est of the man and his organization. I can enjoy a work, but
it is difficult for me to form a judgment on it independently of the
man himself; and I readily say, _as is the tree so is the fruit_.
Literary study thus leads me quite naturally to moral study." This, of
course, he can apply but partially to the ancients; but with the
moderns the first thing to do in order to know the work is to know the
man who did it, to get at his primary organization, his interior
beginnings and proclivities; and to learn this, one of the best means
is, to make yourself acquainted with his race, his family, his
predecessors. "You are sure to recognize the superior man, in part at
least, in his parents, especially in his mother, the most direct and
certain of his parents; also in his sisters and his brothers,
even in his children. In these one discovers important features which,
from being too condensed, too closely joined in the eminent
individual, are masked; but whereof the basis, the _fond_, is found in
others of his blood in a more naked, a more simple state."

Hereby is shown with what thoroughness and professional
conscientiousness M. Sainte-Beuve sets himself to his work of critic.
Partially applying to himself his method, we discover in part the
cause of his sympathy for feminine nature, and of his tact in
delineating it. His father died before he was born; and thence all
living parental influence on him was maternal. None of his volumes is
more captivating than his "Portraits de Femmes," a translation of
which we are glad to see announced.

Of Sainte-Beuve's love for excellence there is, in the third volume of
the "Nouveaux Lundis," an illustration, eloquently disclosing how deep
is his sympathy with the most excellent that human kind has known. For
the London Exposition of 1862 a magnificent folio of the New Testament
was prepared at the Imperial Press of Paris. The critic takes the
occasion to write a paper on "Les saints Evangiles," especially the
Sermon on the Mount. After quoting and commenting on the Beatitudes,
he continues: "Had there ever before been heard in the world such
accents, such a love of poverty, of self-divestment, such a hunger and
thirst for justice, such eagerness to suffer for it, to be cursed of
men in behalf of it, such an intrepid confidence in celestial
recompense, such a forgiveness of injuries, and not simply forgiveness
but a livelier feeling of charity for those who have injured you, who
persecu