bition of human manners and
passions. His most exquisite descriptions owe their vividness to moral
illustration. Loyalty, liberty, patriotism, charity, piety, benevolence,
every generous feeling, every glowing sentiment, every ennobling
passion, grows out of his descriptive powers. His matter always bursts
into mind. His shrubbery, his forest, his flower-garden, all produce

Fruits worthy of Paradise,

and lead to immortality."

Mr. Stanley said, adverting again to the subject of conversation, it was
an amusement to him to observe what impression the first introduction to
general society made on a mind conversant with books, but to whom a the
world was in a manner new.

"I believe," said Sir John, "that an overflowing commerce, and the
excessive opulence it has introduced, though favorable to all the
splendors of art and mechanic ingenuity, yet have lowered the standard
of taste, and debilitated the mental energies. They are advantageous to
luxury, but fatal to intellect. It has added to the brilliancy of the
drawing-room itself, but deducted from that of the inhabitant. It has
given perfection to our mirrors, our candelabras, our gilding, our
inlaying, and our sculpture, but it has communicated a torpor to the
imagination, and enervated our intellectual vigor."

"In one way," said Mr. Stanley, smiling, "luxury has been favorable to
literature. From the unparalleled splendor of our printing, paper,
engraving, illuminating and binding, luxury has caused more books to be
purchased, while from the growth of time-absorbing dissipation, it
causes fewer to be read. I believe we were much more familiar with our
native poets in their former plain garb than since they have been
attired in the gorgeous dress which now decorates our shelves."

"Poetry," replied Mr. Stanley, "has of late too much degenerated into
personal satire, persiflage, and caricature among one class of writers,
while among another it has exhibited the vagrancies of genius without
the inspiration, the exuberance of fancy without the curb of judgment,
and the eccentricities of invention without the restrictions of taste.
The image has been strained, while the verse has been slackened. We have
had pleonasm without fullness, and facility without force. Redundancy
has been mistaken for plenitude, flimsiness for ease, and distortion
for energy. An over desire of being natural has made the poet feeble,
and the rage for being simple has sometimes made him s