he accepts the rest as
unavoidable stuffing, in order to escape the reproach of ignorance or
defect. In the Essay there is no padding. Nothing is put in from
external considerations. The Author here admits no temporising with
his subject.

However foreign the theme may be to him, there is always some point of
contact between himself and the strange Personality. There is certain
to be some crevice through which he can insinuate himself into this
alien nature, after the fashion of the cunning actor with his part. He
tries to feel its feelings, to think its thoughts, to divine its
instincts, to discover its impulses and its will--then retreats from it
once more, and sets down what he has gathered.

Or he steeps himself intimately in the subject, till he feels that the
Alien Personality is beginning to live in him. It may be months before
this happens; but it comes at last. Another Being fills him; for the
time his soul is captive to it, and when he begins to express himself
in words, he is freed, as it were, from an evil dream, the while he is
fulfilling a cherished duty.

It is a welcome task to one who feels himself congenial to some Great
or Significant Man, to give expression to his cordial feelings and his
inspiration. It becomes an obsession with him to communicate to others
what he sees in his Idol, his Divinity. Yet it is not Inspiration for
his Subject alone that makes the Essayist. Some point that has no
marked attraction in itself may be inexpressibly precious to the Author
as Material, presenting itself to him with some rare stamps or
unexpected feature, that affords a special vehicle for the expression
of his temperament. Every man favours what he can describe or set
forth better than his neighbours; each seeks the Stuff that calls out
his capacities, and gives him opportunity to show what he is capable
of. Whether the Personality portrayed be at his Antipodes, whether or
no he have one single Idea in common with him, matters nothing. The
picture may in sooth be most successful when the Original is entirely
remote from the delineator, in virtue of contrary temperament, or
totally different mentality,--just because the traits of such a nature
stand out the more sharply to the eye of the tranquil observer.

Since Montaigne wrote the first Essays, this Form has permeated every
country. In France, Sainte-Beuve, in North America, Emerson, has
founded his School. In Germany, Hillebranat follows th