manner of proceeding was thorough. Each paragraph, on
being read, was commented on by every one in turn, discussed and
rediscussed, to the point of total exhaustion. In 1828 the meetings
ceased; but they were resumed in 1830, upon Mill's 'Analysis of the
Mind,' which was gone over in the same manner." These philosophical
studies were not only of extreme advantage in strengthening and
developing the merits of Mr. Mill and his friends, nearly all of whom
were considerably older than he was, they also served to unite the
friends in close and lasting intimacy of the most refined and
elevating sort. Mr. Grote, his senior by twelve years, was perhaps the
most intimate, as he was certainly the ablest, of all the friends whom
Mr. Mill thus acquired.

Many of these friends were contributors to the original "Westminster
Review," which was started by Bentham in 1824. Bentham himself and the
elder Mill were its chief writers at first; and in 1828, if not
sooner, the younger Mill joined the number. In that year he reviewed
Whately's Logic; and it is probable that in the ensuing year he
contributed numerous other articles. His first literary exploit,
however, which he cared to reproduce in his "Dissertations and
Discussions" was an article that appeared in "The Jurist," in 1833,
entitled "Corporation and Church Property." That essay, in some
respects, curiously anticipated the Irish Church legislation of
nearly forty years later. In the same year he published, in "The
Monthly Repository," a remarkably able and quite a different
production,--"Poetry and its Varieties," showing that in the
department of _belles-lettres_ he could write with nearly as much
vigor and originality as in the philosophical and political
departments of thought to which, ostensibly, he was especially
devoted. Shortly after that he embarked in a bolder literary venture.
Differences having arisen concerning "The Westminster Review," a new
quarterly journal--"The London Review"--was begun by Sir William
Molesworth, with Mr. Mill for editor, in 1835. "The London" was next
year amalgamated with "The Westminster," and then the nominal if not
the actual editorship passed into the hands of Mr. John Robertson. Mr.
Mill continued, however, to be one of its most constant and able
contributors until the Review passed into other hands in 1840. He
aided much to make and maintain its reputation as the leading organ of
bold thought on religious and social as well as political