of the advertisements which appear on the cover of an American volume, will in a moment convince any one of the very great disproportion between the number of the British and the American authors. Nor is there any thing degrading to the character of America in thus taking advantage of the knowledge and intelligence of another country. If her merchants consider it an honorable employment to introduce into their country the productions of our manufactures, it is surely at least as worthy of praise to traffic with us for our intellectual commodities.

The observations which have been made with regard to the state of literature generally in America, will apply with still greater force to the progress of poetical studies. There is no intellectual occupation which requires such high, peculiar, and exclusive qualifications as the labours of the poet; and amongst such qualifications all those which form the basis of what may be called the literary character must necessarily be reckoned. To these, indeed, the heart and the feelings of a poet must be added; but without literary refinement, the finest imaginations and the richest veins of feeling will be comparatively worthless. The greatest of our poets have invariably been men of the highest

cultivation of mind, or have supplied by an extraordinary acuteness of observation the deficiencies of their more limited acquirements. Every thing, therefore, which tends to check the progress of general literature, must also operate prejudicially upon the poetical character of the Americans; and some of those causes, which we have already mentioned as influencing their intellectual improvement, will act much more powerfully upon the loftier and nobler pursuits of poetry. In science, and in the graver paths of literature, it may be easily conceived that the Americans may be very little swayed by English influence; but in matters of taste, where the general tone of feeling has long been borrowed from another country, it is difficult to imagine how the public mind can be imbued with new shades of sentiment. When once we have erected a standard of taste or of fashion, and have constituted some one our arbiter elegantiarum, it is inconceivable with what subserviency we obey the decrees that are issued. France has for centuries given fashions to Europe, which have still been followed in spite of their mutability. We have never attempted to rival the shape of a Parisian bonnet ; but in those pursuits in which we have not proposed our neighbours as models to ourselves, in

discoveries, in arts, and in literature, we may be allowed to say, without any great degree of national vanity, that we have very frequently surpassed them. America and England stand very nearly in the same situation with respect to poetical taste. The standard of excellence is measured by English estimation, and this will continue as long as the popular sentiment remains unaltered. How a change can be accomplished, it is not easy to foresee; but as long as our own poets excel their transatlantic brethren, they will necessarily be, in America itself, the models of taste.

Other causes have also been assigned, to account for the dearth of poetical genius in that country; and it has been said, that the absence of all those local associations with which the countries of the old world abound, must deprive the Americans of many high sources of poetical feelings. Perhaps more influence is attributed to this circumstance than it can justly claim. We do not find that those countries which are richest in ancient and glorious associations, present any proof of the truth of this doctrine; and indeed the great natural advantages which America possesses in the beauty of her scenery, where nature is seen on her most magnificent scale, may be thought sufficient to counter

balance the advantages which the old nations derive from being the birth-place of illustrious men, and the theatre of noble actions.

But, dismissing these speculations, it will be well to inquire, what are the ideas of the Americans themselves on the state of their literature, and more especially of their poetry. Amongst so active-minded and ambitious a people, a love of literary superiority is sure to obtain a place. In throwing off their dependence on the old world, they naturally wish to free themselves from all obligations, and they seem to acknowledge with some degree of unwillingness the literary dominion which the mother country still exercises over them. But while they are unable to deny the value of the intellectual benefits which they receive from us, they endeavour to supersede the necessity of such supplies, by forcing their own literature to a precocious maturity. The motives of this attempt are perhaps patriotic and honorable, but the step is unwise. The mind of a nation can no more acquire knowledge and cultivation per saltum than that of an individual; and it is in vain for the Americans to expect they can arrive at any distinguished stage of literary excellence, without having traversed the intermediate ground. How wil