executed ably, and in many parts brilliantly. In some respects it is an extraordinary work; such as few men in America, perhaps, besides its author, could have produced, and he only after years of sedulous investigation, and under many advantages of circumstance or accident. He has long shown himself to be of Cicero's mind: “Mihi quidem nulli satis erudito videntur, quibus nostra ignota sunt." The distribution of the various writers into their classes, and the selection of representatives of each class or type, exhibit much skill. Many passages present fine specimens of acute, original and just criticism, eloquently delivered. We differ from Mr. Griswold sometimes, but never without a respect for his judgment, and never without feeling that we owe it to the public in all cases to give a reason why we do not assent to the conclusions of so candid and discriminating a judge. We acknowledge Mr. Griswold to be a good critic; and if his personal friends or others claim for him the title of a writer of firstrate merit, we make no other hesitation than that we have not yet seen quite enough of original matter from his pen. "The strength of the eagle," says Mr. Hallam, "is to be measured, not only by the height of his place, but by the time that he continues on the wing." If the editor of "The Prose Writers" will produce an entire volume on some continuous subject, in the same style of fearless and acute discussion, and of graceful and elegant composition, which is displayed in some of the paragraphs herewhich we do not question his ability to do-we shall readily admit his right to take a place among the foremost authors of the country. The present volume we have read with constant interest and frequent admiration. We have derived more instruction from it than it would be becoming in a reviewer to admit. The reader is here brought for a time into society with the greatest and most accomplished of the minds of this country :

Et varias audit voces fruiturque deorum
Colloquio."

It is much to admit that we pass to the comments of the author without any very sensible diminution of interest or respect.

The benefits to be expected from a compilation like this are

several. In the first place, by exhibiting in concentrated brightness, "the ancestors' fair glory gone before," it will stimulate the youthful energy of the day to more earnest action in this great field of exertion and renown. In the next place, it will tend to ascertain and illustrate, by a kind of induction, more reliable than any speculation or random experiment, the natural and proper tone and character of American literature. We wish, as perhaps all wish, and we believe, as certainly many do not believe, that there is, or is to be, a literature peculiarly and distinctively American. This country in its origin was little else than a concourse of individual persons, aggregated but not associated, and of companies clustered but not combined; gradually this "dust and powder of individuality" has tended to an organization: a definite principle of social life has been evolved, or is evolving; characteristics of a national existence have been perceived, and have deepened and multiplied as time has gone on. In every thing the dead-reckoning, which carried forward the old wisdom into the new region, has failed or begun to fail, and new observations have required to be taken. A thousand tokens in every thing from which we can prognosticate, make it manifest that a spirit, indigenous and self-vital, inhabits our country; a spirit of power, ipsa suis pollens opibus. If all this be so, there is an end of the question about a national literature; for this creative vigor, breathing and burning in the bosom of the nation, must find an issue in art as well as in action. The flower of literature will blow, and the fruit of science bloom, upon the tree of national life, as surely as the branches and leaves of business, politics or war expand and strengthen. It is then of the first consequence that every one interested in associating his name with his land's language, should apprehend correctly the tendencies of the literary spirit of the country, in order that he may divine the nature of that literature in its perfect development; for it is only as his productions embody and represent that native spirit of art, that they will have a permanent life. He must look backward, and catch a prophecy of the future from the performances of the past. He must listen to the various notes that have been struck; observe which sound falsely, which have died away and become in

audible, and which rise and flow and swell upon the ear, the true key-notes of the symphony. Of one thing, however, even a hasty glance gives us a gratifying assurance; that of whatever nature or quality the new literature may be, it will bear no resemblance to the productions of "Young America;" a fraternity young only in wisdom, and incapable of representing any thing of America but its vulgarity. Following the order of Mr. Griswold, we shall, in the discursive observations which we propose, attempt a hasty review of the several departments in which monuments of the mental vigor of America remain for the instruction and delight of mankind: beginning with her statesmen and orators.

