The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. I., No. 8, April, 1835Various
General
The Southern Literary Messenger, Vol. I., No. 8, April, 1835
Various
American literature -- 19th century -- Periodicals
The first article contains a spirited review of the political events
in France since the revolution of 1830, and of the foreign and
internal policy of Louis Philippe. The progress of the _juste milieu_
system is well delineated, and a forcible picture is drawn of the
present posture of the French government. We do not entirely coincide
with the writer's ideas of the onward course of the cause of liberty,
(or perhaps more correctly, of revolution) in France; but consider the
article generally correct and instructive. That on Coleridge is
admirable: and we heartily rejoice that in a work so much looked up to
in England as is the North American, for the expression of our
literary opinions, justice so ample should have been done to that
extraordinary mind. A Baltimore newspaper, in allusion to the article
in question, speaks of "the pitiful shifts to which the reviewer is
driven to account for a fact which he admits, viz.--that there is but
here and there an individual who understands him," [Coleridge.] "What
stronger proof do we want," says the journalist, "of that confusion of
thought and mysticism with which he has been charged?" We think _far_
stronger proofs are necessary to support the accusation. That but few
comprehend the metaphysical treatises of Coleridge, is owing to the
simple fact, that few are so thoroughly versed in psychological
knowledge as to maintain a position in the van of the science, the
post universally acceded to Coleridge by the learned in ethics. It is
for this class of men that he has written, and in whose applauses he
has received a plentiful reward. These, at least, will not hesitate to
say that so far from being justly charged with confusion of thought,
and its consequence confusion of expression, no man who ever lived
thought _more distinctly even when thinking wrong_, or more intimately
felt and comprehended the power of _the niceties of words_. That his
philosophical disquisitions are abstruse, is the fault of the
subjects, and not of the language in which he has treated them, than
which none can be more lucid or appropriate.
The article on Italy is interesting--also that on the National
Gallery. In the notice of the _Last Days of Pompeii_, justice is by no
means done to that most noble of modern novels.
* * * * *
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