The Dial

important discovery that his audience is not mainly to be composed of littérateurs, nor yet of widely-read people like Macaulay's formidable schoolboy. This work will probably be mainly consulted by college-students, by ladies in search of "culture," by people who have examinations to pass, and by those who, having heard much and read little of our great authors, desire to know what to think of them. This vast reading public addressed by the modern historian of literature, although immensely patient under instruction, has a shocking propensity to yawn, and is capable of voting a very learned man a bore. It is so much easier to close a book than to steal away from a tedious discourse or to elude the bony finger of the button-holder! Without any sacrifice of severe allegiance to his didactic aim, without swerving from scientific accuracy of exposition, Mr. Gosse has had the taste and tact to make the necessary concessions to his audience and to charm while he instructs. From this point of view, it is to be hoped that those who are entrusted with the remaining volumes of this history will study to imitate our author rather than his predecessor.

By virtue of what qualities does this writer succeed in making a work of popular exposition so graceful and attractive? To the chief qualities of his style I have already referred. As to thought, it is to be remarked that the work owes none of its interest to paradox, to startling theories, to personal judgments, to brilliant obiter dicta, or to literary heresy of any kind. In some of these respects this book is a great improvement upon the sketchy preliminary study entitled "From Shakspere to Pope," a book that added little to Mr. Gosse's fame. In a work like the present one a wise conservatism is peculiarly appropriate, while the temptation to eccentricities of some kind is peculiarly difficult to resist. It is so much easier to be epigrammatic than to be accurate, so much harder to say the right thing than to say the brilliant thing! That he has been sufficiently imbued with the scientific spirit to resist this insidious temptation to win a cheap and flimsy reputation for "originality," is perhaps the highest praise that can nowadays be bestowed upon an author; and Mr. Gosse has fairly earned it.

In answer to the question with which the preceding paragraph began, I can only remind the reader that Mr. Gosse, being a poet as well as a critic, has the rare gift of concrete and pictorial generalization. Long after we close

the book we are haunted by many a charming image, many an unobtrusive bit of coloring, by means of which the artistic historian contrives to convey the general impression of a masterpiece, or the tang of a satire, or the aroma of some gracious character. One is tempted to quote some of these beautiful summary statements, in formulating which the poet hastens to the aid of the critic and rescues generalization from bald abstraction. Examples are, the estimate of Dryden as a prose-writer, of Addison's influence and character, of Fielding's "Tom Jones," of Thomson's "Castle of Indolence." dolence." Indeed, Mr. Gosse's whole temper seems so subdued to what it works in, that he becomes an almost ideal critic of such poets as Dryden and Pope, and of such prosaists as Addison and Fielding. This poetic sensibility is united with catholicity of taste, and with sufficient flexibility of mind to enable him to do full justice to the sentimental veins of Sterne and Richardson, on the one hand, and to Johnson's impatience of cant, on the other. Burke is the only first-rate figure to which he does something less than justice. Mr. Gosse's half-feminine genius shrinks from Burke as a lark might shrink from a tornado. He quietly dissents from the laudation Burke has received from Mr. John Morley and others, while he fails to adorn his study of the great orator with any of those exquisite touches wherewith he illumines the figures of those he loves.

In perusing this book, I have accumulated a too considerable collection of slips and errors, typographical and other, in which I can hardly believe that readers of THE DIAL will be much interested. One of Mr. Gosse's slips deserves, however, to be recorded among the minor curiosities of criticism. He, the biographer and editor of Gray, actually manages to misquote a well-known line from "The Progress of Poesy," one of the few poems with which everyone is expected to be familiar (p. 25). It is as bad as if Professor Sylvester were caught tripping on an elementary proposition in Euclid. Since I have begun to find fault, I will mention one or two other matters of detail. At p. 123 we are informed that Theobald's edition of Shakespeare "was far more scholarly than Pope's." Turning the leaf, we are confronted with the inconsistent statement that "Theobald might justly claim" to be both dull and a dunce. This reminds us of Macaulay's notorious paradox about Boswell. Another inconsistency: at p. 9 the author positively states Dryden to be

"the greatest poet in English literature between Milton and Wordsworth." When he reaches Pope he begins to doubt it: Pope is "perhaps the greatest poet with whom we have to deal in the present volume." Similarly, although without the contradiction, Thomson is introduced by the formula, "the most original and influential poetic figure which exists between Pope and Gray," while Gray carries forward the apostolic succession as "the most important poetical figure in our literature between Pope and Wordsworth." In defence of these rather soulless formulas, it is to be said that they are a part of the general system of perspicuity which is one of the excellences of the book. To make the general outline of a book clear to a fault is certainly, to say the least, pardonable.

