endowed of human intellects had also the most sympathetic and tolerant of human hearts."

Another critic justly remarks: "To say that he is the greatest man that ever lived, or the greatest intellect that ever lived, is to provoke a useless controversy; but what we will say, and what we will challenge the world to gainsay, that he was the greatest expresser that ever lived. No man that ever lived said such splendid ex-tem'po-re things on all subjects universally; no man that ever lived had the faculty of pouring out on all occasions such a flood of the richest and deepest language. He may have had rivals in the art of imagining situations; he had no rival in the power of sending a gush of the appropriate intellectual effusion over the image and body of a situation once conceived.

"From the jeweled ring on an alderman's finger to the most mountainous thought or deed of man or demon, nothing suggested itself that his speech could not envelop and enfold with ease. That excessive fluency which astonished Ben Jonson when he listened to Shakespeare in person astonishes the world yet. Abundance, ease, redundance, a plenitude of word, sound, and imagery, which, were the intellect at work only a little less magnifi cent, would sometimes end in sheer braggardism and bombast, are the characteristic of Shakespeare's style. Nothing is suppressed, nothing omitted, nothing canceled. On and on the poet flows, words, thoughts, and fancies, crowding on him as fast as he can write, all related to the matter on hand, and all poured forth together, to rise and fall on the waves of an established cadence."

For passages quoted from Shakespeare in this volume, see 3, p. 31; 14, 16, p. 33; 21, 22, p. 34; 1, 4, p. 36; 3, p. 37; 4, p. 38; 5, p. 39; 7, 9, p. 40; 12, 13, 14, p. 41; 3, 4, 5, p. 43; 11, 12, p. 45; 1, 2, p. 46; 7, 1, 2, 3, p. 48; 4, 5, p. 49; 12, 1, 2, p. 51; 1, p. 55; 3, p. 56; 9, p. 59; 14, p. 62; 5, p. 69; 8, p. 70; 4, p. 75; 1, p. 78; 1, p. 421.

Quarrel of Brutus and Cassius, p. 140.

Regrets of Drunkenness, p. 234.
The Trial Scene, p. 243.
Iago and Othello, p. 301.

Scene from Hamlet, p. 890. Two Scenes from Hamlet, p. 435. SHELL. As used by Collins, p. 308, this word means a musical instrument, because the first lyre is said to have been made by strain. ing strings over the shell of a tortoise.

66

ness."

SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE, the son of a wealthy baronet, was born in 1792, in Sussex, England. A poet of admirable genius, he was, in the words which he applied to himself, a power girt round with weakWith the utmost gentleness and amiability of personal demeanor, he united an extreme confidence in his own opinions on abstract questions; and, setting himself up, with the presumption of youth, in opposition to received principles which he did not understand, he made himself voluntarily an outcast, and remained through life a martyr to his own indistinct chimeras.

Shelley's school-days were made uncomfortable by his sensitive temper, and he was not distinguished as a scholar. Before he was sixteen he had written two novels. In 1808 he was sent from Eton to Oxford. Here, with very slight philosophical reading, he became entangled in metaphysical difficulties, and, at seventeen, was pleased to publish, with a direct appeal to the heads of colleges, a pamphlet, entitled "The Necessity of Atheism." Instead of treating the audacious freak with the unconcern it merited, the college authorities gravely raised it from insignificance into importance by expelling the author. Thus martyrdom made his wild notions all the more precious to him.

Soon afterward he printed his poem of "Queen Mab," in which singular poetical beauties are interpersed through a mass of speculative absurdities. At the age of eighteen an imprudent marriage alienated Shelley from his family. After three years of misery to himself and his wife, the ill-assorted union issued in a separation; and not long afterwards the young poet was agitated into temporary derangement by learning that his wife had destroyed herself. His children were taken from him by a decree of the Court of Chancery, on the ground of the atheism which he

had avowed, and which he was too proud to retract on compulsion.

Already, among his various wanderings, he had, in 1816, become acquainted with Lord Byron, and lived near him on the Lake of Geneva. There, and by the Lake of Como, he began to write poetry very sedulously. He studied and admired Wordsworth and Coleridge; he was familiar with the Greek dramatists, and was influenced largely by Goethe and Calderon. Not long after his wife's death he married the daughter of Godwin, a lady well known in -literature. In 1818 they settled at Pisa (pe'za), in Italy.

Here, with health already failing, he produced some of his principal works, in a period of about four years. Such were his lyrical drama, called "Prometheus Unbound," the gloomy but powerful tragedy of

The Cenci" (chen'che), and many singularly fine minor poems, among which we may specify "The Skylark," "The Cloud," and "The Sensitive Plant." In July, 1822, when he had not quite completed his twenty-ninth year, he was drowned in a storm which he encountered in his yacht in the Gulf of Spezzia (spet'se-a).