The Congress which, having vindicated by arms those principles of liberty that are constitutional in Anglo-Saxon society, afterward assembled to define and institute them in abiding forms of legislation, brought together, to use the language in which Warburton spoke of the Long Parliament, "the greatest set of geniuses for government that ever embarked in a common cause." And to this day, that high lineage has never failed. Political and legal ability, in fact, seem to be an instinct of the American people; and those faculties, implying an action, present, personal and persuasive, admit of scarcely any effective literary sortie but in oratory. Accordingly, the eloquence of the bar, the legislative hall and the popular assembly constitutes the most characteristic display of American intelligence, and of itself sustains our pretension to take a rank among the great intellectual nations of the world. In the night of tyranny the eloquence of the country first blazed up, like the lighted signal-fires of a distracted border, to startle and enlighten the community. Every where, as the news of this or that fresh invasion of liberty and right was passed on through the land, men ran together and called upon some speaker to address them. It is a striking evidence of the dignity and elevation of this noble gift, that at seasons demanding deep wisdom, and varied resources of suggestion and experience, and consummate judgment, oratory was the most commanding influence in the state, and that it was then more splendid, more finished, more truly classical, than it has been in any times

of less excited interest. Eloquence is the enthusiasm of reason, the passion of the mind; it is judgment raised into transport, and breathing the irresistible ardors of sympathy. It contributed in a great degree to the adoption of the Federal constitution; and never let it be forgotten, that when the same perverse and fatal spirit, against which the constitution in its infancy had prevailed, again appeared in the councils of the nation, inflamed by interest and ambition, and at once insidious and dómineering, to betray the system which it could not overthrow, it was the same divine energy that, with the indignation of truth, the power of argument, and a torrent-rush of resistless feeling, swept forth to scatter and punish the foe. The eloquence of Hamilton, spoken and written, did much to establish our national system; the

eloquence of Webster did more to defend and save it.

“Duo fulmina belli,

Scipiadas, cladem Libyæ !"

Looking then at the monuments of American eloquence, even with the severe eye of scholars and critics, there is cause for satisfaction and a just pride. There is Henry, not fulminating from the clouds, like Demosthenes, to terrify men into sense and virtue ; not sending up a flash, like Cicero, to be a signal to distant ages, rather than a fire of present energy; but first drawing his hearers' sympathies to him by a delightful conciliation, and then charging them with the fervor of his own bosom; familiar, simple and near, yet intense, vehement and thrilling; converting his hearers first into friends, and then animating them into partisans, and finally hurrying all along with him in one united fellowship of feeling; not surpassing in intellect, rarely analytical, never ascending to the illuminated heights of abstract wisdom ; but setting before his mind usually some one definite object, and piercing it through and through by the shaft of a sound understanding, pointed by an honest purpose, and driven by all the force of devoted passion. There is Ames, whose speech was enchantment, and his pen a subtler magic; possessed by nature of "the delicacy which distinguishes in words the shades of sentiment, the grace which brings them to the soul of the reader with

the charm of novelty united to clearness ;" whose dignified and pure spirit, apprehending a corrupt triumph as the most fatal of failures, and unprincipled success as only a keener disgrace, desponded, not because it did not see justly and foresee clearly, but because its hopes had been so high and its feeling so refined; as the common air would cloud and sully an atmosphere of more essential ether; who, had he lived to see what we see, with his quick sensibilities of honor and his far-reflective sagacity, instead of recalling one of his gloomy anticipations, would perhaps have pointed to the most despairing omens of his eloquence, and have said in anguish: "This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears!" There is Otis the elder, impetuous, uncompromising, kindling; Marshall, who could vindicate the power of reason in discussion as impressively as he could illustrate its dignity in judgment; whose only surviving oration stands like the cyclopean structure of a superior race; Rutledge, Adams. Coming down to later times, Quincy, Stockton, Wirt, and afterward Clay, Calhoun, Everett, are truly orators of the early heroic age of our statesmen, the μ0ɛot of our history. Mr. Griswold has properly chosen Hamilton as the principal and representative. He closes an animated survey of his life with these discriminating remarks:

"In every page of the works of Hamilton we discover an original, vigorous and practical understanding, informed with various and profound knowledge. But few of his speeches were reported, and even these very imperfectly; but we have traditions of his eloquence, which represent it as wonderfully winning and persuasive. Indeed, it is evident from its known effects that he was a debater of the very first class. He thought clearly and rapidly, had a ready command of language, and addressed himself solely to the reason. He never

lost his self-command, and never seemed impatient; but from the bravery of his nature, and his contempt of meanness and servility, he was perhaps sometimes indiscreet. His works were written hastily, but we can discover in them no signs of immaturity or carelessness; on the contrary, they are hardly excelled in compactness, clearness, elegance, and purity of language."

Mr. Webster is properly selected as the representative of the best sense and highest wisdom and most consummate dignity of the politics and oratory of the present times. With elements of reason, definite, absolute and emphatic; with principles settled,