There is but one example of what seems to me fanciful theorizing. It occurs on the first page of the "Conclusion" : "But still, throughout the seventeenth century, poetry remained the normal class of expression, while prose retained its conscious character as something which had to compete with poetry and share its graces." Now the plain fact is that English prose failed to become precise and clear in the seventeenth century, simply because scarcely anyone took the task of writing English prose seriously enough. So soon as men began to take the task seriously, prose began to "get free its hinder parts" from the bog of Latin in which it had been mired. In other words, English prose was written, as Milton wrote it, "with the left hand," by men trained in the Latin school, who despised "the vulgar tongue" and who disdained to take the pains with English prose that they willingly took with Latin prose. Bacon and Sir Thomas Browne wrote carefully and produced measured and precise English prose. As Latin scholarship declined, as the resources of the vernacular became better known, and as the influence of French classic prose began to tell, men like Cowley, Temple, and Dryden, were led to take the task of English prose composition seriously. From that moment our classic prose style was formed, and the flounderings of such men of genius as Milton and Jeremy Taylor became thenceforth impossible.

praised Mr. Gosse for his freedom from the itch of "originality," it would not become me to censure him for failure to break new ground. To reproduce in an agreeable summary the best results of the labors of other critics, to inform such a summary with the freshness of first-hand work, to betray no crudeness, no lack of liberal equipment for a task so extensive,this is indeed a very honorable achievement. Mr. Gosse's book is not likely to be completely superseded by future labors in the same field. MELVILLE B. ANDERSON.

THE CRITICAL PERIOD OF AMERICAN
HISTORY.*

Professor Fiske occupies a unique place in the field of historical authorship. He unites with the literary skill of the essayist something of the profundity of the original investigator. His writings rarely fail to impress one as the expression of mature conviction attained only after research, and his opinions are the more readily granted a hearing since they come to us in a form that is fitted to please and instruct, rather than to dogmatize.

The volume before us is a popular treatise on a most interesting theme, "The Critical Period of American History" (1783-89). As the preface states, the author's aim is simply to group the events of the six years succeeding the conclusion of peace with Great Britain in such an order as may best bring out their causal causal sequence. The culmination of the period, of course, is the constitution itself, and its adoption. The book is chiefly occupied with a setting forth of the train of important facts and conditions that made the Federal Convention of 1787 possible, and its results on the whole acceptable. While the work was clearly intended for the general reader, the special student of American history cannot fail to find in it much suggestive and stimulating material. The full bibliographical note at the end of the volume is to be especially commended.

One of the most noteworthy chapters of the book is the first. In this the reader is made acquainted with the "Results of Yorktown". not in America, but in old England. To many this vivid statement of the close relation between the success of the Continental arms and the strifes and falls of British parties will reveal, perhaps for the first time, a most instruct*THE CRITICAL PERIOD OF AMERICAN HISTORY, 1783-1789.

The chapter dealing with the development of English prose after the Restoration is the least satisfactory one in the book. But the subject has never, so far as my reading goes, been adequately treated, a recent American attempt in that direction being something worse than a distinct disappointment. Having just By John Fiske. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

the United States constitution as to be considered by itself, or as presenting in itself the whole or the essential part of the American system. That system can be understood only by considering the Federal constitution as but one portion, while the various State constitutions are another portion of no less importance in the completed whole. This dual form of our government is emphasized in these lectures. The State constitutions stand as an essential part of the Federal system. The correlative proposition has never been more forcibly presented than now by Professor Landon, that the United States constitution is necessary to the proper scope and development of that part of the system which finds its expression in the State constitutions. It was this dual constitutional system which was the natural growth. If criticism upon so excellent a work would not be considered ungracious, one might suggest a fuller elaboration by Professor Landon of the details of the gradual and natural growth, during the American colonial period, of each of these principles of national sovereignty and local independence.

