ADVERTISEMENT.

THE

HE appearance of this Number of the EDINBURGH REVIEW, has been delayed a good deal beyond its proper period of publication by accidental circumstances, in which the Public can take no interest. Arrangements, however, have been made to prevent the recurrence of such irregularities in future; -and the Publishers rely upon being able, hereafter, to bring out the Numbers correctly at the expiration of each Quarter.

As various reports have reached them as to the discontinuance of the Work, they think it right to mention, that they have the authority of the Editor for declaring, that no such measure either is, or has been in contemplation.

EDINBURGH, 12. April, 1813.

THE

EDINBURGH REVIEW,

FEBRUARY, 1813.

No. XLI.

ART. I. De la Litérature considérée dans ses Rapports avec les Institutions Sociales. Par Mad. de Staël-Holstein. Avec' un Précis de la Vie et les Ecrits de l'Auteur. 2 tomes. 12mo. pp. 600. London, 1812.

TH

HIS is not a new book-as seems to be imagined by most of its present readers in this country ;-but a book published at least ten years ago, with no very brilliant success,-and lately brought back into notice by the happier fortune of the Novels with which its distinguished author has since condescended to favour this frivolous generation. Its true date, indeed, is sufficiently marked by a great part of its contents; since it is ful!" of reflections on the effects of ten years of revolution-and of conjectures as to the changes which European literature is likely to undergo from the establishment of an august Republic in France. These proud anticipations, indeed, are now among the most curious and interesting parts of the work; and when compared with the events that have already succeeded, cannot fail to excite in the mind of the thinking reader, a sentiment of mingled distrust and compassion for the bright and fleeting visions of human prosperity-a disposition to laugh at the miserable miscarriage of so many vast pretensions, and to mourn over the ruin of so many glorious hopes. All this, however, is nothing to the ingenious frequenters of circulating libraries, and the lively inquirers after new books in duodecimo;-and Mad. de Staël's charming work upon Literature is devoured, we make no doubt,' by the greater part of its readers, with the same discriminating relish as Miss Owenson's or Miss Porter's last few works upon sentimental Poles or ingenuous Irish women.

What such persons think in their hearts of the little volumes before us, we do not pretend of our own knowledge to deter VOL. XXI. NO. 41.

A

mine; but we should be apt to suspect, that they find them very dull in comparison of their native favourites,-and that the bolder among them already venture to insinuate, that the author of Delphine and Corinne is falling fast into dotage and morality. For ourselves, we must say, that we are not exactly of that opinion. We look upon this as, upon the whole, the best and the least exceptionable of all Mad. de Staël's publications; and we look upon her as beyond all comparison the first female writer of her age. We are glad, therefore, that the book has been so generally taken for a new book, as to entitle us, without any great impropriety, to make it the subject of direct observation. Something may be gained, occasionally, both by the author, the critic, and the reader, from a work's falling out of notice for some years after its publication.

When we say, that Madame de Staël is decidedly the most eminent literary female of her age, we do not mean to deny that there may be others whose writings are of more direct and indisputable utility-who are distinguished by greater justness and sobriety of thinking, and may pretend to have conferred more practical benefits on the existing generation. But it is impossible, we think, to deny, that she has pursued a more lofty as well as a more dangerous career ;-that she has treated of subjects of far greater difficulty, and far more extensive interest, and, even in her failures, has frequently given indication of greater powers, than have sufficed for the success of her more prudent contemporaries. While other female writers have contented themselves, for the most part, with embellishing or explaining the truths which the more robust intellect of the other sex had previously established,-in making knowledge more familiar, or virtue more engaging, or, at most, in multiplying the finer distinctions which may be detected about the boundaries of taste or of morality,-and in illustrating the importance of the minor virtues to the general happiness of life, this distinguished person has not only aimed at extending the boundaries of knowledge, and rectifying the errors of received opinions upon subjects of the greatest importance, but has uniformly applied hersclf to trace out the operation of general causes, and, by combining the past with the present, and pointing out the connexion and reciprocal action of all coexistent phenomena, to develop the harmonious system which actually prevails in the apparent chaos of human affairs; and to gain something like an assurance as to the complexion of that futurity towards which our thoughts are so anxiously driven, by the selfish as well as the generous principles of our nature.

