[Note 7: _It was so Keats learned_. This must be swallowed with a grain of salt. The best criticism of the poetry of Keats is contained in his own _Letters_, which have been edited by Colvin and by Forman.] [Note 8: _Montaigne ... Cicero_. Montaigne, as a child, spoke Latin before he could French: see his _Essays_. Montaigne is always original, frank, sincere: Cicero (in his orations) is always a _Poseur_.] [Note 9: _Burns ... Shakespeare_. Some reflection on, and investigation of these statements by Stevenson, will be highly beneficial to the student.] [Note 10: The literary scales. It is very interesting to note that Thomas Carlyle had completely mastered the technique of ordinary prose composition, before he deliberately began to write in his own picturesque style, which has been called "Carlylese"; note the enormous difference in style between his _Life of Schiller_ (1825) and his _Sartor Resartus_ (1833-4). Carlyle would be a shining illustration of the point Stevenson is trying to make.] No notes have been added to the second and third parts of this essay, as these portions are unimportant, and may be omitted by the student; they are really introductory to something quite different, and are printed in our edition only to make this essay complete. VIII BOOKS WHICH HAVE INFLUENCED ME[1] The Editor[2] has somewhat insidiously laid a trap for his correspondents, the question put appearing at first so innocent, truly cutting so deep. It is not, indeed, until after some reconnaissance and review that the writer awakes to find himself engaged upon something in the nature of autobiography, or, perhaps worse, upon a chapter in the life of that little, beautiful brother whom we once all had, and whom we have all lost and mourned, the man we ought to have been, the man we hoped to be. But when word has been passed (even to an editor), it should, if possible, be kept; and if sometimes I am wise and say too little, and sometimes weak and say too much, the blame must lie at the door of the person who entrapped me.