impartial, and affectionate summary of her lamented friend's leading merits and distinguishing qualities. It hardly requires an addition, and certainly does not admit of improvement. After justly remarking that, many of the giants he combated being not only slain but forgotten, the very completeness of his victory tends to efface from the minds of the present generation the extent of their obligations to him, she asks, "What other private gentleman of our day, unconnected with Parliament, without rank or fortune, has been able by a few pages from his pen to electrify the country, as he did by his letters to the Americans? or to fight single-handed against the combined power of the ministry and of the dignitaries of the Church

a battle in which he carried public opinion with him ?"—or, we beg leave to add, to alter the whole complexion of a controversy on a subject apparently So exhausted as the Ballot? At the same time, we cannot quite agree with Mrs. Austin as to his style; and Sir Henry Holland's remarks, which she quotes approvingly, must be read with a few grains of allowance :-"If," writes Sir Henry, "Mr. Sydney Smith had not been the greatest and most brilliant of wits, he would have been the most remarkable man of his time for a sound and vigorous understanding and great reasoning powers; and if he had not been distinguished for these, he would have been the most eminent and the purest writer of English."

Since we are on the chapter of style, we may be pardoned for suggesting that Sir Henry's obvious meaning is not expressed with his usual precision. But he clearly intended to assert that Sydney Smith, besides being the most brilliant of wits, and possessing great reasoning powers, was no less remarkable for the excellence of his style. Now a good style is one which can be safely recommended for general

VOL. I.

E

use; and in saying that Sydney Smith's was not, in this sense at least, a good style, we say no more than is indisputably true of Burke's, Gibbon's, or Johnson's. We are not denying that Sydney Smith's style was admirably fitted for his purpose, and we could cite passages of high eloquence which are unexceptionable in point of composition. His sermons, which are mostly free from mannerism, prove that he could combine purity and correctness with force of language when he thought fit. But his humorous writings are often deficient in ease, smoothness, grace, rhythm, and purity, because he constantly aimed at effect by startling contrasts, by the juxtaposition of incongruous images or epithets, or by the use of odd-sounding words and strange compounds of Greek and Latin derivation. Thus he describes a preacher wiping his face with his "cambric sudarium," and asks, "Why this holoplexia on sacred occasions. alone?" A weak and foolish man is "anserous and asinine." Dr. Parr's wig is the péya lavμa of barbers. Mr. Grote is quizzed for supposing that England is to be governed by "political acupuncturation," and told that his concealed democrat, doomed to lead a long life of lies between every election, " must do this not only eundo, in his calm and prudential state, but redeundo, from the market, warmed with beer and expanded by alcohol."

This is certainly not pure English; it is not even popular writing, like Defoe's, or Swift's, or Cobbett's. It is caviare to the multitude, and would require to be interpreted for the benefit of the ladies and the country gentlemen; that is, if the country gentlemen did not now constitute one of the most highly educated classes of our society. The art of true criticism demands that we should subject ourselves to a strict self-examination, and that we should analyse the causes and sources of our impressions, favourable or

unfavourable. Let Sir Henry Holland do this, and he will admit that he has confounded the style with the man, and that Sydney Smith sometimes formed a striking exception to Buffon's famous dogma, Le style, c'est l'homme. In this case the man was always natural, simple, and essentially English, the style was often forced, factitious, composite, and (to borrow his own word) cosmopolite. Many of his allusive expressions, rich with the raciest humour, could not be enjoyed beyond the polished circles of the metropolis. He wrote for the meridian of Holland House; and one reason why he notwithstanding exercised such widespread influence, is to be found in the aristocratic constitution of our Legislature.