Shelley's poems, amid much that is mystical and unintelligible, are pervaded by a spiritual beauty which produces on the reader the effect of a strain of exquisite music. There is something marvelous in the rich originality of his imagination, and the ideal loveliness of the forms which it pours forth. His true and noble heart contradicts the boyish errors of his head. He was generous, charitable, and affectionate; and, every year of his life, love was leading him nearer and nearer to the great truths of God and immortality, which the untrained speculative intellect had wandered away from.

The Skylark, p. 447. SHENSTONE, WILLIAM, a pleasant, but not vigorous writer in verse and prose, was born in Shropshire, England, 1714; died 1763. He was skilled in landscape gardening, and his estate, known as the Leaso wes, was often resorted to as a showplace. SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEY, was born in Dublin, Ireland, 1751. His

father, Thomas Sheridan, was well known as an actor and a teacher of elocution, and as the author of a Pronouncing Dictionary. Richard, an idle and mischievous boy, passed at school for a hopeless blockhead. Leaving school he professed to study law; but his prospects were very hazy indeed, when, being barely of age, he made a runaway marriage with Miss Linley, a beautiful and accomplished singer. A small fortune she brought him was speedily dissipated by that careless way of living which he practiced at all stages of his life.

His earliest comedy, "The Rivals," appeared in 1775, when the author was not 24 years old; his "School for Scandal," in 1777; and his witty, but ill-natured farce," The Critic,' in 1779. Becoming acquainted with Burke and Fox, and impressing these eminent men with a strong belief in his political and oratorical talents, he obtained a seat in Parliament in 1780. But he became improvident in his expenditures and intemperate in his habits; and the wit and orator died in 1616, abandoned by friends and hunted by bailiffs.

Extracts from speech at the trial of Hastings, p. 34.

Extract from "The Rivals," p. 79. Sir Lucius and Bob' Acres, p. 83. Scene from "The Critic," p. 368. SHORT-LIVED (lived). SHRIVELED or SHRIVELLED. SIBYL (sib'il), a pagan prophetess. SIMILE (sim'e-le).

SIMULTANEOUS (sim- or si-). SINAI (sī'nā or si'na-i). SI'REN, in Greek mythology, one of certain female divinities who, by the sweetness of their song, so fascinated passing mariners, that they forgot their homes, and remained till they perished. SKEPTIC or SCEPTIC (from the Greek skeptikos; skeptomai, to look about, to consider). The form skeptic is preferred by Jolinson, Ash, Kenrick, Entick, Sheridan, Perry, Jameson, Richardson, and many other leading lexicographers. The form is more agreeable to the genius of our language, and is less liable than sceptic to be mispronounced. SKILLFUL or SKILFUL. SKY (not ske-i).

SMITH, HORACE, joint author, in connection with his brother James, of

the famous "Rejected Addresses,' was born in London, 1779, died 1849. A collection of his poems, edited by Epes Sargent, was published in New York in 1856. See extract, p. 63. SMITH, SYDNEY, born in Essex, England, in 1768, was educated at Winchester and Oxford. About 1796 he became a curate, and soon afterwards removed with a pupil to Edinburgh. Here he became the principal originator of the Edinburgh Review, and wrote several papers for that celebrated periodical. During the years 1804-5-6 he delivered in London a series of admirable lectures on Mental Philosophy. He now settled in Yorkshire as rector of a parish. In 1831 he was made a canon of St. Paul's. Smith was celebrated for his wit, his powers of raillery and sarcasm, and his flashes of eccentric fun. A vigorous and elegant writer, he was equally distinguished as a brilliant talker. He was a strenuous advocate of Catholic emancipation.

On Religious Freedom, p. 193.
Labor and Genius, p. 418.

The Uses of the Passions, p. 374. All Sorts of Minds, p. 468. SOCIALISM, appropriately, the substitution of the principle of association for that of competition in every branch of human industry; a state in which there is a community of property among all the citizens. Soc'RA-TES, born at Athens in the year 468 B. C., suffered the punishment of death for "impiety "at the age of 70; his impiety consisting in his pursuit of truth, however it might conflict with the absurd mythologies of the age. He was styled by Plato "the best of all men of the time, the wisest and most just of all men." See p. 138. SOLWAY.

The spring tides in the Solway Frith, an arm of the Irish Sea, are very remarkable for their rapidity and volume. At ebb-tide a large portion of the Solway is left dry.

SORCERY (sor'cer-y).

