without reference to the differences which exist
between them. In a literary body this can never be the case. Literature
is, and always must be, inseparably blended with politics and theology;
it is the great engine which moves the feelings of a people on the most
momentous questions. It is, therefore, impossible that any society
can be formed so impartial as to consider the literary character of an
individual abstracted from the opinions which his writings inculcate. It
is not to be hoped, perhaps it is not to be wished, that the feelings
of the man should be so completely forgotten in the duties of the
academician. The consequences are evident. The honours and censures
of this Star Chamber of the Muses will be awarded according to the
prejudices of the particular sect or faction which may at the time
predominate. Whigs would canvass against a Southey, Tories against a
Byron. Those who might at first protest against such conduct as unjust
would soon adopt it on the plea of retaliation; and the general good of
literature, for which the society was professedly instituted, would be
forgotten in the stronger claims of political and religious partiality.

Yet even this is not the worst. Should the institution ever acquire any
influence, it will afford most pernicious facilities to every malignant
coward who may desire to blast a reputation which he envies. It will
furnish a secure ambuscade, behind which the Maroons of literature may
take a certain and deadly aim. The editorial WE has often been fatal
to rising genius; though all the world knows that it is only a form of
speech, very often employed by a single needy blockhead. The academic WE
would have a far greater and more ruinous influence. Numbers, while
they increase the effect, would diminish the shame, of injustice.
The advantages of an open and those of an anonymous attack would be
combined; and the authority of avowal would be united to the security of
concealment. The serpents in Virgil, after they had destroyed Laocoon,
found an asylum from the vengeance of the enraged people behind the
shield of the statue of Minerva. And, in the same manner, everything
that is grovelling and venomous, everything that can hiss, and
everything that can sting, would take sanctuary in the recesses of this
new temple of wisdom.

The French academy was, of all such associations, the most widely and
the most justly celebrated. It was founded by the greatest of ministers:
it was pat