there are, who would, "if they could," eradicate it from every department: but, that this class is so large as Daleth intimates, is inadmissible without proof. If wit according to the general acceptation be understood by him to consist principally in a mirthful scurrility—a punning buffoonery, his assertion is indeed granted to be correct. The number, who are not only disgusted, but who actually disdain such attempts at the ridiculous, is both large,and able to defend their position. But that there is a large class of the community, who affect to be offended with wit,containing the characteristics of Locke's definition, [which by the way is the only one our author has given us,] demands for proof something besides his bare assertion.

If from the occasions on which he considers it proper to exercise wit, I arrive at his sentiment concerning it, he regards it but a slight degree, in merriment beyond that vivacity of temper, which is so happily adapted to cheer the dejected and comfort the mourner. He says that "the sacred ministry is not too grave for its exercise there, and that, not at the expense of its wonted, consequent sanctity:" "the physician of sense and skill" may employ it as "an effective antidote for sorrow and despondency, and in producing cheerfulness in scenes of sickness and mourning." I suppose that Daleth would not have the minister of Christ attempt to excite the boisterous laugh of the vulgar, or the physician entice his dying patient to mirth and gaiety. If then I have discovered his opinion concerning wit, if the statement I have made be what he understands by it, let me ask him to point out a numerous class of the community, who rather than despise it, would not rejoice in its diffusion. Let him refer to any article, which militates in the least against this idea of wit, in any publication supported by any numerous class of individ uals. Or let him mention the particular division of society, to which this class belongs,-whether to the rich, or the poor, to the learned or the ignorant, to the religious or the irreligious. Or are they pe culiar to any sect comprising a numerous class? Let him produce it. To whatever part of the community this class pertains, let him bring them forward. Then his censures may do good.

Wit, according to Locke's definition, has evidently a greater lat itude in gaiety, than by the view given above. According to that, the object of it is to please by readily bringing together such ideas as form pleasing pictures in the fancy. There can be no design in him, who uses it, to sooth and comfort; but simply to produce gaiety and pleasant arrision. Even if this be our author's sentiment

concerning wit, his assertion, or at least, strong intimation, that a large class affect to despise it on every occasion, needs proof.— Many doubtless would reject the idea of employing this kind of wit, in the pulpit, or in the chamber of the dying man. But Daleth may safely be challenged to prove that those, whether in the ministry, or at the bar, or in the medical department, or in the common walks of life, who would reject it thus defined, with disgust, "are not very rare.' So far as my own observation extends, the person, in whatever calling, has never been met with, who rejected wit taken in this sense, as improper, if exercised on proper occasions: If such, worthy of regard, exist, Daleth will do the readers of your work a favour, by so describing them that they may be known.

After proceeding in my remarks on the subject thus far, it would be hardly justifiable to close this communication without more fully expressing my own views of wit. The field of its range is wide, and as wide is the common import of the term. It extends from that pleasing vivacity so peculiar to some, to that power of connecting strange and unusual ideas, which excite the most noisy and boisterous laughter of the vulgar. To say that wit in its wildest form is proper, would be ridiculous. To pretend that it ought not to extend beyond that liveliness, which is always proper, would discover a frigidity unpardonable. It is, indeed, beyond my skill to mark the exact limits of its use. There are, however, certain characteristics of genuine wit, which may be pointed out and become auxiliary to ascertain its true bounds. Lord Chesterfield says, that "genuine wit never made a man laugh." From this it is quite difficult to see in what he would make true wit consist. Certainly, if this was once the common acceptation of the term, it is not now. The very design of it,as now understood, is to raise pleasant, risible sensations; and if this is not its effect, none would imagine that a preduction possessed any of the characteristics of wit. Were I called to give a definition to the term, I should say that true, genuine wit is the faculty of bringing together readily different ideas, in such an unusual, yet agreeable manner, as to produce risible sensations, with moderate and becoming laughter. If I am not mistaken this accords, with the common sentiment. Its characteristics, then, are pleasantry and the power of producing laughter. If this is the correct view, ought it to be exercised on all occasions? On this point Daleth has said nothing. If his sentiments accord with this definition, I agree with him, in the propriety of exercising it in every department; not, however, as he, by his catalogue of proper seasons and

places for exercising it, seems to intimate, on all occasions. Who, for instance, would think of throwing together a strange mass of ideas for the purpose of exciting the risible faculties of a dying man? Nor would it be pardonable in the minister of righteousness, called to sound the note of alarm in the ears of his congregation, and to set before them the tremendous scenes of the judgment of the great day, to draw their attention from these solemn and awful subjects, by mirthful witticisms. In satirical discourses, where the object is to hold up vice for contempt and ridicule, it is often useful and highly embellishing. In the recent temperance, reform it has been used to great advantage. At present nothing more.

SPECTATOR.

DAVID'S LAMENT.

SECOND SAMUEL CHAP. 1, VERSES 19-20-21.

Oh Israel! oh Israel! thy beauty is slain!
The boast of thy Mountains is low in the Vale ;*
Thy bravest and boldest are cold on the plain,
And the brow of thy mightiest, lifeless and pale.

Be silent in Gath, and O! breathe not a sound,
Where rise the tall turrets of proud Askełon;
Lest the halls of her City with triumph resound,
That the hope and the glory of Judah are gone.

Ye hills of Gilboa! receive not the dew,

Nor yield to the sickle your harvest of corn;
For the shield of the mighty is hidden with you,
And the hopes of the people are weak and forlorn.

The bow of the prince, and the falchion of Saul
Ne'er shone in the van of the battle in vain,

And the maids of Philistia exult in the fall

Of the Sword, that so oft drank the blood of their slain.

Oh Israel! oh Israel! thy beauty is slain!
The boast of thy Mountains is low in the Vale;

Thy bravest and boldest are cold on the plain,
And the brow of thy mightiest, lifeless and pale,

B. D.

I slept beneath that starlit sky,

And the odors fanned my rest,

And dreams, sweet dreams, came flitting by, Too fleeting to arrest.

VII.

Of my own far distant land I dreamed,

Of n

my

childhood's haunts of play;

Of the meadow, and wood, and the playmate stream,
So dear to my earlier day.

VIII.

'Tis chang'd-there's a sound like the dying note
Of the Bugle on the sea;

Like the last faint song of the swan's clear throat,
E're she sinks to her rest for aye.

The idea of cultivating style, as in a manner independent of thought, is a sad mistake. It is like the cultivation of manners, without any regard to duty and affection, their only genuine source. Style may be called the manners of the mind. And like them it will be natural or artificial, according as it arises from natural or artificial cultivation. Every mind has its own appropriate style; and that style can only be drawn forth and finished by the cultivation of thinking and reasoning. It is not surprising that we see such lamentable deficiences in style, when the writers have been led to cultivate a foreign, artificial style, instead of their own natural style, flowing out of the character of their own minds. "The style of a man," said Buffon to Herablt de Sechelles, "is the man himself." -Grimke.