It is, however, elucidated in this treatise, and with a clearness most excellent, how the central powers of the National government have been exercised with the result of strengthening the State governments. During the period prior to the Civil War, the hostility of the States toward supposed encroachments of the Federal governments is stated succinctly but clearly. The author is not, however, a harsh critic of the States-Rights politicians, although himself a firm and uncompromising Unionist. With impartial candor, he shows how natural was the political feeling, at one time so prevalent, of jealousy of the central power. With like judicial calmness, he shows in what an orderly way the central power has, in the new era since the Civil War, become the firm bulwark of the reserved rights of the States.

This, which may be considered the final summary of the author's views of our constitutional development, is presented in the three lectures which are appropriately devoted to an illustration of the influence of the Supreme Court of the United States upon our constitutional development and growth. This court occupied, at the beginning of our first century, a position in our political system which may be best described by the term sufferance. Recognized in the constitution, it was allowed to exist and operate; but its decisions were

often treated with disrespect and sometimes with contumely and open disregard. It worked its way gradually into partial and then more complete favor; then into a position of influence, and finally into one of calm and quiet, yet supreme and unquestioned power. Its first great work was to determine the proper powers of the nation in our system, and to secure for those powers just recognition, respect, and obedience. It was through the labors of this court that the people were educated into the faith and the strength sufficient to carry the Union through the crisis of the Civil War; that work done, and the nation finally planted with firmness upon the constitutional foundation, it then became the task of the Supreme Court to enforce and maintain in like manner the powers conferred by our system upon the State governments. The consummation of the work of our statesmen, as described by the court, is an indissoluble Union, composed of indestructible States. Landon appropriately reminds us that that august court has itself done no small portion of the work of erecting and perfecting such a Union.

"Not immediately, but gradually, ultimately, and surely, the court by its decisions separated the National and State powers from their confusing mixture, and gave to each clearness of outline and distinctness of place. It gave to the abstract words of the constitution an active and commanding significance. It disclosed the instrumentalities by which rights conferred could be enjoyed, and wrongs forbidden could be averted or redressed. It composed conflicts, promoted harmony, and soothed passions. It defined the just limits of contending powers, separated encroaching jurisdictions, and restored each to its proper place. It lifted a dissolving and moribund nation to great strength and vitality. It gave to the States clear and accurate conceptions of their wide field of domestic government. It instructed coördinate departments. It vested the nation with its own, and did not impair the just powers of the States. The peaceful manner in which all this was accomplished made the accomplishment more remarkable. Revolutionary results without revolutionary means are rarely witnessed in the history of mankind.” (p. 274.)

It is a familiar thought that our political system is one of "checks and balances.' Probably few persons who are in the habit of using this phrase have ever attempted to fully state or closely define these checks and balances. That one power checks another, is easily seen; but that the checks and balances should in themselves contain the germs of much of the inherent strength of our system, is not so evident. To this feature of our system Landon devotes several pages. Among those provisions which assist in insuring its perpet

uity, he calls attention to the following: The division of the great powers of government among three departments prevents the lodging in any one man or body of men of so much power as to allow him or them to oppress the people. These separate powers, so committed to separate officers, are so co-ordinated that the proper action of each is usually necessary to the successful working of the whole; so that officers in each are watchful of defects or abuses in the other departments. The powers most liable to abuse are committed to officers with short terms of service, so that the public interest in their proper discharge of duty is well-nigh continuous. The constant participation of the people in the government is a force continually tending not only to strengthen and perpetuate it, but to keep up its standard of excellence. The division of the Legislative department into two chambers makes each one constantly watchful against encroachments by the other, precisely according to the prescient suggestion of Madison. The provisions of the constitution for its own amendment are a safeguard against revolution and discontent. Finally, the separation between the National and State powers of government furnishes a constant and always active influence against any attempt on the part of either State or Federal authorities to encroach upon the powers or privileges pertaining to the other. These careful selections by our constitution-makers from the precedents furnished by the best experience of earlier governments and political ventures, have proved to be, in our system, the sufficient means of its continuance and preservation.

From what has been here said, it will be plain that the pessimist will derive but little comfort from the perusal of Professor Landon's pages. They will, however, reward every patriot, whether optimist or not, who may give the necessary time to their careful reading.

JAMES O. PIERCE.

