to call a holy principle; consenting to his Charitable Bequests-bill, to his Maynooth Endowment-bill, and bearing with astonishing fortitude the liberalism which dismisses gentlemen from the bench of magistrates on no other grounds than that their attachment to the constitution in Church and State is excessive. They have seen the amount of protection offered to the British corn-grower cut down to a figure which no other statesman than he could have presented, and are suffering, some of them not very patiently, under the pressure of an income-tax which they owe to his boldness. Let them have reason to apprehend that he means to go farther, and there will be an end at once to their confidence. And then where is he-ay, and where is the country? Sir Robert Peel knows all this. He may regret that the public temper should be what it is. He may feel the restraints of party gall and hamper him sorely, and, in his more earnest moments, he may come to the determination of breaking through them. But he cannot break through them. Neither he nor any other man living can govern this great country except by a party, for the attempt to do otherwise will overwhelm in one common ruin both the individual who makes it and the constitution.

Lastly, Sir Robert Peel has some knowledge of human nature, and does not, therefore, need us to tell him that men who cannot be brought to fight for any thing else, will fight like lions for their breeches-pockets. Now the agriculturists may be right or they may be wrong, but it is past dispute that the conviction has established itself among them, that the repeal of the Corn-laws would reduce the incomes of landowners by one-third at the least, besides throwing an immense quantity of the land of the country out of cultivation. We know, indeed, of our personal knowledge, many tenantsat-will, the occupiers of enormous farms, who are so satisfied of the mischievous working of a repeal measure, that nothing would induce them to accept at this moment leases from their landlords. Their argument is this, "We are doing well enough now; and, if we could be insured against any further tampering with the Corn-laws, we should

own

be happy to engage to pay the same amount of rent that we are paying now, for as many years as our landlords might propose; but, whether rightly or wrongly, we are convinced of the impossibility of competing, on our present terms, with the foreign grower, and are, therefore, prepared to throw up our farms the moment the ports are opened, and to live in idleness till things find their level.” Now, with such a prospect before them, is it reasonable to expect that the landlords of England will consent, whether they be peers or commoners, to an immediate and total repeal of the Corn-laws? Can they afford to exist on two-thirds of their present income, making good the engagements to which their estates are liable? and if they could, who will undertake to guarantee even twothirds of their income from the outset? No one. A sudden opening of the ports, an abrupt repeal of the Corn-laws, would tend as surely to anarchy for awhile as the wiping out of the national debt; and five years of anarchy, through the throwing up of leases or the breaking of tenants and we cannot anticipate less would suffice to make beggars of the representatives of all the best families in the kingdom. Can it surprise us to learn that the landlords are determined to resist a sudden repeal to the death? and seeing that in their ruin the ruin of the peasants, at all events, must be involved, is the driving of such a body of men to desperate measures a contingency to be thought of without horror?

Whatever changes Sir Robert Peel's plan may involve- that is, supposing him to have a plan in preparation-we are on these grounds satisfied that he cannot contemplate either the unconditional or the immediate repeal of laws amid which all the domestic arrangements of all the landed proprietors and cultivators of the kingdom have for the last five-and-thirty years been formed. And we come to this conclusion, not only from contemplating the effects which such a procedure must have upon the social condition of a very large portion of our population, but from a perusal of the arguments of those who endeavour, by fair means and by foul, to push the change onwards. Whatever our private opi

nions may be in regard to the wisdom of a protective system in connexion with the corn-trade, we can never consent that the policy of England's prime minister shall be forced upon him by the Anti-Corn-Law League; and we are inclined to believe that the majority of the aristocracy-of the Whig aristocracy not less than of the Tory-are of our way of thinking. Messrs. Cobden and Bright, in the fervour of their anticipated triumph, let out a little too much for the good of the cause which they advocate, at the great Covent Garden meeting. The English people entertain a profound respect for the hereditary peerage; they would not exchange so noble an institution even for Mr. Cobden's services, were he called to the queen's councils, and invited to bring in an abolition-bill as Secretary of State for the Home Department to-morrow. Besides, the people of England must be more gullable than we take them to be, if they are persuaded to believe that an order of things can be very injurious to trade and manufactures under which the great apostle of the repeal of the Corn-laws has contrived to work his way from the condition of a poor farmer's son in Sussex, to the ownership of mills, the profits on which are rated to the income-tax at an amount so enormous, that we are really afraid to particularise it.

