ize with the character of a rake; and although he hurt
himself by his follies, he did his best to help others by his genial
wisdom. If he did not sufficiently regard his own interests, his
thoughts, as Addison said, 'teemed with projects for his country's
good.' Savage Landor, with an impulse of somewhat extravagant eulogy,
exclaimed, 'What a good critic Steele was! I doubt if he has ever been
surpassed.' This is one of the sayings that will not bear examination.
Steele had doubtless the fine perception of what is noble in art and
literature, which some men possess instinctively. He felt what was good,
but does not appear either to have reached or strengthened his
conclusions by any process of study.

As an essayist Steele is careless, rapid, emotional, and disposed to be
on the best terms with himself and with his readers. He makes them sure
that if they could have met him in his rollicking mood at Will's
Coffee-house, he would have treated them all round, even if, like
Goldsmith, he had been forced to borrow the money to do it. But he was
not always in this reckless humour. His heart was expansive in its
sympathies and tender as a woman's; his mind was open to all kindly
influences, and his essays have in them the rich blood and vivid
utterances of a man who has 'warmed both hands before the fire of life.'

Between Steele's _Guardian_ (1713) and the _Rambler_ of Johnson (1750),
a period of thirty-seven years, a swarm of periodicals testify to the
fame of Steele and Addison. The reader curious on the subject will find
in Dr. Drake's essays a minute account of the numerous essayists who
flourished, or who made an effort to live, between the close of the
eighth volume of the _Spectator_ and the beginning of the present
century. Of these a few have still a place on our shelves, but for the
most part they enjoyed a butterfly existence, and serve but to prove the
immeasurable superiority of the writers who created the English Essay.

FOOTNOTES:

[36] Cibber's _Apology_, p. 386.

[37] Courthope's _Addison_, p. 150.

[38] _English Dramatic Literature_, vol. ii., p. 603.

[39] 'It is a strange thing,' he writes, 'that you will not behave
yourself with the obedience people of worse features do, but that I must
be always giving you an account of every trifle and minute of my time.'

[40] Steele had been previously married to Mrs. Stretch, a widow, who
possessed an estate in the West Indies; but the lady did not long
sur