it is a mistake to suppose that the eighteenth century
ended with the year 1800. It lasted in the upper currents of opinion
till at least 1832. Sydney Smith's theology is that of Paley and the
common-sense divines of the previous period. Jeffrey's politics were but
slightly in advance of the true old Whigs, who still worshipped
according to the tradition of their fathers in Holland House. The ideal
of the party was to bring the practice of the country up to the theory
whose main outlines had been accepted in the Revolution of 1688; and
they studiously shut their eyes to any newer intellectual and social
movements.

I do not say this by way of simple condemnation; for we have daily more
reason to acknowledge the immense value of calm, clear common-sense,
which sees the absurd side of even the best impulses. But it is
necessary to bear the fact in mind when estimating such claims as those
put forward by Sydney Smith. The truth seems to be that the 'Edinburgh
Review' enormously raised the tone of periodical literature at the time,
by opening an arena for perfectly independent discussion. Its great
merit, at starting, was that it was no mere publisher's organ, like its
rivals, and that it paid contributors well enough to attract the most
rising talent of the day. As the 'Review' progressed, its capacities
became more generally understood, and its writers, as they rose to
eminence and attracted new allies, put more genuine work into articles
certain to obtain a wide circulation and to come with great authority.
This implies a long step towards the development of the present system,
whose merits and defects would deserve a full discussion--the system
according to which much of the most solid and original work of the time
first appears in periodicals. The tone of periodicals has been
enormously raised, but the effect upon general literature may be more
questionable. But the 'Edinburgh' was not in its early years a journal
with a mission, or the organ of an enthusiastic sect. Rather it was the
instrument used by a number of very clever young men to put forward the
ideas current in the more liberal section of the upper classes, with
much occasional vigour and a large infusion of common-sense, but also
with abundant flippancy and superficiality, and, in a literary sense,
without that solidity of workmanship which is essential for enduring
vitality.

FOOTNOTES:

[21] Scott's letter, stating that this overture had been made by J