eady, and gentle reader, in what civilized part
of Central Africa such question and reply will be made, we predict not;
but you and we feel, that when and wheresoever the little dialogue shall
occur, we two shall have for ourselves our own sufficient share of
posthumous reputation, and eke Charles Knight. These twelve volumes always
lying on their own line of our table, are Charles' edition of Shakspeare,
alone of all our valuables uninsured at the Sun, for they are bound in
asbestos. And now, obedient reader, listen to us lecturing, like a
philosophical critic as we are, on Pope's ESSAY ON CRITICISM, involved in
these ten volumes, edited twenty years ago by William Roscoe, now with the
saints.

Essay on Criticism! What does one expect? Criticism, be it noted, has two
phases. This is the first. In its origin, it follows now afar, now close
upon the works out of which it has arisen. It describes the methods which
genius has half-instinctively, half-thoughtfully followed. It brings out
into clear statement, certain movements and felt workings of genius; and
it defines formal imitation to workers that shall come. It appears,
therefore, as an embodying of rules. This is, in the main, the shape in
which criticism appears in classical antiquity. This was the meaning of
the name with Pope and his contemporaries. "_Dicta sunt omnia_," remarks
Quinctilian, (insisting upon the order in which nature produces, first,
the arts themselves, poetry or eloquence, in power--operative; _then_, the
deduction and exposition of the method,) "_antequam praeciperentur_." And
so in Pope and his contemporaries, we read of nothing but
RULES--RULES--RULES! At this day, the word then in honour, grates, albeit
a smooth one, upon one's ear. It seems to depress and to tame, to shut up
and imprison thought, which would range and soar, and asks breath, and
vigour, and liberty, from true criticism. The truth is, that since that
day the world has turned round, and we are turned philosophers. Thus the
second phasis has arisen. We want no longer the rules, but the
PRINCIPLES--the facts or the laws in our nature, and the nature of things
about us, which have given out the rules; whence they flowed to Homer and
to Demosthenes. We will drink from the fountains; not even from those
"golden urns!" And with right and with reason, for we, too, are the
children of nature. Besides, we will JUDGE Homer and Demosthenes. Without
doubt, criticism, founded as an art empir