Although but few works are known to be from the pen of Mr. Kimball, he has been a voluminous author. The vigorous and polished style of his avowed compositions, is never attained but by long practice. He has been, we believe, a contributor to every volume of the _Knickerbocker_ published since 1842. He printed in that excellent magazine his "Reminiscences of an Old Man," "The Young Englishman," and the successive chapters of "St. Leger, or the Threads of Life." This last work was published by Putnam, and by Bentley in London, about one year ago, and it passed rapidly through two English and three American editions. It was not raised into an ephemeral popularity, as so many works of fiction easily are, for their lightness, by careless applauses; it arrested the attention of the wisest critics; commanded their study, and received their verdict of approval as a book of learning and reflection in the anatomy of human life. Mr. Kimball had been eminent in his class at college for a love of Greek literature, and he studied the Roman also with reverent attention. It was his distinction that he had thoroughly acquainted himself with the philosophy of the ancients. At a later day he was attracted by the speculation of the Germans, and a mastery of their language enabled him to enter fully into the spirit of Spinosa, Kant, and Fichte, as he did into that of the finer intelligences, Goeethe and Richter, and pervading he found the passion to know Whence are we? What are we? Whither do we go? In "St. Leger," a mind predisposed to superstition by some vague prophecies respecting the destiny of his family--a mind inquisitive, quick, and earnest, but subject to occasional melancholy, as the inherited spell obtains a mastery of the reason--is exposed to the influences of a various study, and startling experiences, all conceived with a profound knowledge of human nature, and displayed with consummate art; having a metaphysical if not a strictly dramatic unity; and conducting by the subtlest processes, to the determination of these questions, and the flowering of a high and genial character; as Professor Tayler Lewis expresses it, "at rest, deriving substantial enjoyment from the present, because satisfied with respect to the ultimate, and perfect, and absolute."[9]