nvective of Brougham, nor the light and subtle raillery of Jeffrey could
do, his contemptuous explosion effected, and, himself crying with mirth,
saw them hoisted toward heaven in ten thousand comical splinters.
Comparing him with other humorists of a similar class, we might say, that
while Swift's ridicule resembles something between a sneer and a spasm
(half a sneer of mirth, half a spasm of misery)--while Cobbett's is a
grin--Fonblanque's a light but deep and most significant smile--Jeffrey's a
sneer, just perceptible on his fastidious lip--Wilson's a strong, healthy,
hearty laugh--Carlyle's a wild unearthly sound, like the neighing of a
homeless steed--Sidney Smith's is a genuine guffaw, given forth with his
whole heart, and soul, and mind, and strength. Apart from his matchless
humor, strong, rough, instinctive, and knotty sense was the leading
feature of his mind. Every thing like mystification, sophistry, and
humbug, fled before the first glance of his piercing eye; every thing in
the shape of affectation excited in him a disgust "as implacable" as even
a Cowper could feel. If possible, with still deeper aversion did his manly
nature regard cant in its various forms and disguises; and his motto in
reference to it was, "spare no arrows." But the mean, the low, the paltry,
the dishonorable, in nations or in individuals, moved all the fountains of
his bile, and awakened all the energy of his invective. Always lively,
generally witty, he is never eloquent, except when emptying out his vials
of indignation upon baseness in all its shapes. His is the ire of a
genuine "English gentleman, all of the olden time." It was in this spirit
that he recently explained, in his own way, the old distinctions of Meum
and Tuum to Brother Jonathan, when the latter was lamentably inclined to
forget them. It was the same sting of generous indignation which, in the
midst of his character of Mackintosh, prompted the memorable picture of
that extraordinary being who, by his transcendent talents and his tortuous
movements--his head of gold, and his feet of miry clay--has become the
glory, the riddle, and the regret of his country, his age, and his
species.

As a writer, Smith is little more than a very clever, witty, and ingenious
pamphleteer. He has effected no permanent _chef d'oeuvre_; he has founded
no school; he has left little behind him that the "world will not
willingly let die;" he has never drawn a tear from a human eye, nor
excite