e all others to identify the reader with
the writer; compositions which are often discovered in a fugitive state,
but to which their authors were prompted by the fine impulses of genius,
derived from the peculiarity of their situation. Dictated by the heart, or
polished with the fondness of delight, these productions are impressed by
the seductive eloquence of genius, or attach us by the sensibility of
taste. The object thus selected is no task imposed on the mind of the
writer for the mere ambition of literature, but is a voluntary effusion,
warm with all the sensations of a pathetic writer. In a word, they
are the compositions of genius, on a subject in which it is most deeply
interested; which it revolves on all its sides, which it paints in
all its tints, and which it finishes with the same ardour it began. Among
such works may be placed the exiled Bolingbroke's "Reflections upon
Exile;" the retired Petrarch and Zimmerman's Essays on "Solitude;" the
imprisoned Boethius's "Consolations of Philosophy;" the oppressed Pierius
Valerianus's Catalogue of "Literary Calamities;" the deformed Hay's Essay
on "Deformity;" the projecting De Foe's "Essays on Projects;" the liberal
Shenstone's Poem on "Economy."

We may respect the profound genius of voluminous writers; they are a kind
of painters who occupy great room, and fill up, as a satirist expresses
it, "an acre of canvas." But we love to dwell on those more delicate
pieces,--a group of Cupids; a Venus emerging from the waves; a Psyche or
an Aglaia, which embellish the cabinet of the man of taste.

It should, indeed, be the characteristic of good Miscellanies, to be
multifarious and concise. Usbek, the Persian of Montesquieu, is one of the
profoundest philosophers, his letters are, however, but concise pages.
Rochefoucault and La Bruyere are not superficial observers of human
nature, although they have only written sentences. Of Tacitus it has been
finely remarked by Montesquieu, that "he abridged everything because he
saw everything." Montaigne approves of Plutarch and Seneca, because their
loose papers were suited to his dispositions, and where knowledge is
acquired without a tedious study. "It is," said he, "no great attempt to
take one in hand, and I give over at pleasure, for they have no sequel or
connexion." La Fontaine agreeably applauds short compositions:

Les longs ouvrages me font peur;
Loin d'epuiser une matiere,
On n'en doit prendre que la fleur;

an