e before." For myself, I
doubt whether the exaltation of Fielding has not become too much a matter
of orthodoxy in recent years. Compare him with Swift, and he is
long-winded in his sentences. Compare him with Sterne, and his characters
are mechanical. Compare him with Dickens, and he reaches none of the
depths, either of laughter or of sadness. This is not to question the
genius of Fielding's vivid and critical picture of eighteenth-century
manners and morals. It is merely to put a drag on the wheel of Mr
Saintsbury's galloping enthusiasm.

But, however one may quarrel with it, _The Peace of the Augustans_ is a
book to read with delight--an eccentric book, an extravagant book, a
grumpy book, but a book of rare and amazing enthusiasm for good
literature. Mr. Saintsbury's constant jibes at the present age, as though
no one had ever been unmanly enough to make a joke before Mr. Shaw, become
amusing in the end like Dr. Johnson's rudenesses. And Mr. Saintsbury's one
attempt to criticize contemporary fiction--where he speaks of _Sinister
Street_ in the same breath with _Waverley_ and _Pride and Prejudice_--is
both amusing and rather appalling. But, in spite of his attitude to his
own times, one could not ask for more genial company on going on a
pilgrimage among the Augustans. Mr. Saintsbury has in this book written
the most irresistible advertisement of eighteenth-century literature that
has been published for many years.

(2) MR. GOSSE

Mr. Gosse and Mr. Saintsbury are the two kings of Sparta among English
critics of to-day. They stand preeminent among those of our contemporaries
who have served literature in the capacity of law-givers during the past
fifty years. I do not suggest that they are better critics than Mr.
Birrell or Sir Sidney Colvin or the late Sir E.T. Cook. But none of these
three was ever a professional and whole-time critic, as Mr. Gosse and Mr.
Saintsbury are. One thinks of the latter primarily as the authors of books
about books, though Mr. Gosse is a poet and biographer as well, and Mr.
Saintsbury, it is said, once dreamed of writing a history of wine. One
might say of Mr. Gosse that even in his critical work he writes largely as
a poet and biographer, while Mr. Saintsbury writes of literature as though
he were writing a history of wine. Mr. Saintsbury seeks in literature,
above all things, exhilarating qualities. He can read almost anything and
in any language, provided it is not non-intoxicating.