And now a word or two to all right thinking men,-to those among our readers who value the country's well-being above such minor considerations as the question who shall or who shall not preside in her majesty's councils, and be called prime minister. We witnessed with regret the unbecoming haste with which, immediately The Times' rumour got afloat, some who ought to have known better proceeded at once to condemn and denounce the recreant premier. This was neither just nor wise. Sir John Tyrrell, and other equally respectable, though somewhat hot-tempered gentlemen, have no ground as yet-none with which we, at least are acquaintedfor coming to the conclusions at which, with extraordinary precipitation, they arrived. They would have done

better had they waited, as we recommended others of the party to do, till Sir Robert Peel and his colleagues-who continue in office, and their friends who quit it shall have made their explanations. If, indeed, The Times be correct in its assumptions, then each man, whether a member of parliament or not, will be free to take his own line. The unflinching advocates for protection will, of course, resist whatever attempts are made to diminish or in any other way to interfere with it; while such of them as take pleasure in dealing out hard names and bitter words may, with a better grace than now, give license both to their pens and to their tongues. At the same time one point there is peculiar to the crisis at which we have arrived, which seems to demand their serious attention. Supposing they defeat Sir Robert Peel, and drive him out of office (no hard matter to do, it would appear, seeing that he would have voluntarily resigned, if he had been permitted), are they perpared with any one to take his place, who shall prove at once acceptable to the crown, and of sufficient weight, personal or otherwise, to go down with the constituencies? They cannot look to the Whigs, that is clear. The Whigs have done their best to form an administration, and failed; neither, we presume, will they condescend to make terms with Mr. Cobden, or Mr. Bright, or Mr. O'Connell. Will the Duke of Richmond be invited to form an administration? and if he do, will the country support him?

We cannot tell, but this much we venture to hope, that the actual measures of the existing cabinet will be found much less alarming than the sanguine on either side anticipate; and, at all events, we advise our readers to suspend their judgments, as we here undertake to suspend our own, till the mystery in which the proceedings of the last month are involved shall be dispelled; and there are some sure grounds on which either to support or to condemn the man whom, for ten years and more, the great Conservative party has, both in opposition and in power, honoured as its champion.

Is one of Lord Byron's MS. diaries, begun at Ravenna, May 1821, he makes this entry,-" What shall I write? Another journal? Any thing that comes uppermost, and call it My Dictionary.' The project

died in the thinking. Whether the bow was not well bent, or the quiver had been exhausted in other forays, we know not, but the author never carried his incursion beyond A. Like other bold invaders, he was stopped by the elements. The interruption of the plan is certainly to be regretted. We should have received many brilliant sayings and much hardihood of criticism and philosophy. The prose of Byron was very often better than his verse, more fluent, natural, and idiomatic; vigorous, yet elastic; and masculine, yet musical. The framework, morcover, was well adapted to his pencil. He could stretch or contract it to his canvass. Every letter might be a picture, copious and magnificent as a Veronese, or minute and delicate as a Mieris. Lockhart once recommended a similar shape to his excursive friend Sir Egerton Brydges. He might have adopted it with advantage, and given us, to our delight and improvement, the gossip of Wal

VOL. XXXIII. NO. CXCIV.

pole, the criticism of Warton, and the fancy of Collins.

It seems difficult to brand any article save one with the mark of utter exclusion, and that is dulness, in every form and under every aspect, from the beginning to the end of the alphabet. It must not be suffered to creep in through D, or steal upon us with a sweet surprise in the murmurs of S. No column will keep the field with this symbolical letter in the ranks. Miserable in itself, it is fatal to its companions. It will ensure the defeat of a whole army of eloquence and learning. The most brilliant music of the fancy fails to attract our attention when it has been completely benumbed. Pope might have read in vain the rape of Mrs. Fermor's lock to an audience whom Dennis had been lecturing upon poetry. The saying of Haller is true in literature, whatever it may be in physics, and we are assuredly deaf when we are yawning.

There can be no doubt that Byron was in the full enjoyment of the prophetic eye of taste when he sketched this faint image of a new dictionary. Writing at Ravenna, he was really in Regent Street. The doctrine of

K

developement, with all its wonders of imagination, was present to his mind, and he felt a deep but delicious sentiment of delight in the conviction that the suggestion, thus idly thrown out, was only a germ which would subsequently take root, and grow, and blossom, and bear fruit; and that while the first seed-small, barren, and insignificant,-might indeed be imbedded in his own writings, the verduré, and foliage, and fragrance, and fruit, would be found, after the lapse of twenty years, in the garden of Fraser's Magazine. And where can any good or salutary thought be planted with a richer promise and hope of ripeness and abundance? REGINA is above all little jealousies; safe in the unapproached splendour of her charms, she has no sneer for her rival :

48 No Rufa, with her combs of lead, Whisp'ring that Sappho's hair is red."

:

The idea of a dictionary implies universality; in dragging the stream from A to Z, you enclose every thing the largest and the smallest, Homer or Hume, Demosthenes or Duncombe, the Sophist or the Sonneteer. And this variety is only the reflection of every scholar's experience. It was the agreeable confession of Gray, that his studies ranged from Pausanias to Pindar, and that he mixed Aristotle with Ovid; just as the hand wanders from the bread to the cheese, and provides the appetite with refreshment from both. The image is his own. But the habit can plead still higher authority in its behalf. Lord Bacon long ago urged the importance of being able to contract or dilate the eyesight of the understanding. He regarded that power as essential to the healthfulness of the organ. And justly so. Every one knows that the natural eye is injured by gazing too steadfastly or too long upon a brilliant body; the dilation, which that protracted scrutiny occasions, impedes the necessary and restorative contraction. Any reader can make the experiment for himself. Let him, on some gorgeous summer-day, wind out gradually from the beeches of Knowle, or the chestnuts of Penshurst, until he comes full upon the sun, then riding in its state above the trees; let him fix his eye upon

the burning orb for an instant, and then look down unto the grass; he will perceive that every blade is tinged with a reddish glare, and that a flickering lustre is shed over the turf, as if a fairy procession had just gone by. And this peculiarity will not be really in the grass, but in his own eye. When it is refreshed by the contrast, the light will fade. We will endeavour to apply this phe

nomenon.

