ces saved it from manifold excesses; for Jeffrey was not a man
to be moderate in times like those. The brilliant critic received not a
few such lectures as the following:--"I certainly, my dear Jeffrey, in
conjunction with the Knight of the Shaggy Eyebrows [Homer], do protest
against your increasing and unprofitable skepticism. I exhort you to
restrain the violent tendency of your nature for analysis, and to
cultivate synthetical propensities. What is virtue? What's the use
of truth? What's the use of honor? What's a guinea but a d--d yellow
circle? The whole effort of your mind is to destroy. Because others
build slightly and eagerly, you employ yourself in kicking down their
houses, and contract a sort of aversion for the more honorable, useful,
and difficult task of building well yourself." It was the boast of
Sydney Smith in old age that he had very little to change in the
opinions which he had at various times advanced,--that he had seen
every important measure which he had advocated passed and become
recognized as beneficent. The variety of the review suited the
versatility of his talent; the problem, What worthy thing shall I employ
myself in doing? was solved; and an ample public career was opened to
him. When, after five years, he passes from Edinburgh to London, he is
not only a poor clergyman, but a famous Edinburgh reviewer. He becomes
popular in society and as a preacher, and delivers pictures on Moral
Philosophy to crowded houses of the _elite_ of the metropolis.

When he is again exiled as a curate, his solitude is not unbroken, but
he receives and returns the visits of the most eminent people. His
neighbors ran to him one day, shortly after his arrival, exclaiming,
--"Please your honor, a coach! a coach! a coach!" Sydney saw in the
distance the equipage of Lord Holland, and challenged the admiration of
his parishioners by boldly answering,--"Well, my good friends, _stand
firm_; never mind, even if there should be a coach; it will do us no
harm;--let us see." A simple pastor and an eminent man, with flashing
energy he approves himself a good man. Sunday he preached, Monday he
doctored the sick, Tuesday Sir James Mackintosh visited him for a week,
Wednesday he read Ariosto, Thursday he began an article, Friday he
reviewed his patients, Saturday he repaired his barn. Now he is laying
down a rule that no day shall pass in which he will not make somebody
happy; now he is fixing a bar whereon it shall be conven