have had strong
heads and sound hearts among us. Thrown on one side of the world, and left
to bustle for ourselves, we have fought out many a battle for truth and
freedom. That is our natural style; and it were to be wished we had in no
instance departed from it. Our situation has given us a certain cast of
thought and character; and our liberty has enabled us to make the most of
it. We are of a stiff clay, not moulded into every fashion, with stubborn
joints not easily bent. We are slow to think, and therefore impressions do
not work upon us till they act in masses. We are not forward to express
our feelings, and therefore they do not come from us till they force their
way in the most impetuous eloquence. Our language is, as it were, to begin
anew, and we make use of the most singular and boldest combinations to
explain ourselves. Our wit comes from us, "like birdlime, brains and all."
We pay too little attention to form and method, leave our works in an
unfinished state, but still the materials we work in are solid and of
nature's mint; we do not deal in counterfeits. We both under and over-do,
but we keep an eye to the prominent features, the main chance. We are more
for weight than show; care only about what interests ourselves, instead
of trying to impose upon others by plausible appearances, and are
obstinate and intractable in not conforming to common rules, by which many
arrive at their ends with half the real waste of thought and trouble. We
neglect all but the principal object, gather our force to make a great
blow, bring it down, and relapse into sluggishness and indifference again.
_Materiam superabat opus_, cannot be said of us. We may be accused of
grossness, but not of flimsiness; of extravagance, but not of affectation;
of want of art and refinement, but not of a want of truth and nature. Our
literature, in a word, is Gothic and grotesque; unequal and irregular; not
cast in a previous mould, nor of one uniform texture, but of great weight
in the whole, and of incomparable value in the best parts. It aims at an
excess of beauty or power, hits or misses, and is either very good indeed,
or absolutely good for nothing. This character applies in particular to
our literature in the age of Elizabeth, which is its best period, before
the introduction of a rage for French rules and French models; for
whatever may be the value of our own original style of composition, there
can be neither offence nor presumption in