The analogy between the natural and intellectual sight-the eye of the body and the mind-is very close and interesting. interesting. If, after a prolonged and earnest examination of the dim recesses of early eloquence or poetry, the inward eye of thought be suddenly turned upon the broad, central, glowing orbs of Cicero, Shakspeare, Thucydides, or Milton, and be then cast down into the common surface of daily life, and the low growth of everyday thoughts and feelings, it becomes not only dazzled and confused, but even pained by the discolouring hues that seem to float over every object. In both cases the phenomenon admits of a similar explanation. The blaze of light and the intensity of attention have dilated the eye beyond the healthful expansion; the continued exposure of the nerve, either natural or intellectual, is attended with results of peculiar inconvenience and injury.

The nerve of vision gradually loses much of its susceptibility to the finer gradations of light and shade; and, for a transient gratification, undergoes a permanent damage. On the other hand, a careful education of the eye refines and strengthens it; it makes the astronomer or the critic, the naturalist or the painter. The Nogay Tartar can resolve what appear to be only dark spots in the remote horizon into horses, sheep, or oxen; and, throwing himself on the ground, the quick sensibility of his ear distinguishes the neighing and bleating of his own cattle. This is the fruit of instruction and habit. In like manner, the intellectual eye arranges what to the uncultivated faculty seem to be rude and unshapen images into the elements of a charming landscape of poetry and taste.

We shall not forget the physiology of the mental vision in our Dictionary, "from grave to gay, from lively to

severe," is a wise precaution in a moral, as well as in a literary sense. We shall follow it. Things great and small will pass before us, and after the magnificence of the upward gaze into the sun, we shall be ever looking down into the fragrant sequesterment of the daisy.

Our philosophy will be related to our poetry-truth, but upon its sunny side as it is best calculated to cheer and warm the traveller under the burden and storm of life. Philosophy, thus illuminated by poetry, will be a powerful shield in the warfare of existence.

He who cultivates Literature in a pure and trusting spirit will never find himself forsaken or forlorn. Much she loves, if much she be loved. Other friends fail us, she never; alike beautiful and fond, when the lamps of our fortune are full of oil, and when the embers upon our hearth are mouldering away. The Greek poet's description of Venus concealing her favourite from the attack of the enemy, is only the allegory of Literature protecting her children. Now as then, on a British as on a Trojan field,

Προσθε δε οἱ πεπλειο φαείνου πτυγμέ εκάλυψεν.

She does not wrap him in her veil, but only interposes it when the danger is imminent and the arrow is abroad. She, who helps him most, teaches him also to help himself.

Slight revelations only of her beauty and her face does she vouchsafe; a faint gleam of her garment, a vanishing flash of her eye, a parting whisper of her voice, that is all, but it is enough; the celestial visitor is sooner recognised in her departure than in her approach. Who shall despise these glimpses? In the stoniest wilderness they come oftenest, and the Olympian friends of the poet or the philosopher make the clouds of trial to be their ladder of descent :

"Voices are beard; a choir of golden strings,

Low winds, whose breath is loaded with the rose ; Then chariot-wheels, the nearer rush of wings; Pale lightning round the dark pavilion glows,

It thunders, the resplendent gates unclose;

Far as the eye can glance, on height o'er height,

Rise fiery waving wings and starcrown'd brows,

Rank'd by their millions brighter and more bright,

Till all is lost in one supreme unmingled light."

Who does not know the enchantment of small circumstances, in any terrible crisis of our destiny? When the packet ship, Lady Hobart, was driving before the tempest, a white bird, like a dove, suddenly hovered over the mast; and, amid all the consternation of the elements, the hearts of the crew were cheered by the spectacle. One bright thought in our storm is the dove upon our mast. Seek not great comforts or great hopes, but be content with small. These blossom under your feet. There grows among the Indian jungle-grass a phosphorescent plant that emits a clear brilliancy in the night. "To husbands, who rove about the Himalaya mountains with their wives, and enter its caves, these plants serve in the night as lamps, burning without oil." This is an Indian tale, but what a deep and affecting moral it enfolds! This luminous grass makes green our English villages and skirts the highways of our swarming cities, if we only look for it with the patient and the trusting eye. Every where has the sced of happiness and hope been scattered, every where may its shining blade be seen, slowly rising up in the darkest weather. But men trample this grass down in their impatience to reach some broader turning of their road. They scorn their little and illuminating blessings, because they think they might be favoured with others, larger and brighter.

"To the man of the studious turn that Tranquillus is, it is sufficient if he has but a small spot to relieve the mind and divert the eye, where he may saunter round his grounds, traverse his single walk, grow fami liar with his two or three vines, and count his little plantation." Why should Tranquillus live only in the time of Pliny? We shall seek to multiply the tribe; and if we be asked,