“_July 4._—The difference between Scott and Shakspere is of two kinds: (1) the difference of dramatic and prosaic description, and (2) the native difference of the two men. The first involves a discussion and comparison of the two kinds of writing. The dramatic is _narrower_, more formal and measured, and consequently more _stiff_. No one ever heard one speak as Macbeth, as Hamlet, or as Iago, for no one ever spoke so. Passion, or indeed nature, never marches in heroic measure. In another respect it differs. There is a general _sameness of language_. The imitation of nature respects _feelings_ and character, and not _expression_, if we except some comic characters. But prose imitates with perfect freedom, unshackled by _verse_, not only the passion, _character_, etc., but the _expression_ and _language_. “In this respect Scott differs from himself as a poet and novelist as much as when a novelist he differs from Shakspere, etc....” Similar and lengthy criticisms of Crabbe, Coleridge, Byron, Burns, and others follow, many of them crude, but all aiming to grasp and express the original thought of the poet, as he says after naming some rules by which to judge a book: “But such things are the externals of criticism. I admire the German way of going into the motive and spirit of a poem, and discussing the principles and source of feeling.” We find his habit of drawing from his own experiences some moral or spiritual lesson, and then teaching it to others, thus early formed: “_June 27, 1835._— ... Being unwell is by no means useless. It crowds one on to thoughts of death, and sweeps away all the mist of forgetfulness which the frivolity of events has accumulated. One must either wrap himself in designed forgetfulness—which is a stupid resource—or come to some conclusion in respect to his religious prospects. For my part, in sickness (what little I have had) I am not agitated, but rendered serious and calmly apprehensive, and I begin to think what God is, and Christ, and heavenly joy, and compare them with my tastes and disposition, and see if they accord or are repulsive. I’ve written enough for the present, so I’ll return to Scott’s ‘Legend of Montrose.’” We find very little, almost nothing, concerning the regulation work and studies of the theological course, possibly because some other book which has not come down to us contained these. He seems to have plenty to do, and carries into his work a very decided determination to succeed.