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lessness, haste, or incompetency-will cure itself. But however this may be, the fact of the deterioration and invalidation of criticism in public esteem can have escaped no one that has mixed in generally intelligent and well-educated society, commercial or otherwise. So extraordinary a discrepancy as that which I have laid before the public is calculated to shake what little relic of popular confidence might remain in so vacillating a guide. Here are two judges having the same uncomplicated and unerring laws to direct them—and the sentence of one is GUILTY; of the other, NOT GUILTY. Nay! one says that the accused is a criminal, and deserves death; the other, that he is a hero, and deserves a crown. If two judges sitting in juxtaposition, in Westminster Hall, were to give such sentences, what would be said or thought of them? Solvuntur risu tabula. If two Turkish cadis were to give judgment after this fashion, it would probably be inferred, that one of them had partaken too plentifully of forbidden wine, or too sparingly (to satisfy a cadi's auri sacrá fames) of equally-forbidden fees. Yet discrepancy on minor points (though not so vital a collision) may well be pardoned to the legal decisions of our courts, since the law is in some cases at variance with itself. But it is not so with criticism. It has no internecine principles. Its laws have been long ascertained; they are few and simple. They have been determined by reason, admitted by common sense *,

*It is commonly thought that this phrase, used with its ordinary

supported by ancient precedent, and established by modern example. It would be pedantic, in a publi cation of this nature, to refer, in proof of the existence of a perspicuous, precise, and invariable STANDARD OF CRITICISM, to Aristotle or to Longinus, to Quintilian or to Horace; to Bossu or to Boileau; but excuse will not be necessary, while addressing English readers, for appealing to English authorities on this head. Burke forcibly says, while affirming the existence of a settled standard of critical taste, • It is probable that the standard of reason, as well as taste, is the same in all human creatures; for if there were not some principles of judgment, as well as of sentiment, common to all mankind, no hold could possibly be taken either of their reason or their passions, sufficient to maintain the ordinary correspondence of life.'-(Burke on Taste, page 1.)

Here he impresses a most important inference on the mind, as correlatively dependent on the main argument, namely, that a defect in the critical judgment, as to the fitness, proportion, order, and character of the subjects submitted to its discrimination, would tend to argue a parallel defect, in the moral judgment, as to right and wrong. The standard, according to him, therefore, is not only fixed and invariable, but the necessity of its canons being so, is of vital

signification, is peculiarly English, or at least modern; but Juvenal uses the words "communis sensus" with precisely the same meaning.

and catholic importance to the unlearned, as well as to the learned. Again, Pope has founded his elegant, compact, and highly polished Essay on Criticism on the stability and immutability of such a standard. Among others of his terse and perspicuous distichs on this theme, he has the following, which are at once replete with point, and in point.

Ye, then, whose judgment the right course would steer,
Know well each ancient's proper character ;
His fable, subject, scope, in every page-
Religion, country, genius of his age.
Without all these at once before your eyes,
Cavil you may, but never criticise.

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Learn hence for ancient rules a just esteem;
To copy Nature is to copy them..

Essay on Criticism.

These rules (such is the common consent of all our best writers on the subject) of nature sanctified by art, must be applied to the PLOT or FABLE, the CHARACTER OF CHARACTERS, the SENTIMENTS, DICTION, and MORAL of every Poem*.

Such is the law of criticism; the practice has been shown. But neither the reader nor myself will be much surprised at the discrepancy caused by the new opponents to Mr. Montgomery's reputation, when I am bold enough, and without fear of contradiction,

* Addison has governed himself rigidly by the laws dependent on this critical standard, in his excellent critique on Milton. Johnson never loses sight of them.

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to state, that neither the Edinburgh Literary Journal, nor Fraser's Magazine (which in talent are far superior to the other objectors, and in substance condense all their objections), make the least reference to the authority of those critical laws without which it is morally impossible to arrive at a fair and legitimate judgment. They neither refer to them, nor defer to them; to them it would appear that they are either nonexistent, or effete and obsolete. They may, indeed, have knowingly rejected their authority as too cramping and slavish a yoke for the modern march of mind.' But in rejecting these restraints of art, it has been shown, on good authority, that they equally reject the dictates of nature and good sense. Do I impute critical corruption, or sinister motive, to these gentlemen, as a means of accounting for what must be pronounced, according to the foregoing premises, at least, an obliquity of judgment? Far from it. Criticism has become corrupted; it has either abdicated or obliterated its first principles; and these critics merely float with the corrupted stream. They hold a brief; their brief was to condemn; and they proceed to do so in the modern dashing, off-hand style, i. e. a few general censures, ex cathedrá-a few reasons like those ungallantly called women's-I dislike because I dislike-stet pro ratione voluntas'-a few quotations of passages, pronounced bad on the critic's ipse dixit; and a few (often melancholy) jokes. I have looked carefully into the materials of these reviews;

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or delusive manner.

argument and logic were not, perhaps, to be expected, nor are they found; but they scarcely contain a single reason, or process of reasoning; they contain a few bald opinions, but unsupported by authority, and without reference to a single critical principle. Surprising as this may seem, it is probable, that if readers would be at the pains to analyse them, nine hundred and ninety-nine, out of every thousand critiques, would be found to be got up' in the same slovenly It may be replied, that it was not the intention of the writers to produce a formal critique, which would not be read, but to write an amusing paper, which would. Then let such papers be avowed as humorous essays; let them appear as ironical philippics against personal adversaries, and not foisted on the public as cautious judgments on elaborate or popular works, with a view to direct its judgment (a calm, unimpassioned quality) in the purchase or non-purchase of such works. This is not fair either towards the public, the author, or the publisher, whose property being embarked, may consider that which is fun to the off-hand cutters up,' as death to him. A light, witty, and humorous essay is, undoubtedly, a good thing in its place, and will as undoubtedly contribute to sell the magazine or periodical in which it may appear, better than a dry critique, according to rule. This is the cause effective,' probably, why we are treated occasionally-in the midst of a more sober banquet, with the entremets and hors

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