t would produce and the
idea it should convey. Goldsmith reminded Miss Reynolds of 'a low
mechanic, particularly . . . a journey-man tailor'; but that he was
unconsciously the most elegant and natural writer of his age is a
position which has not yet been advanced. And surely it is high time
that Boswell should take that place in art which is his by right of
conquest, and that Macaulay's paradox--which is only the opinion
brilliantly put of an ignorant and unthinking world--('Il avait mieux que
personne l'esprit de tout le monde')--should go the way of all its kind.

CONGREVE

His Biographers and Critics.

An American literary journal once assured its readers that Congreve has a
'niche in the Valhalla of Ben Jonson.' The remark is injudicious, of
course, even for a literary American, and there is no apparent reason why
it should ever have got itself uttered. It is probably the unluckiest
thing that ever was said of Congreve, who--with some unimportant
exceptions--has been singularly fortunate in his critics and biographers.
Dryden wrote of him with enthusiasm, and in doing so he may be said to
have set a fashion of admiration which is vigorous and captivating even
yet. Swift, Voltaire, Lamb, Hunt, Hazlitt, Thackeray, Macaulay, to name
but these, have dealt with him in their several ways; of late he has been
praised by such masters of the art of writing as Mr. Swinburne and Mr.
George Meredith; while Mr. Gosse, the last on the list, surpasses most of
his predecessors in admiration and nearly all, I think, in knowledge.

The Real Congreve.

It is no fault of Mr. Gosse's that with all his diligence he should fail
to give a complete and striking portrait of his man, or to make more of
what he describes as his 'smiling, faultless rotundity.' As he puts it:
'There were no salient points about Congreve's character,' so that 'no
vagaries, no escapades place him in a ludicrous or in a human light,' and
'he passes through the literary life of his time as if in felt slippers,
noiseless, unupbraiding, without personal adventures.' That, I take it,
is absolutely true. It is known that Congreve was cheerful, serviceable,
and witty; that he was a man of many friends; that Pope dedicated his
_Iliad_ to him; that Dryden loved and admired him; that Collier attacked
his work, and that his rejoinder was equally spiritless and ill-bred;
that he was attached to Mrs. Bracegirdle, and left all his money to the
Duch