liberty, patriotism, charity, piety, benevolence, every generous feeling, every glowing sentiment, every ennobling passion, grows out of his descriptive powers. His matter always bursts into mind. His shrubbery, his forest, his flower-garden, all produce

Fruits worthy of Paradise,
and lead to immortality."

Mr. Stanley said, adverting again to the subject of conversation, it was an amusement to him to observe what impression the first introduction to general society made on a mind conversant with books, but to whom a the world was in a manner new.

"I believe," said Sir John, "that an overflowing commerce, and the excessive opulence it has introduced, though favorable to all the splendors of art and mechanic ingenuity, yet have lowered the standard of taste, and debilitated the mental energies. They are advantageous to luxury, but fatal to intellect. It has added to the brilliancy of the drawing-room itself, but deducted from that of the inhabitant. It has given perfection to our mirrors, our candelabras, our gilding, our inlaying, and our sculpture, but it has communicated a torpor to the imagination, and enervated our intellectual vigor."

"In one way," said Mr. Stanley, smiling, "luxury has been favorable to literature. From the unparalleled splendor of our printing, paper, engraving, illuminating and binding, luxury has caused more books to be purchased, while from the growth of time-absorbing dissipation, it causes fewer to be read. I believe we were much more familiar with our native poets in their former plain garb than since they have been attired in the gorgeous dress which now decorates our shelves."

"Poetry," replied Mr. Stanley, "has of late too much degenerated into personal satire, persiflage, and caricature among one class of writers, while among another it has exhibited the vagrancies of genius without the inspiration, the exuberance of fancy without the curb of judgment, and the eccentricities of invention without the restrictions of taste. The image has been strained, while the verse has been slackened. We have had pleonasm without fullness, and facility without force. Redundancy has been mistaken for plenitude, flimsiness for ease, and distortion for energy. An over desire of being natural has made the poet feeble, and the rage for being simple has sometimes made him silly. The sensibility is sickly, and the elevation vertiginous."

"To Cowper," said Sir John, "master of melody as he is, the mischief is partly attributable. Such an original must naturally have a herd of imitators. If