he few, it comes home to every one. Thus it is the philosophy of
Shakspeare, Byron, Horace, Pope, Moliere, which has put them into every
one's hands and hearts--while that of Propertius, even of Lucretius,
of Cowley, and Shelley, makes us often throw down the book, because
it fatigues us with the scholar. Philosophy, therefore, only sins in
poetry, when, in the severe garb of learning, it becomes 'harsh and
crabbed,' and not 'musical, as is Apollo's lute.'"

"Alas!" said I, "how much more difficult than of yore, education is
become--formerly, it had only one object--to acquire learning; and now,
we have not only to acquire it, but to know what to do with it when
we have--nay, there are not a few cases where the very perfection of
learning will be to appear ignorant."

"Perhaps," said Glanville, "the very perfection of wisdom may consist
in retaining actual ignorance. Where was there ever the individual who,
after consuming years, life, health, in the pursuit of science, rested
satisfied with its success, or rewarded by its triumph? Common sense
tells us that the best method of employing life, is to enjoy it. Common
sense tells us, also, the ordinary means of this enjoyment; health,
competence, and the indulgence, but the moderate indulgence, of our
passions. What have these to do with science?"

"I might tell you," replied Vincent, "that I myself have been no idle
nor inactive seeker after the hidden treasures of mind; and that, from
my own experience, I could speak of pleasure, pride, complacency, in
the pursuit, that were no inconsiderable augmenters of my stock of
enjoyment: but I have the candour to confess, also, that I have known
disappointment, mortification, despondency of mind, and infirmity
of body, that did more than balance the account. The fact is, in my
opinion, that the individual is a sufferer for his toils, but then
the mass is benefited by his success. It is we who reap, in idle
gratification, what the husbandman has sown in the bitterness of labour.
Genius did not save Milton from poverty and blindness--nor Tasso from
the madhouse--nor Galileo from the inquisition; they were the sufferers,
but posterity the gainers. The literary empire reverses the political;
it is not the many made for one--it is the one made for many; wisdom and
genius must have their martyrs as well as religion, and with the same
results, viz: semen ecclesioeest sanguis martyrorum. And this reflection
must console us for their mi