In the Southern Literary Messenger for April, which reached us a few days since, the Editor opens the department of “critical notices” with some spirited and just remarks on the puffing system, as practised in this country towards native writers, and a vindication of his own course. He is on the strong side, whatever number or influences may be arrayed against him, and will do much good even though he run occasionally into the extreme of severity. Many people really believe, by dint of reading the repeated praise bestowed on them, that the marrowless prose fictions and “baseless” verse of the day constitute a Literature. Let the editor of the Messenger and others, go on purging their judgment of such crude notions, and assuming a high standard of literary merit, require substantial qualifications in candidates for fame, and condemn unsparingly all who do not unite genius with cultivation, a union indispensable for the production of works of permanent value. From the Baltimore Athenæum. _Southern Literary Messenger_.—The April number of this excellent periodical is before us, and fully maintains the dignity and reputation won by its predecessors. We have read it carefully, and therefore hold ourselves qualified to pronounce judgment on its general merit. The articles in prose, are _all_ good. We wish we could say the same of the poetry; which, with the exception of the dramatic sketch entitled “The Death of Robespierre,” (admirable by the bye, although we think the writer has caught somewhat of the reflection of Coleridge,) we say, with the above exception, the poetry, judged by the Editor's own standard, that of Ideality, does not rank above mediocrity. The critical notices, together with the brief introductory essay “On the present state of American criticism,” are in the Editor's best vein. We like the independent spirit, and critical acumen, which {520} he evinces in the performance of his duty; and, however we may at times be induced to differ with him in opinion, yet we cannot but say, that in general his dissections of “poor devil authors,” though apparently severe, are well merited. In making this admission, we do not withdraw any opinion heretofore expressed when we have differed from the Editor of the Messenger, for, whenever we dislike an article we shall, (as we have ever done,) speak our mind fully though in all friendliness. But we assert our conviction, that judicious criticism, exercised without regard to persons, has been long wanting. There was a time when American Reviewers _imported_ their decisions on the works of native authors, and frowned down any attempt to resist the foreign decree. They have now rushed into the opposite extreme, the barrier once broken down, the torrent of adulation has lifted up every man who could fill a book with words; and changed the current of popular feeling to such an extent, that it