stalk in the fairy tale, aspiring to the skies, and ending in an enchanted castle, but a huge growth of intertwisted fibres, grasping the earth by numberless roots, and bearing vestiges of "a thousand storms, a thousand thunders."

It would be beside our purpose to discuss the relative merits of Mr. Hazlitt's publications, to most of which we have alluded in passing; or to detail the scanty vicissitudes of a literary life. Still less do we feel bound to expose or to defend the personal frailties which fell to his portion. We have endeavored to trace his intellectual character in the records he has left of himself in his works, as an excitement and a guide to their perusal by those who have yet to know them. The concern of mankind is with this alone. In the case of a profound thinker more than of any other, "that which men call evil”—the accident of his condition, is interred with him, while the good he has achieved lives unmingled and entire. The events of Mr. Hazlitt's true life are not his engagement by the 'Morning Chronicle,' or his transfer of his services to the Times,' or his introduction to the Edinburgh Review,' or his contracts or quarrels with booksellers; but the progress and the development of his understanding as nurtured or swayed by his affections. "His warfare was within ;" and its spoils are ours! His "thoughts which wandered through eternity" live with us, though the hand which traced them for our benefit is cold. His death, though at the age of only fifty-two, can hardly be deemed untimely. He lived to complete the laborious work in which he sought to embalm his idea of his chosen hero; to see the unhoped-for downfall of the legitimate throne which had been raised on the ruins of the empire; and to open, without exhausting, those stores which he had gathered in his youth. If the impress of his power is not left on the sympathies of a people, it has (all he wished) sunk into minds neither unreflecting nor ungrateful.

CHARACTER OF HAZLITT.

BY CHARLES LAMB.

FROM THE LETTER TO SOUTHEY."

THE friendship of Lamb and my father was once interrupted by some wilful fancy on the part of the latter. At this time, Southey happened to pay a compliment to Lamb at the expense of some of his companions, my father among them. The faithful and unswerving heart of the other forsaking not, although forsaken, refused a compliment at such a price, and sent it back to the giver. The tribute to my father, which he at the same time paid, may stand forever as one of the proudest and truest evidences of the writer's heart and intellect. It brought back at once the repentant offender to the arms of his friend, and nothing again separated them till death came. It is as follows:- 66*** * From the other gentleman I neither expect nor desire (as he is well assured) any such concessions as LH- made to C- What hath soured him, and made him suspect his friends of infidelity towards him, when there was no such matter, I know not: I stood well with him for fifteen years (the proudest of my life,) and have ever spoken my full mind of him to some to whom his panegyric must naturally be least tasteful. I never in thought swerved from him; I never betrayed him; I never slakened in my admiration of him; I was the same to him (neither better nor worse,) though he could not see it, as in the days when he thought fit to trust me. At this instant he may be preparing for me some compliment, above my deserts, as he has sprinkled many such among his admirable books, for which I rest his debtor; or, for any thing I know or can guess to the contrary, he may be about to read a lecture on my weaknesses. He is welcome to them (as he was to my humble hearth,) if they can divert a spleen, or ventilate a fit of sullenness. I wish he would not quarrel with the world at the rate he does; but the reconciliation must be effected by himself, and I despair of living to see that day. But, protesting against much that he has written, and some things which he chooses to do; judging him by his conversations which I enjoyed so long, and relished so deeply, or by his books, in those places where no clouding passion intervenes-I should belie my own conscience, if I said less than that I think W. H. to be, in his naural and healthy state, one of the wisest and finest spirits breathing. So far from being ashamed of that intimacy which was betwixt us, it is my boast that I was able for so many years to have preserved it entire; and I think I shall go to my grave without finding, or expecting to find, such another companion. But I forget my manners-you will pardon me, Sir.--I return to the correspondence."

SONNETS

TO THE MEMORY OF HAZLITT.

BY A LADY.

I.

HE ranged all fields of Science-he whose head
Now pillows on a clod.-Ye gentle Arts,
Whom HAZLITT cherished in his heart of hearts,
How rest the relics of the mighty dead?

Hath his cold urn the flowers of fancy wreathed,
Or hath for him the living canvas glowed,
Grateful for triumphs which his pen bestowed,

Or hath the soul-inspired marble breathed?
When your loved lore his ardent bosom fired,
He gaye your works a new and glorious birth;
And the fair imaginings of heaven and earth,
A far diviner grace than art inspired;

While the rare genius of his varied mind
All forms of beauty caught, and all refined.

II.

THOU, who didst grasp the mighty universe
Of intellect to whom the realms of thought
Opened all knowledge which thy spirit sought;
How should a simple lay, like mine, rehearse
The triumphs of thy proud philosophy?
Through time and space, where thou dost search, or soar,
The depths and heights of science to explore,

With wonder, love, and awe I follow thee.
Infused by thine, my winged thoughts aspire,
Fluttering, yet free, my longing spirit mounts,
And finds the springs of truth's eternal founts,
Touched by a spark of thy ethereal fire :-

Yet thou wert mortal-and the dull sod cries,

(Oh! dark and narrow house!) "Here HAZLITT lies!"

III.

TWICE HAZLITT came to our domestic hearth:
He came and went-a few brief days was seen,
And left mementos where he thus had been,
Might consecrate the holiest spot on earth,
He left a voice in faithful memory,
With love and wisdom redolent and deep,
And calm, and soft, as when the billows sleep
O'er the eternal murmurs of the sea.
And now the pathos of that deep, low tone

Comes o'er us like a dirge:-that voice of thine,
In gentlest bosoms hath a living shrine:

From the world's strife, now thy proud spirit's flown,
Fond mourners oft their pensive vigils keep
Beside the tomb where thy cold relics sleep!

IV.

HE spake of early friends whom once he loved,
Who climbed the hill of science in their youth
In the pure light of a diviner truth,

Until his inmost breast his troubled spirit moved-
Till all the secret depths of joy and pain
Gave thought and feeling to his look and tone,

Like one who mourned his friends long dead and gone,
Or saw departed lover's shade again :

And, for their sakes, the world seemed dull and rude: Those speculations of the lofty soul,

Whose single aim was Virtue's highest goal,

Had made a sanctuary ir green solitude

While from their burning lips those high truths passed. The oracles he kept which surrendered them at last :

V.

THROUGH good and ill report, honor and blame,
Steadfast he kept his faith-firmly adhered

To his first creed, nor slight nor censure feared.
The cause hath triumphed-HAZLITT but a name !
What matters it, since HAZLITT's name shall stand,-
Despite detraction's venom, tyrants' rage,-

The Patriot, Philosopher, and Sage,

High in the annals of his native land!

Oh! say not then that HAZLITT died too soon

Since he had fought and conquered-though the strife

Cost him his health-his happiness-his life—

Freely he yielded up the noble boon!

He saw the mists of error roll away,

And closed his eyes-but on the rising day.

VI.

SOUL-SICK of the dull world, when thou didst turn
To gentle hearts, forgetful of its strife,
With all the sweet humanities of life,

Pure and intense thy generous breast did burn:
And soon from all life's troubles thou didst part,
After thy weary journey, going to rest,

Midst love and prayers that reached thy inmost breast,
And soothed and sanctified thy broken heart.
They laid thy cold remains-dust unto dust:

In the omnipotence of truth and love,

Thou heldist thy faith, all fear and doubt above, Or in their dread despite, still kept thy trembling trust. Forlorn thy course, oh! traveler alone

Yet o'er thy soul's dim path immortal halos shone!

6*