ns and long
contemplations. The eternal spicy breeze would transform the leaden
atmosphere of his thought. An outlaw of the universe for his sins, he
would then be restored to the realities of the heart and mind. He would
then for the first time discover the difference between skill and
knowledge. Readers and writers would then be succeeded by human beings.
The golden ante-Cadmean age would come again. Literary sanctity having
become a tradition, there would be an end of its pretentious
counterfeits. The alphabet, decrepit with its long and vast labors,
would at last be released. The whole army of writers would take their
place among the curiosities of history. The Alexandrian thaumaturgists,
the Byzantine historians, the scholastic dialecticians, the serial
novelists, and the daily dissertationists, strung together, would make a
glittering chain of monomaniacs. Social life is a mutual joy; reading
may be rarely indulged without danger to sanity; but writing, unless the
man have genius, is but creating new rubbish, the nucleus of new deltas
of obstruction, till the river of life shall lose its way to the ocean,
and the Infinite be shut out altogether. The old bibliopole De Bury
flattered himself that he admired wisdom because it purchaseth such vast
delight. He had in mind the luxury of reading, and did not think that in
this world wisdom always hides its head or goes to the stake. Even if
literature were not to be abolished altogether, it is safe to think that
the world would be better off, if there were less writing. There should
be a division of labor; some should read and write, as some ordain laws,
create philosophies, tend shops, make chairs,--but why should everybody
dabble with literature?

In all hypotheses as to the more remote destiny of literature, we can
but be struck by the precariousness of its existence. It is art
imperishable and ever-changing material. A fire once extinguished
perhaps half the world's literature, and struck thousands from the list
of authors. The forgetfulness of mankind in the mysterious mediaeval age;
diminished by more than half the world of books. There are many books
which surely, and either rapidly or slowly, resolve themselves into the
elements, but the process cannot be seen. A whole army of books perishes
with every revolution of taste. And yet the amount of current writing
surpasses the strength of man's intellect or the length of his years.
Surely, the press is very much of