The Press.
London, England, 1856-02-09 00:00:00

far from justifying the use of personalities,
but we believe the fact to be that, when one
party in politics adopts their use systemati-
cally, it is absolutely necessary for the other
side to employ the same weapon. Court scan-
dals, about the time of the French revolution,
gave vast resources in this particular line to
Liberal " publicists," and for forty years our
English discussions were saturated with per-
sonality of every kind. But we must say that
the first who introduced the spirit and practice
of personality into critical literature (or what
purposed to be such) were the " Liberals."
The tone of the early numbers of the Edinburgh
Review was ferociously truculent, and for years
that periodical ruled as a terrorist, until the
retaliation by Lord Byron, and the signal
triumphs won in controversy over it by the
late Bishop of Llandaff, taught its conductors
more caution.

We know all that can be urged about the
personality of Bolingbroke, Swift, and of Can-
ning and the Anti-Jacobin in later days. But
was Junius a Tory ? \Vas he not an aristocratic
Whig in his politics; and what Tory ever
produced so much envenomed personality ?
Were not his " Liberal" contemporaries, Wilkes
and Horne Tooke, adepts in scurrility, and
active practitioners in abuse ? The writers of
the Rolliad, also, were not Tories, but Whigs
of the most aristocratic school. Lord John
Townshend, General Fitzpatrick, and their
associates, were also accustomed to produce
bitter and galling comments on their foes.
We recollect, in one instance, how they hailed
the fact of the first Sir Robert Peel being
made a baronet:—
Mr. Peel, Mr. Peel,
In return for your zeal,
1 am told they have dubbed you Sir Bob;
By coarse Manchester stuff
You have yet wealth enough,
And for honours you'll now drive a job,
Mr. Peel,
For honours you'll now drive a job.
" Low " enough, indeed ! Yet these lines came
from Brookes's.

Recollecting, also, what constant personality
came from the pens of Thomas Moore,
Hazlitt, and of the writers in the journal called
" the Liberal," and from the whole school of
politicians who vilified Lord Castlereagh in
false and foul invectives, we are perfectly
justified in meeting with a denial the assertion
that Conservatives have been the most prolific
of vituperation.

We are reminded of these things, not merely
by the recent strictures on Wilson which have
appeared in some contemporary organs, but
also by observing. in this volume the spirited
and ingenious defence of Croker's " Boswell's
Johnson" against the famous onslaught of
Mr Macaulay. Even Mr. Macaulay himself
must admire the gallantry with which North
does battle for a friend in difficulties. The
versatility of Wilson, and the facile power
with which he could contract his large mind
to some of the petty questions involved in
the verbal:controversy, are strikingly displayed.
If we were ever in literary trouble we should
like to have as cool and skilful an ally as
North showed himself, though judgment must
be given against him in a court of criticism,
as Mr. Croker made several mistakes beyond
doubt, though they were comparatively venial
in a work with such immense variety of
references.

But the reason why people were so much
amused with Mr. Macaulay's scourging review
of Croker's " Boswell's Johnson" was because
a professed dealer in " slashing articles " was
himself exhibited at the whipping post before
all the world. The circumstance, also, that
the points urged with such rancorous skill by
Mr. Macaulay were both small and numerous
added to the sport. Mr. Cooker himself had
lacerated many authors on far less provocation,
and an undue amount of gall had been infused
into his ink if the culprit were of the softer
sex. His style of criticism rarely rose above
the tone of a pamphleteer of the last century,
and his typographical artifices in using italics
and CAPITALS were very tiresome. One of our
m ist respected Conservative collaborateurs
once in conversation happily described Mr.
Croker's style of reviewing—" Show hink.the
" horse that won the St. Leger, and he'd look
" for a flea in his hide."