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the manners of men, that insults shall rarely be given or received; or if offences of this kind arise, they may be settled by the umpirage of gentlemanly friends, which might supersede the courts of honour, and abate the barbarian nuisance of duelling, whose only defence is that specified by Dean Swift, "that it rids the world of its fools and knaves." And more than all, might the spirit of chivalry extend to diminishing and mitigating the terrible evils of naval and military hostilities, gradually make wars to cease on the earth, and drive them to their native hell, their only proper dwelling place.

But let it still be borne in mind that it is the spirit of chivalry which will avail us. It is the spirit we find in Sir Philip Sydney or Sir Charles Grandison, which will be always delightful, because always philanthropical. As to the mere forms of chivalry, as they have been recently revived at Eglinton Castle, we cannot help thinking them unprofitably expensive and frivolous. There is too much of what the economists call unproductive consumption about them to suit the good sense and good taste of the British. In their proper age, in the olden time these forms were highly important and serviceable; they then enabled the knights to settle many actual disputes concerning precedence and points of honour. Such contests were then made in good earnest, and they bore sufficient relation to the military discipline prevalent, to serve as valuable schools of emulation for youthful aspirants. But now-a-days a tournament is not praetium operis : nay, worse, the thing that was august hath become absurd. "There is but a step from the sublime to the ridiculous," as the Emperor Napoleon very sagaciously observed; and that step has been passed. The very points, which, in the ancient tournaments, used to be fraught with the most thrilling and palpitating interest, are now the very ones that most inspire laughter; and laughter they will inspire in spite of the champions, just because the sublimest passages always admit of the funniest parodies. No, the great tide of social experience rolls on in omne volubilis ævum; you may inflect its current, but you cannot force it back. All which Don Quixote did to demolish the chivalry of Spain has Hudibras done to enervate that of England. The spirit and principle of chivalry, and all that made it most valuable, thank Heaven, gentlemen may still retain, even in the nineteenth century. But the mere forms must needs perish in spite of all the efforts made to uphold them. We cannot help thinking in this instance, that le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle! The whole affair, to our minds, nearly equals in preposterousness the description of a certain festivity, with which Byron concluded his " Age of Bronze." His lines, if we may venture to quote them from memory, run nearly thus:

My Muse' gan weep, but, ere a tear was spilt,
She caught Sir William Curtis in a kilt!
While throng'd the Chiefs of every Highland clan
To hail their brother, Vich Ian Alderman!

Guildhall grows Gael, and echoes with Erse roar,
While all the Common Council cry Claymore!'
To see proud Albyn's tartans as a belt
Gird the gross sirloin of a City Celt,
She burst into a laughter so extreme
That I awoke-and lo! it was NO DREAM!"

A FEW LINES ON LITERATURE.

BY HANNAH D. BURDON.

WHEN we consider the common occupations and ordinary thoughts of life, it seems scarcely possible that the mind can rise above them, as it sometimes does, and expatiate in the most elevated regions of reason and imagination; scarcely possible, that it can arrest itself on its hurried course, to take cognizance of its own nature, and mark, with calm precision, the intricate windings of its progress.

Nor are there many men who, either by nature or habit, possess the power of this abstraction; and very few, even when highly educated, are capable of original thought. In common life opinions are most frequently received and adopted without discussion or examination; they are prejudices under a false name. When the brain has small power of reflection, it spares much painful, and indeed useless labour, to coincide with others, and many men are not only incapable, but undesirous of exploring the heights of knowledge. They move contentedly on in the beaten track, despising the few who, with infinite toil and difficulty, gain the summit of the rugged cliffs, and who, after basking in the glowing light that truth sheds only there, return to reveal her mysteries for the benefit of their fellow-creatures.