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY LITERATURE.*

Mr. Gosse's "Eighteenth Century Literature" is intended to serve as the third volume of a history of English Literature in four volumes, by as many different hands. Reviewing the second volume, Saintsbury's "Elizabethan

* A HISTORY OF EIGHTEENTH CENTURY LITERATURE (1660 To 1780). By Edmund Gosse, M.A., Clark Lecturer in English Literature at Trinity College, Cambridge. New York: Macmillan & Co.

vey

Literature," in THE DIAL (vol. viii. p. 259), I found good reason to hope that the completed work would constitute a more satisfactory surof the whole field of our literature than we had hitherto possessed. It is pleasant now, after the lapse of fourteen months, to be able to say that Mr. Gosse's contribution fully bears out the promise of Mr. Saintsbury's. Indeed, by its freedom from the glaring imperfections which it has been more than once my duty to point out in Mr. Saintsbury's style, the present volume is, negatively, a marked advance upon its predecessor. Not that Mr. Gosse's style is, in Saintsburian phrase, "impeccable." It is sometimes feeble, now and then negligent, and occasionally marred by far-sought similes which a are too plainly stuck-on for decorative effect. But barring these lapses, which are so far from being penetrative that they might easily be corrected in a later edition, Mr. Gosse's mode of expression is singularly clear, pure, and polished. If he fails anywhere, it is in enthusiasm and strength; always interesting and sensible, he seldom betrays any warmth of feeling. thusiasm and strength are perhaps the sole qualities in which this volume falls short of its predecessor. It should, however, be borne in mind that Mr. Saintsbury had to deal with a period of abounding intellectual life,—a period when genius actually appeared to be "catching." In the period treated in the volume before us, on the other hand, the human mind seldom rises very high above what Matthew Arnold calls "our ordinary selves."

And if

in Mr. Saintsbury's style there is something of the want of measure characterizing the age of which he treats, in Mr. Gosse's narrative there is a sobriety, a symmetry, an evenness of movement, eminently suited to the historian of "an age of prose and reason."

Mr. Gosse is to be commended, I insist, for his abstention from the literary argot, the intolerable affectations, the foreign interlardings, which make the old jest inevitable in its application to Mr. Saintsbury, "He has been at a great feast of languages, and stolen the scraps." This purity of speech is itself the sign of a deeper excellence. Mr. Gosse has evidently reflected much more deeply than his predecessor upon the aims and limitations of such a rhetorical mandate to adapt yourself to your work as this. He has obeyed the good old audience,- -a precept that becomes more binding and more arduous in proportion as the written word tends to usurp the place of oratory. Mr. Gosse has evidently made the

important discovery that his audience is not mainly to be composed of littérateurs, nor yet of widely-read people like Macaulay's formidable schoolboy. This work will probably be mainly consulted by college-students, by ladies in search of “culture," by people who have examinations to pass, and by those who, having heard much and read little of our great authors, desire to know what to think of them. This vast reading public addressed by the modern historian of literature, although immensely patient under instruction, has a shocking propensity to yawn, and is capable of voting a very learned man a bore. It is so much easier to close a book than to steal away from a tedious discourse or to elude the bony finger of the button-holder! Without any sacrifice of severe allegiance to his didactic aim, without swerving from scientific accuracy of exposition, Mr. Gosse has had the taste and tact to make the necessary concessions to his audience and to charm while he instructs. From this point of From this point of view, it is to be hoped that those who are entrusted with the remaining volumes of this history will study to imitate our author rather than his predecessor.

the book we are haunted by many a charming image, many an unobtrusive bit of coloring, by means of which the artistic historian contrives to convey the general impression of a masterpiece, or the tang of a satire, or the aroma of some gracious character. One is tempted to quote some of these beautiful summary statements, in formulating which the poet hastens to the aid of the critic and rescues generalization from bald abstraction. Examples are, the estimate of Dryden as a prose-writer, of Addison's influence and character, of Fielding's "Tom Jones," of Thomson's "Castle of Indolence." Indeed, Mr. Gosse's whole temper seems so subdued to what it works in, that he becomes an almost ideal critic of such poets as Dryden and Pope, and of such prosaists as Addison and Fielding. This poetic sensibility is united with catholicity of taste, and with sufficient flexibility of mind to enable him to do full justice to the sentimental veins of Sterne and Richardson, on the one hand, and to Johnson's impatience of cant, on the other. Burke is the only first-rate figure to which he does something less than justice. Mr. Gosse's half-feminine genius shrinks from Burke as a lark might shrink from a tornado. He quietly dissents from the laudation Burke has received from Mr. John Morley and others, while he fails to adorn his study of the great orator with any of those exquisite touches wherewith he illumines the figures of those he loves.

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