We are not acquainted, indeed, with any writer who has made such bold and vigorous attempts to carry the general

izing spirit of true philosophy into the history of literature and manners, or who has thrown so strong a light upon the capricious and apparently unaccountable diversity of national taste, genius, and morality, by connecting them with the political structure of society, the accidents of climate and external relation, and the variety of creeds and superstitions. In her lighter works, this spirit is indicated chiefly by the force and comprehensiveness of those general observations with which they abound; and which strike at once, by their justness and novelty, and by the great extent of their application. They prove also in how remarkable a degree she possesses the rare talent of embodying in one luminous position those sentiments and impressions which float unquestioned and undefined over many an understanding, and give a colour to the character, and a bias to the conduct, of multitudes, who are not so much as aware of their existence. Besides all this, her Novels bear testimony to the extraordinary accuracy and minuteness of her observation of human character, and to her thorough knowledge of those dark and secret workings of the heart, by which misery is so often elaborated from the pure elements of the affections. Her knowledge, however, we must say, seems to be more of evil than of good. The predominating sentiment in her fictions is, Despair of human happiness and human virtue ; and their interest is founded almost entirely on the inherent and almost inevitable heartlessness of polished man. The impression which they leave upon the mind, therefore, though powerfully pathetic, is both painful and humiliating; at the same time that it proceeds, we are inclined to believe, upon the double error of supposing that the bulk of intelligent people are as selfish as those victims of fashion and philosophy from whom her characters are selected; and that a sensibility to unkindness can survive the extinction of all kindly emotions. The work before us, however, exhibits the fairest specimen which we have yet seen of the systematizing spirit of the author, as well as of the moral enthusiasm by which she seems to be possessed.

The professed object of this work is to show that all the peculiarities in the literature of different ages and countries, may be explained by a reference to the condition of society, and the political and religious institutions of each ;—and at the same time, to point out in what way the progress of letters has in its turn modified and affected the government and religion of those nations among whom they have flourished. All this, however, is bottomed upon the more fundamental and favourite proposi tion, that there is a progress, to produce these effects-that letters and intelligence are in a state of constant, universal, and

irresistible advancement-in other words, that human nature is tending, by a slow and interminable progression, to a state of perfection. This fascinating idea seems to have been kept constantly in view by Mad. de Staël, from the beginning to the end of the work before us;and though we conceive it to have been pursued with far too sanguine and assured a spirit, and to have led in this way to most of what is rash and questionable in her conclusions, it is impossible to doubt that it has also helped her to many explanations that are equally solid and ingenious, and thrown a light upon many phenomena that would otherwise have appeared very dark and unaccountable.

In the range which she here takes, indeed, she has need of all the lights and all the aids that can present themselves; for her work contains a critique and a theory of all the literature and philosophy in the world, from the days of Ho mer to the tenth year of the French Revolution. She begins with the early learning, and philosophy of Greece; and after characterizing the national taste and genius of that illustrious people, in all its departments, and in the different stages of their progress, she proceeds to a similar investigation of the literature and seienee of the Romans; and then, after a hasty sketch of the decline of arts and letters in the later days of the Empire, and of the actual progress of the human mind during the dark ages, when it is supposed to have slumbered in complete inactivity, she enters upon a more detailed examination of peculiarities, and the causes of the peculiaritiesof all the different aspects of national taste and genius that characterize the literature of Italy, Spain, England, Germany and France,-entering, as to each, into a pretty minute exposition of its general merits and defects,-and not only of the circumstances in the situation of the country that have produced those characteristics, but even of the authors and productions, in which they are chiefly exemplified. To go through all this with any tolerable success, and without committing any very gross and ridiculous blunders, evidently required, in the first place, a greater allowance of learning than has often fallen to the lot of persons of the learned gender, who lay a pretty bold claim to distinction, upon the ground of their learning alone; and, in the next place, an extent of general knowledge, and a power and comprehensiveness of thinking, that has stil more rarely been the ornament of great scholars. Mad. de Staël may be surpassed, perhaps, in scholarship, (so far as relates to accuracy at least, if not extent), by some-and in sound philosophy by others. But there are few indeed who can boast of having so much of both; and no one, so far as we know, who has ap-. plied the one to the elucidation of the other with so much judg