Yet, in spite of the contempt with which the ignorant console themselves for their inferiority, it is by the thoughts of the sur passing few that their actions are unconsciously regulated. Aware of this power, and worthy of possessing it, the ancient professors of literature alone directed it to the improvement of individual man, in morality and religion, by teaching him how to attain the greatest virtue and happiness, by simply relating the noble actions of the dead as models for the living, or pouring forth in poetry, the inspirations of genius; either exciting men by the lofty aspirations of their own souls to soar above the world and its vanities, or instructing them with didactic strength how to use it with moderation. Virtue was then the object of all contemplation, and wisdom the means of attaining it.

But the examination of political interests has of late, except with religious writers, almost entirely replaced the philosophy of the soul. Philosophers have become habituated to contemplate their fellow-creatures as a mass, and no longer emulous of improving the qualities of separate minds, they endeavour only to influence the operations of nations, and watch their revolutions with intense anxiety, as the great machines which are to work out their own abstract principles, and prove the truth or fallacy of their political theories.

At the same time, the extensive diffusion of knowledge, by generating a continual demand for a literature adapted to the tastes of many classes, has greatly lowered its standard. In answer to the universal desire for novelty, a number of ephemeral writers have

sprung up, who, without either profound thought, or rigid principle, and indifferent as to the ultimate effects of their works, cater for every passing taste of the multitude. They amuse, and they are satisfied-they are paid, and their purpose is accomplished.

But at a time when democratic power is advancing with incalculable strides, it is of intense importance to the well-being of society, that the minds of the multitude should be instructed in the leading principles of morality and religion; that whilst they are eagerly acquiring a knowledge of their rights, they should be made acquainted with their duties; that the affections and the feelings should be trained as well as the faculties, and the general average of mind elevated, not only in knowledge, but in virtue.

Day by day the luxuries of the rich are diffusing their corrupting influence amongst the poor; yet day by day the voice of the people is assuming louder authority in the councils of nations; and though knowledge cannot arrest the progress of either, it is the sole means of controlling the most evil attributes of both, and directing them to become the means of human benefit.

Those therefore who are alone impelled to join in the arduous pursuit of literature, from the fulness of their own minds, and a disinterested love of truth and intellectual labours, should never be unmindful of the mighty and important task it is their duty to fulfil, nor forget that their toil is as worthless as idleness, when not directed to exalt and improve the mental and moral condition of mankind.

It was this single-hearted and god-like purpose alone which invested the poets and philosophers of ancient days with those immortal wreaths, against which even the thunderbolts of Jupiter were fabled to be powerless; it is this which has made the multitude of every age bow down before the shrine of genius; and it is this which can alone finally accomplish the triumph of intellect over the dominion of human passions, and the powers of earthly matter. Such writers belong not exclusively to any age or country: the fountain of their inspiration is beyond the confines of space; and their influence will be felt in the remotest depths of time, though their labours are frequently undervalued by their contemporaries; for very slowly do mankind become aware of their real benefactors, and the light literature, merely contributing to their amusement, often secures immediate praises and rewards, whilst those sterling productions of genius destined eventually to immortalise their author, are disregarded by the multitude, till some reigning critic has pronounced his fiat in their favour; and he whose converse with the deity is to be the measure of future genius, passes away before his fellow-creatures are conscious of his existence. He follows the even tenour of his way without reputation or distinction, walking through the multitude unrecognised, as angels whom the guise of men veils from ungodly eyes.

But like such blessed messengers, in obscurity and humility, he still holds converse with things beyond the earth; and, in defiance of neglect, pursues his lofty contemplations for the benefit of his fellow-creatures, sustained by the persuasion that time in its pro

gress will untimately dispel the darkness that brooded over his course. In the silent consciousness of immortality, of which genius is not to be divested by adversity, he dies, and leaves the mantle of his glory to lesser men, who, whilst they are themselves illustrated by the transmitted splendour, first teach mankind the mightiness of the prophet who has passed away. With gradual but certain influence, his thoughts, as their justice and utility are tried and proved by the infallible test of experience, direct the great current of public opinion; his speculations become the actions of nations, and the truths his genius elicited are thenceforth engraven as indisputable on the great volume of human knowledge.

