gymen from polemics;
but to regard these metrical mechanics as sacred because nobody wishes
to touch them, as meritorious because no one can be merry in their
company,--to rank them in the same class with those ancient songs of the
Church, sweet with the breath of saints, sparkling with the tears of
forgiven penitents, and warm with the fervor of martyrs,--nay, to set
them up beside such poems as those of Herbert, composed in the upper
chambers of the soul that open toward the sun's rising, is to confound
piety with dulness, and the manna of heaven with its sickening namesake
from the apothecary's drawer. The "Enchiridion" of Quarles is
hardly worthy of the author of the "Emblems," and is by no means an
unattainable book in other editions,--nor a matter of heartbreak, if it
were so. Of the dramatic works of Marston it is enough to say that they
are truly _works_ to the reader, but in no sense dramatic, nor worth the
paper they blot. He seems to have been deemed worthy of republication
because he was the contemporary of true poets; and if all the Tuppers
of the nineteenth century will buy his plays on the same principle, the
sale will be a remunerative one. The Homer of Chapman is so precious
a gift, that we are ready to forgive all Mr. Smith's shortcomings in
consideration of it. It is a vast _placer_, full of nuggets for the
philologist and the lover of poetry.

Having now run cursorily through the series of Mr. Smith's reprints, we
come to the closer question of _How are they edited?_ Whatever the merit
of the original works, the editors, whether self-elected or chosen by
the publisher, should be accurate and scholarly. The editing of the
Homer we can heartily commend; and Dr. Rimbault, who carried the works
of Overbury through the press, has done his work well; but the
other volumes of the Library are very creditable neither to English
scholarship nor to English typography. The Introductions to some of
them are enough to make us think that we are fallen to the necessity
of reprinting our old authors because the art of writing correct and
graceful English has been lost. William B. Turnbull, Esq., of Lincoln's
Inn, Barrister at Law, says, for instance, in his Introduction to
Southwell: "There was resident at Uxendon, near Harrow on the Hill,
in Middlesex, a Catholic family of the name of Bellamy whom [which]
Southwell was in the habit of visiting and providing with religious
instruction when he exchanged his ordinary [