ubjects which were new to him;
but, such is the mutual connection and dependence of every branch of
literature, that a mind stored like his was already in possession of
that kind of knowledge, which would make him apprehend, with great ease,
whatever he had to learn; and would instruct him, though the subject
were new to him, where he might express himself decisively, and where he
should doubt. How extensive and profound his general knowledge was,
appears from this, that a person who happens to have made any subject,
treated of by him, his particular study, will seldom read what our
author has written upon it without finding in it something original, or,
at least, so happily expressed or illustrated as to have the merit of
originality. In some instances, as in his account of the Manichaens, in
the life of St. Augustine, and of the crusades, in the life of St.
Lewis, he shows such extent and minuteness of investigation, as could
only be required from works confined to those subjects. In other
instances, where his materials are scanty, so that he writes chiefly
from his own mind, as in the lives of St. Zita or St. Isidore of
Pelusium, he pours an unpremeditated stream of piety, which nothing but
an intimate acquaintance with the best spiritual writers could produce.

The sameness of a great number of the most edifying actions which our
author had to relate, made it difficult for him to avoid a tiresome
uniformity of narrative: but he has happily surmounted this difficulty.
Another difficulty he met with, was the flat and inanimate style of the
generality of the writers from whom his work was composed. Happy he must
have been, when the authors he had to consult were St. Jerome, Scipio,
Maffei, Bouhours, or Marsollier. But most commonly they were such as
might edify but could not delight. He had then to trust to his own
resources for that style, that arrangement, those reflections, which
were to engage his reader's attention. In this he has certainly
succeeded. Few authors on holy subject have possessed, in a higher
degree, that indescribable charm of style which rivets the reader's
attention to the book, which never places the writer between the book
and the reader, but insensibly leads him to the conclusion, sometimes
delighted, but always attentive and always pleased.

His style is peculiar to himself; it partakes more of the style of the
writers of the last century than of the style of the present age. It
possesses gre