elty of thought than is generally supposed, and
whose originality, at best, has an uneasy and meretricious quaintness,
replete with startling effects unfounded in nature, and inducing
trains of reflection which lead to no satisfactory result. The essays
of Hawthorne have much of the character of Irving, with more of
originality, and less of finish; while, compared with the _Spectator_,
they have a vast superiority at all points. The Spectator, Mr. Irving
and Hawthorne have in common that tranquil and subdued manner which I
have chosen to denominate repose; but, in the ease of the two former,
this repose is attained rather by the absence of novel combination, or
of originality, than otherwise, and consists chiefly in the calm,
quiet, unostentatious expression of commonplace thoughts, in an
unambitious, unadulterated Saxon. In them, by strong effort, we are
made to conceive the absence of all. In the essays before me the
absence of effort is too obvious to be mistaken, and a strong
undercurrent of suggestion runs continuously beneath the upper stream
of the tranquil thesis. In short, these effusions of Mr. Hawthorne are
the product of a truly imaginative intellect, restrained, and in some
measure represt by fastidiousness of taste, by constitutional
melancholy, and by indolence.

But it is of his tales that I desire principally to speak. The tale
proper, in my opinion, affords unquestionably the fairest field for
the exercise of the loftiest talent which can be afforded by the wide
domains of mere prose. Were I bidden to say how the highest genius
could be most advantageously employed for the best display of its own
powers, I should answer, without hesitation--in the composition of a
rimed poem, not to exceed in length what might be perused in an hour.
Within this limit alone can the highest order of true poetry exist. I
need only here say, upon this topic, that, in almost all classes of
composition, the unity of effect or impression is a point of the
greatest importance. It is clear, moreover, that this unity can not be
thoroughly preserved in productions whose perusal can not be completed
at one sitting. We may continue the reading of a prose composition,
from the very nature of prose itself, much longer than we can
persevere, to any good purpose, in the perusal of a poem. This latter,
if truly fulfilling the demands of the poetic sentiment, induces an
exaltation of the soul which can not be long sustained. All high
ex