of what
they call "solid acquirements," which really mean no more than an
acquaintance with the classics. As a fact, literary ability and solid
acquirements are to be had in abundance; invention, humour, and
originality are excessively rare. It may be a painful reflection to
those who, having had a great deal of money spent on their education,
and having given a great deal of time to their solid aquirements, now
see genius and original power of all kinds more esteemed than their
learning; but they should reflect that what is learning now is only the
diffused form of what was once invention. "Solid acquirement" is the
genius of wits become the wisdom of reviewers.

IV.

Authors are styled an irritable race, and justly, if the epithet be
understood in its physiological rather than its moral sense. This
irritability, which responds to the slightest stimulus, leads to much
of the misdirection of talent we have been considering. The greatness
of an author consists in having a mind extremely irritable, and at the
same time steadfastly imperial:--irritable that no stimulus may be
inoperative, even in its most evanescent solicitations; imperial, that
no solicitation may divert him from his deliberately chosen aims. A
magisterial subjection of all dispersive influences, a concentration of
the mind upon the thing that has to be done, and a proud renunciation
of all means of effect which do not spontaneously connect themselves
with it--these are the rare qualities which mark out the man of genius.
In men of lesser calibre the mind is more constantly open to
determination from extrinsic influences. Their movement is not
self-determined, self-sustained. In men of still smaller calibre the
mind is entirely determined by extrinsic influences. They are prompted
to write poems by no musical instinct, but simply because great poems
have enchanted the world. They resolve to write novels upon the
vulgarest provocations: they see novels bringing money and fame; they
think there is no difficulty in the art. The novel will afford them an
opportunity of bringing in a variety of scattered details; scraps of
knowledge too scanty for an essay, and scraps of experience too meagre
for independent publication. Others, again, attempt histories, or works
of popular philosophy and science; not because they have any special
stores of knowledge, or because any striking novelty of conception
urges them to use up old material in a new shape, but simply