e virulence of party spirit. Under the
latter head would fall what may be termed _political criticism._ The
basis of this style of writing is a _caput mortuum_ of impotent spite
and dulness, till it is varnished over with the slime of servility,
and thrown into a state of unnatural activity by the venom of the most
rancorous bigotry. The eminent professors in this grovelling department
are at first merely out of sorts with themselves, and vent their spleen
in little interjections and contortions of phrase--cry _Pish_ at a lucky
hit, and _Hem_ at a fault, are smart on personal defects, and sneer at
'Beauty out of favour and on crutches'--are thrown into an ague-fit by
hearing the name of a rival, start back with horror at any approach
to their morbid pretensions, like Justice Woodcock with his gouty
limbs--rifle the flowers of the Della Cruscan school, and give you
in their stead, as models of a pleasing pastoral style, Verses upon
Anna--which you may see in the notes to the _Baviad_ and _Maeviad._ All
this is like the fable of 'The Kitten and the Leaves.' But when they get
their brass collar on and shake their bells of office, they set up their
backs like the Great Cat Rodilardus, and pounce upon men and things. Woe
to any little heedess reptile of an author that ventures across their
path without a safe-conduct from the Board of Control. They snap him up
at a mouthful, and sit licking their lips, stroking their whiskers, and
rattling their bells over the imaginary fragments of their devoted
prey, to the alarm and astonishment of the whole breed of literary,
philosophical, and revolutionary vermin that were naturalised in this
country by a Prince of Orange and an Elector of Hanover a hundred
years ago.(4) When one of these pampered, sleek, 'demure-looking,
spring-nailed, velvet-pawed, green-eyed' critics makes his King and
Country parties to this sort of sport literary, you have not much chance
of escaping out of his clutches in a whole skin. Treachery becomes a
principle with them, and mischief a conscience, that is, a livelihood.
They not only _damn_ the work in the lump, but vilify and traduce the
author, and substitute lying abuse and sheer malignity for sense and
satire. To have written a popular work is as much as a man's character
is worth, and sometimes his life, if he does not happen to be on
the right side of the question. The way in which they set about
_stultifying_ an adversary is not to accuse you of faults,