Sovereignty, a Poem in Twelve
Cantos," to be called the most remarkable man of the age, when he knows
that he shares that preeminence with Mr. Tupper, nay, with half the
names in the Directory? Indiscriminate eulogy is the subtlest form of
depreciation, for it makes all praise suspicious.

We look upon artistic genius as the rarest and most wayward apparition
among mankind. It cannot be predicated upon any of Mr. Buckle's
averages. Given the census, you may, perhaps, say so many murders, so
many suicides, so many misdirected letters (and men of letters), but not
so many geniuses. In this one thing old Mother Nature will be whimsical
and womanish. This is a gift that John Bull, or Johnny Crapaud, or
Brother Jonathan does not find in his stocking every Christmas. Crude
imagination is common enough,--every hypochondriac has a more than
Shakspearian allowance of it; fancy is cheap, or nobody would dream;
eloquence sits ten deep on every platform. But genius in Art is that
supreme organizing and idealizing faculty which, by combining,
arranging, modulating, by suppressing the abnormal and perpetuating the
essential, apes creation,--which from the shapeless terror or tipsy
fancy of the benighted ploughman can conjure the sisters of Fores heath
and the court of Titania,--which can make language thunder or coo at
will,--which, in short, is the ruler of those qualities any one of which
in excess is sure to overmaster the ordinary mind, and which can
crystallize helpless vagary into the clearly outlined and imperishable
forms of Art.

It is not, therefore, from any grudging incapacity to appreciate new
authors, but from a strong feeling that we are to guard the graves of
the dead from encroachment, and their fames from vulgarization, that the
"Atlantic" has been and will be sparing in its use of the word _genius_.
One may safely predicate power, nicety of thought and language, a clear
eye for scenery and character, and grace of poetic conception of a book,
without being willing to say that it gives proof of genius. For genius
is the _shaping_ faculty, the power of using material in the best way,
and may not work itself clear of the besetting temptation of personal
gifts and of circumstances in a first or even second work. It is
something capable of education and accomplishment, and the patience with
which it submits itself to this needful schooling and self-abnegation is
one of the surest tests of its actual possession. Could ev