n, though I much incline to doubt that;
but such a nation will not contain a number of great men.' With the
advance of intelligence, advances a catholicism of literature, of
taste, of humanity at large. Uncultured intellect, 'cabined, cribbed,
confined,' is ill at ease among the riches of variety in literary
lore; it is satisfied with the little, because, as Menzel says, it
knows not the great; it is content with one-sidedness, because it sees
not the other sides. If critical _esprit de corps_ has its advantages,
it has its penalties also; potent within its self-imposed bounds, it
is impotent outside of them. Longfellow reminds his brethren of the
lyre, that whatever is best in the great poets of all countries, is
not what is national in them, but what is universal: their roots are
in their native soil, but their branches wave in the unpatriotic air,
that speaks the same language to all men, and their leaves shine with
the illimitable light that pervades all lands. 'Let us throw all the
windows open; let us admit the light and air on all sides; that we may
look towards the four corners of the heavens, and not always in the
same direction.'

Monomania is sometimes simply the exaggerated regard to one side of
many-sided truth. It is not absolute, but only relative delusion. It
is in its degree true; but by affecting to be the whole truth, it
becomes untrue. Philosophic reflection shews, that if a man fasten his
attention on a single aspect of truth, and apply himself to that alone
for a long time, 'the truth becomes distorted, and not itself, but
falsehood;' and may be compared to the air, which is our natural
element, and the breath of our nostrils; 'but if a stream of the same
be directed on the body for a time, it causes cold, fever, and even
death.' 'How wearisome,' exclaims Emerson, 'the grammarian, the
phrenologist, the political or religious fanatic, or, indeed, any
possessed mortal, whose balance is lost by the exaggeration of a
single topic! It is _incipient insanity_.' The bore of society is
constituted by his one-sidedness. His ear is deficient in the sense of
harmony, and he deafens and disgusts you by harping on one string. The
retired nabob holds you by the button, to hear his wearisome diatribes
on Indian economics; the half-pay officer is too fluent on his
worn-out recollections of the Peninsular War, and becomes savage if
you broach a new theme, or move to adjourn the debate; the university
pedant distra