There is another class of writers, who, created by the time, go with the time, and adapt their works to the temporary taste; who, though not endowed with any extraordinary or pre-eminent ability. are deeply imbued with religious and moral principles, and ever mindful of the high purpose of their calling. When they neither sink to common-place, nor bewilder themselves and their readers in the misty abstractions of sentiment, such authors have frequently an extensive and immediate influence on society, denied to more rare and loftier genius. They speak to ordinary understandings, and are universally understood; they appeal to common feelings, and they find an echo in every heart; they require no commentators to elucidate their meaning, and though they discover no new principles, they make a judicious application of established truths. Whilst the venerated works of their superiors, like mines of gold, are only explored by those who seek to rifle their treasures, their volumes, like coin of inferior metal, are endlessly multiplied to circulate from nation to nation. But years pass away, and others in more modern garb take their place, and they are forgotten.

A man must have other gifts to maintain a permanent reputation, and, however highly endowed, must remember, that all systems, whether physical or moral, erected solely by the imagination, all theories not founded in facts, and all literature where nature has not been taken as the type, have failed to hold a durable station in the estimation of society, and that the only source of impressive and original writing is truth. Yet nothing is more difficult to attain. Its dim reflections frequently wear the appearance of reality to worldly men: error is, by inexperienced ignorance, perpetually mistaken for it; and the spirit that is zealously bent on its pursuit, must not rely alone on its own powers, or those of living men, but claim the assistance of study to expand its perceptions into the past.

The works of a man of genius to whom extensive knowledge affords matter for reflection, are no longer limited to the thoughts of a single brain; no longer the mere reflections of existing manners, or passing events; but in his pages are condensed, as in a lens, all pre-existing talent, and his experience extends to the utmost limits of time. He sits like the merchant in his quiet home, receiving contributions from every nation of the earth. The minute historian, the zealous antiquary, the laborious collator, and the subtle legist, are all purveyors to his store-house of original

ideas, the observations of the traveller, the discoveries of science, the actions of the politician, and the vicissitudes of nations, are the oil which feeds the torch of his intellect, and thoughts, and words, and facts, worthless to other men, assume the diamond's value, when combined by his master mind, and condensed by the fire of his genius.

Extensive knowledge, whilst it embellishes literature, pre-eminently conduces to its utility. It is not by vague theories and idle deductions from fanciful propositions, that the moral conduct of man is to be improved, or his mind imbued with the purifying and elevating truths of religion, till his actions are constrained to be the result of his love for his Creator. They may amuse the imagination, but they are insufficient to control the passions, or correct the selfishness of the visionary student, and forgotten in the first moment of excitement or temptation, his reading and reflections are equally barren of good works, when he emerges from his study to mingle in the conflict of human interests.

It is action only which proves the value of a man's thoughts; and the sole worth of reading and meditation is to fit him for the performance of his duties. Literature, therefore, is of no value, but as it teaches him to connect the unreal with the real; the invisible with the visible, and by occasionally abstracting him from the hurry of life, to exercise the higher faculties of his mind in serious reflections, strengthen their influence over the senses, and enable him in future seasons of temptation to bring the principles he has derived from his studies to bear upon his conduct.

It is only when thus directed, that literature can effectually struggle with the corrupting influence of luxury, or effect that moral improvement of the individual, from whence the only permanent social amelioration can originate.

Its style and its subjects must necessarily be varied in adaptation to the diversity of human tastes and powers, but by whatever grade of intellect it is employed, whether it be used as the voice of science, the modifier of human institutions and bodily sufferings, or the bold assertor of human liberty and human rights, it will inevitably pass like a pestilential vapour over that land, where, divested of the sanctifying principles of religion and philanthropy, it breathes its noxious vapours. If unmindful, or despising the eternal and invisible, it deals only with the things of time, all the moral, all the social ties will be successively destroyed by its influence, till man, degraded to the depths of sin by the exercise of the intellect that was bestowed upon him as his guide to salvation, will experience, even on earth, in the consequences of his abuse of this mighty gift, that misery which the Divinity has ordained to be the infallible avenger of every dereliction from his law.