of a great
name indicates the greatness of the character who appeals to it. When
SYDENHAM mentioned, as a proof of the excellence of his method of treating
acute diseases, that it had received the approbation of his illustrious
friend LOCKE, the philosopher's opinion contributed to the physician's
success.

Such have been the friendships of great literary characters; but too true
it is, that they have not always contributed thus largely to their mutual
happiness. The querulous lament of GLEIM to KLOPSTOCK is too generally
participated. As Gleim lay on his death-bed he addressed the great bard of
Germany--"I am dying, dear Klopstock; and, as a dying man will I say, in
this world we have not lived long enough together and for each other; but
in vain would we now recal the past!" What tenderness in the reproach!
What self-accusation in its modesty!

CHAPTER XX.

The literary and the personal character.--The personal dispositions of an
author may be the reverse of those which appear in his writings.
--Erroneous conceptions of the character of distant authors.--Paradoxical
appearances in the history of Genius.--Why the character of the man may be
opposite to that of his writings.

Are the personal dispositions of an author discoverable in his writings,
as those of an artist are imagined to appear in his works, where Michael
Angelo is always great, and Raphael ever graceful?

Is the moralist a moral man? Is he malignant who publishes caustic
satires? Is he a libertine who composes loose poems? And is he, whose
imagination delights in terror and in blood, the very monster he paints?

Many licentious writers have led chaste lives. LA MOTHE LE VAYER wrote two
works of a free nature; yet his was the unblemished life of a retired
sage. BAYLE is the too faithful compiler of impurities, but he resisted
the voluptuousness of the senses as much as Newton. LA FONTAINE wrote
tales fertile in intrigue, yet the "bon-homme" has not left on record a
single ingenious amour of his own. The Queen of NAVARRE'S Tales are
gross imitations of Boccaccio's; but she herself was a princess of
irreproachable habits, and had given proof of the most rigid virtue; but
stories of intrigues, told in a natural style, formed the fashionable
literature of the day, and the genius of the female writer was amused in
becoming an historian without being an actor. FORTIGUERRA, the author of
the Ricciardetto, abounds with loose and licentious descripti