amentable.

To the Thinkers of this nation, however, of which class it is firmly
believed there are individuals yet extant, we can safely recommend the
Work: nay, who knows but among the fashionable ranks too, if it be true,
as Teufelsdrockh maintains, that "within the most starched cravat there
passes a windpipe and weasand, and under the thickliest embroidered
waistcoat beats a heart,"--the force of that rapt earnestness may be
felt, and here and there an arrow of the soul pierce through? In our
wild Seer, shaggy, unkempt, like a Baptist living on locusts and wild
honey, there is an untutored energy, a silent, as it were unconscious,
strength, which, except in the higher walks of Literature, must be rare.
Many a deep glance, and often with unspeakable precision, has he cast
into mysterious Nature, and the still more mysterious Life of Man.
Wonderful it is with what cutting words, now and then, he severs asunder
the confusion; sheers down, were it furlongs deep; into the true centre
of the matter; and there not only hits the nail on the head, but with
crushing force smites it home, and buries it.--On the other hand, let us
be free to admit, he is the most unequal writer breathing. Often after
some such feat, he will play truant for long pages, and go dawdling and
dreaming, and mumbling and maundering the merest commonplaces, as if he
were asleep with eyes open, which indeed he is.

Of his boundless Learning, and how all reading and literature in most
known tongues, from _Sanchoniathon_ to _Dr. Lingard_, from your Oriental
_Shasters_, and _Talmuds_, and _Korans_, with Cassini's _Siamese
fables_, and Laplace's _Mecanique Celeste_, down to _Robinson Crusoe_
and the _Belfast Town and Country Almanack_, are familiar to him,--we
shall say nothing: for unexampled as it is with us, to the Germans such
universality of study passes without wonder, as a thing commendable,
indeed, but natural, indispensable, and there of course. A man that
devotes his life to learning, shall he not be learned?

In respect of style our Author manifests the same genial capability,
marred too often by the same rudeness, inequality, and apparent want of
intercourse with the higher classes. Occasionally, as above hinted, we
find consummate vigor, a true inspiration; his burning thoughts step
forth in fit burning words, like so many full-formed Minervas, issuing
amid flame and splendor from Jove's head; a rich, idiomatic diction,
picturesque allusions