The Sun.
London, England, 1846-07-01 00:00:00

TAI.7'S.

With extreme pleasure we observe an accession of
talent to this able periodical, in the person of Mr. George
Gilfillan, as a contributor. What he has commenced in
his eloquent volume of " Literary Portraits," he appears
determined to complete here—namely, a gallery of those
personages who have during the present century adorned
the literature of Great Britain by their writings. And
we are glad to observe, in the first paper of his second
series, a very remarkable improvement in the style of
composition. What was previously extravagant in
brilliancy is now modulated to something approaching
to rhetorical correctness ; what was an exorbitant
elongation of paragraphs, heaped one upon the other for
the expression of a single idea, is now reduced to a brevity
more consonant with the object—namely, the utterance
of that single idea. Still Mr. Gilfillan must
guard himself from falling into an extreme of
condensation when he is thus endeavouring to correct
this tendency to copiousness. Despite the sneers of
certain frigid critics, he must, if he would not utterly
crampingand formalities his powers by a too
formalities of composi-
tion.tv ei d
rules
strictruin hissu b ge
cent
iiouns,toa
We would the more particularly urge this upon
him, as in his writings we recognise the impetuosity of
an enthusiastic thinker. Mr. Gilfillan throws his
thoughts upon paper with a nerve and earnestness which
we would not see abated one jot, even though it were
at the risk of encountering the blemishes of pre-
cipitation. Originality and
depth of sentiment, and
spontaneousness of diction may be frittered away bya
too great anxiety to produce sentences peculiar for ele-
gance, or arguments of a precise sequence, and a prim ap-
propriateness. We say thus much because we believe
Mr. Gilfillan to have received his credentials as an
author rather from nature than from the book-
shelf ; his mind is animated rather by an in-
nate vigour than by reflections from the dilectus or
schoolings from the dominie. " Sir Edward Buiwer
Lytton" is the first contemporary writer considered in
this new series, and forms an admirable opening paper to
Tait for July. It is to be hoped that Dickens, and
Carleton, and Marryat, and the rest of that fraternity,
will be anatomised by the same cunning hand. Full
justice is done to Bulwer as an essentially unique ro-
mancer. He is shown to be no copyist of others, but to
have formed for himself a class of novel writings, and
(what is still more) a Class of readers. But we conceive
the critic rather exaggerates when he observes that Sir
Edward's " stile is vicious from excess of virtue, weak
from repletion of strength ; that every word is a
point, every clause a beauty, the close of every
sentence a climax." The analogy drawn be-
tween the characters of Byron and Buiwer is
eccentric enough and Plut strehian enough ; and the eccen-
tricity of it is especially visible in the concluding remark
that "while Byron, by way of doing penance, threw his
jaded system into the Greek war, Buiwer has with better
result leaped into a tub of cold water !" Cordially do
we coincide with Gilfillan in regarding " Zanoni" as in
all respects the masterpiece of Bulwer Lytton ; the
memory of that beautiful book clings to us like a vision,
the like of which is never seen but once—a vision of the
mysterious, the solemn, and thepathetic. As a specimen
of the novelty with which Mr. Gilfillan invests even
Ithemes handled a thousand times before, and as an ex-
ample also of the brilliant mannerisms of his style, we
transcribe a few observations about Byron. After

/7-

perusing them, the reader will acknowledge that, as
Robert Hall said about Johnson, Gilfillan " shines most
on the angles of a thought."
" Byron's mind, in itself essentially unspeculative, was
forced upwards upon those rugged and dangerous tracts of
thought, where he has gathered the rarest of his beauties,
by intimacy with Shelley, by envious emulation of his Lake
contemporaries, and, above all, by the pale hand of his mi-
sery, unveiling to him heights and depths in his nature and
genius, which were previously unknown and unsuspected,
and beckoning him onward through their grim and shadowy
regions. He grew, at once, and equally, in guilt, misery,
and power. An intruder, too, on domains, where some other
thinkers had long fixed their calm and permanent dwelling,
his appearance was the more startling. Here was a dandy
discussing the great questions of natural and moral evil ; a
roué in silk stockings meditating suicide, and mouthing blas-
phemy on an Alpine rock; a brilliant and popular wit and
poet, setting Spinoza to music, and satirising the princi-
palities and powers of heaven as bitterly as he had done the
bards and reviewers of earth. Into those giddy and terrible
heights where Milton had entered a permitted guest in pri-
vilege of virtue; where Goethe had walked in like a pas-
sionless and prying cherub, forgetting to worship in his ab-
sorbing desire to know; and on which Shelley was wrecked
and stranded in the storm of his fanatical unbelief; Byron
is upborne by the presumption and the despair of his mental
misery."

Such articles as this one upon Bulwer are very appro-
priately introduced into the pages of Tait, since the
principle characteristic of that - magazine is that of
elaborate and dispassionate criticism. The credit which
iLhas already acquired in this respect is fully sus-
tained in the present number by the notices of Prince
Labanoff's " Lettters of Mary Stuart," Ulrici's volume
upon " Shakspere's Dramatic Art," Murdoch's " Tour
in France and Italy," and particularly by Thomas De
Guincey's sound analysis of the " Miscellaneous Works
of Mackintosh." We should recommend the son of
Sir James Mackintosh to revise his editorial
notes after the blunders and the " sins of
omission" which De Quincey has therein exposed.
A great responsibility is always assumed by, any man
who undertakes the editing of a bygone author, especi-
ally if that author has acquired for himself a reputation
so solid as that of Mackintosh ; and it becomes the,
bounden duty of such an editor to fulfil the responsibili-
ties of his seff-imposed offices with the utmost care and
the most scrupulous exactitude. Indeed anything like
an editorial slur, anything indicative of slovenliness in
the supervision of works like those, is excessively repre-
hensible. Hence. we are inclined.to think that a fresh
edition of these miscellaneous writings is necessary for
the reputation of Mr. Robert Mackintosh, if not for the
reputation of his celebrated father. The paper, such as
it is, written by De Quincey, will not be attractive to the
general magazine reader, but to the contemplative and to
the lover of bibliographic curiosities it will prove—to em-
ploy a somewhat cant and conventional phrase—" nuts."
The little fpoem addressed "To the Clouds," might
possible appear more worthy of insertion, did it not
recall, by the very association of its title, the dainty
lines of Shelley—and, by them, sink into insignificance.
In the " Literary Register," there are some agreeable
quotations ; and, what with the continuation of " Truth
and Falsehood, a Romance," Tait is not unworthy of
this summer season.