What Sir Henry Holland says of the suddenness and unexpectedness of his manner is just. His review of Madame d'Epinay's "Memoirs " begins thus:

"There used to be in Paris, under the ancient régime, a few women of brilliant talents, who violated all the common duties of life, and gave very pleasant little suppers. Among these supped and sinned Madame d'Epinay, the friend and companion of Rousseau, Diderot, Grimm, Holbach, and many other literary persons of distinction of that period. Her principal lover was Grimm; with whom was deposited, written in feigned names, the history of her life. Grimm died— his secretary sold the history - the feigned names have been exchanged for the real ones - and her works now appear abridged in three volumes octavo."

An excellent judge of composition, the Dean of St. Paul's (Dr. Milman), has spoken of the increased vigour of style and boldness of illustration in Sydney Smith's writings as he advanced in years. This is most observable in the letters, the earliest of which, we frankly own, have disappointed us, although they contain ample confirmation (were any needed) of his soundness of principle, his unaffected piety, his unde

viating rectitude of purpose, his affectionate disposition, his happy temper, and his warm heart. The shortest are the best. The longest, we believe, cost him no effort, but some of them read as if they did, and we would gladly exchange them for a collection of the notes he dashed off in the daily commerce of life. Thus in one excusing himself from keeping an engagement to sup in the Temple:

"Charles Street, May 18, 1836.

"My dear Hayward,-There is no more harm in talking between eleven and one, than between nine and eleven. The Temple is as good as Charles Street. The ladies are the most impregnable, and the gentlemen the most unimpeachable, of the sex ; but still I have a feeling of the wickedness of supping in the Temple; my delicate and irritable virtue is alarmed, and I recede.

"Ever yours, S. S."

The following, printed in the selection, are thoroughly characteristic:

"Munden House, Friday 11, 1841. "Dear Milnes, I will not receive you on these terms, but postpone you for safer times. I cannot blame you; but, seriously, dinners are destroyed by the inconveniences of a free Government. I have filled up your place, and bought your book.

"SYDNEY SMITH."

"May 14, 1842.

"My dear Dickens, I accept your obliging invitation conditionally. If I am invited by any man of greater genius than yourself, or one by whose works I have been more completely interested, I will repudiate you, and dine with the more splendid phenomenon of the two.

"Ever yours sincerely,

"SYDNEY SMITH."

"July 4, 1843.

"My dear Lord Mahon, I am only half-recovered from a violent attack of gout in the knee, and I could not bear the confinement of dinner, without getting up and walking be

tween the courses, or thrusting my foot on somebody else's chair, like the Archbishop of Dublin. For these reasons, I have been forced for some time, and am still forced, to decline dinner engagements. I should, in a sounder state, have had great pleasure in accepting the very agreeable party you are kind enough to propose to me; but I shall avail myself, in the next campaign, of your kindness. I consider myself as well acquainted with Lady Mahon and yourself, and shall hope to see you here, as well as elsewhere. Pray present my benediction to your charming wife, who I am sure would bring any plant in the garden into full flower by looking at it, and smiling upon it. Try the experiment from mere curiosity.

"Ever yours, SYDNEY SMITH."

The following is a sample of his more thoughtful epistles. It is addressed to his old friend Lord Murray :

"Green Street, June 4, 1843. "My dear Murray, —I should be glad to hear something of your life and adventures, and more particularly so, as I learn you have no intention of leaving Edinburgh for London this season.

"Mrs. Sydney and I have been remarkably well, and are so at present; why, I cannot tell. I am getting very old in years, but do not feel that I have become so in constitution. My locomotive powers at seventy-three are abridged, but my animal spirits do not desert me. I am become rich. My youngest brother died suddenly, leaving behind him 100,0007. and no will. A third of this therefore fell to my share, and puts me at my ease for my few remaining years. After buying into the Consols and the Reduced, I read Seneca On the Contempt of Wealth!' What intolerable nonsense! I heard your éloge from Lord Lansdowne when I dined with him, and I need not say how heartily I concurred in it. Next to me sat Lord Worsley, whose enclosed letter affected me, and very much pleased me. I answered it with sincere warmth. Pray return me the paper. Did you read my American Petition, and did you approve it?

"Why don't they talk over the virtues and excellences of