Angelo has blocked
a Colossus which may stand in the public square to defy all
competitors. To be sure, that is its least merit,--that nobody
can do the like,--yet is it a gag to Cerberus. Its better merit
is that it inspires self-trust, by teaching the immense resources
that are in human nature; so I sent it to be read by a brave man
who is poor and decried. The doctrine is indeed true and grand
which you preach as by cannonade, that God made a man, and it
were as well to stand by and see what is in him, and, if he act
ever from his impulses, believe that he has his own checks, and,
however extravagant, will keep his orbit, and return from far; a
faith that draws confirmation from the sempiternal ignorance and
stationariness of society, and the sempiternal growth of all
the individuals.

The _Diamond Necklace_ I read with joy, whilst I read with my own
eyes. When I read with English or New-English eyes, my joy is
marred by the roaring of the opposition. I doubt not the exact
story is there told as it fell out, and told for the first time;
but the eye of your readers, as you will easily guess, will be
bewildered by the multitude of brilliant-colored hieroglyphics
whereby the meaning is conveyed. And for the Gig,--the Gig,--it
is fairly worn out, and such a cloud-compeller must mock that
particular symbol no more.

I thought as I read this piece that your strange genius was the
instant fruit of your London. It is the aroma of Babylon. Such
as the great metropolis, such is this style: so vast, enormous,
related to all the world, and so endless in details. I think you
see as pictures every street, church, parliament-house, barrack,
baker's shop, mutton-stall, forge, wharf, and ship, and whatever
stands, creeps, rolls, or swims thereabouts, and make all your
own. Hence your encyclopediacal allusion to all knowables, and
the virtues and vices of your panoramic pages. Well, it is your
own; and it is English; and every word stands for somewhat;
and it cheers and fortifies me. And what more can a man ask of
his writing fellow-man? Why, all things; inasmuch as a good
mind creates wants at every stroke.

The proof-sheet rhymes well with _Mirabeau,_ and has abated my
fears from your own and your brother's account of the new book.
I greet it well. Auspicious Babe, be born! The first good of
the book is that it makes you free, and as I anxiously hope makes
your body sound. A possible good is that it will