SOVEREIGN (suv'ur-in or sov'ur-in). SPENCER, HERBERT, an English philosophical writer, born about 1807. See pp. 148, 393. SPENSER, EDMUND, a great English poet, was born in London, about 1553, died 1599. His principal work, "The Fairy Queen," is an allegorical poem, full of beauties; but Hume

truly remarks of it, yet does its perusal soon become a kind of task reading." SPHERE (sfere).

SPON'DEE, a poetical foot containing two long syllables. SPRAGUE, CHARLES, an American poet, was born in Boston, Oct. 26, 1791. He was educated at the Franklin school, in that city, and entered a mercantile house at 13 years of age. In 1820 he became a teller, and afterwards a cashier, in the Globe Bank, a position he still held in 1864. His poetical writings consist of a series of theatrical prize addresses, "Curiosity," a poem, a Shakespeare Ode, and a number of minor pieces, all exhibiting remarkable grace and power in the use of language, and a genuine poetical sensibility. See p. 254.

In

STOCKTON, ROBT. FIELD, of the U. S. navy, a grandson of Richard Stockton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was born in Princeton, N. J., 1796. He entered the navy at 15, and behaved with marked gallantry in several battles. 1845 he was sent as commodore to the Pacific coast, and was very efficient in establishing the authority of the United States over California. In 1851 he was elected to the Senate of the United States, where he procured the passage of a law for the abolition of flogging in the navy. See p. 154.

STORY (store'ry).

STORY, Wм. W., a poet and sculptor, is the son of Judge Story, of the U. S. Supreme Court, and was born in Salem, Mass., 1819. He graduated at Harvard College in 1838, and published a volume of poems in 1847. He has resided for many years in Italy, where he has acquired a high reputation in art. See p. 466.

STREW (stroo or strō,- and sometimes spelt strow).

STUART, the royal house of Great Britain, after the union of Scotland. James, whose successors all bore the same name, succeeded to the throne of Scotland in 1406; the fifth of his line becoming father of the unhappy Mary, queen of Scots. The other kings of this house were James VI. of Scotland and I. of England, Charles I. (who was beheaded), Charles II., and James II., by whose deposition, in 1688, the

Stuarts were finally expelled the throne.

SUFFICE (suf-fize').

SUGGEST (sud-jest or sug'jest). Of the pronunciation of this word Smart truly remarks: "It is possible, with a great deal of pains, to pronounce suggest so as to preserve to each g its regular sound; but surely the elegant, because the easy, pronunciation is that which runs both letters into the same sound, namely, that of j." SULPHUROUS (sulfur-us). SUMNER, CHARLES, born at Boston,

Mass., Jan. 6, 1811, was prepared for college at the Latin school, and graduated at Harvard in 1830. Entering the law school he soon distinguished himself by the breadth and thoroughness of his legal acquisitions. In 1837, he visited Europe, and became personally acquainted with the most distinguished of his foreign contemporaries. In 1851 he was elected the successor of Mr. Webster in the Senate of the U. States.

SWIFT, JONATHAN, a celebrated writer, was born in 1667, at Dublin, in Ireland, and was educated at Kilkenny School, Trinity College, Dublin, and Hertford College, Oxford. In 1701 he took his doctor's degree, and on the accession of Queen Anne he visited England. In 1710 he became active as a political writer. When he first returned to Ireland he was exceedingly unpopular, but he lived to be the idol of the Irish people. In 1726 he gave "Gulliver's Travels" to the world. As he advanced in years he suffered from deafness and fits of giddiness; in 1739 his intellect gave way, and he expired in October, 1745.

SWARTHY (swawrth'e, the th aspirate, as in froth).

SWATH (Swoth or swawth).

SWORD (sōrd or sword; the former is

the preferred mode).

SYDNEY, ALGERNON, the second son of Robert, earl of Leicester, was born in England about the year 1621. He was a thorough republican, and opposed the dictatorship of Cromwell. He is the author of a volume of noble discourses concerning government. He was beheaded Dec. 7th, 1683, for supposed implication in plots against royalty. He met his fate with iron firmness; and

will always appear, in the eyes of freemen, more glorious on that bloody scaffold than any king on his throne.

TALFOURD, THOMAS NOON, born in Stafford, England, in 1795, died 1854. He was the author of "Ion," a classical tragedy, from which see an extract, 13, p. 45. TAR-PE'IAN, in Roman antiquity, an appellation given to a steep rock in Rome, whence those persons guilty of certain crimes were precipitated. It formed part of the hill on which stood the Capitol.

TASSO, TORQUATO, a celebrated Italian poet, was born in 1544 at Sorrento, on the southern shore of the Bay of Naples. He wrote "Jerusalem Delivered," one of the few great epics which the world has seen. He was confined in a madhouse for seven years; but in 1595 was invited to come to Rome from Naples, and be crowned a poet as Petrarch had been. He died about the time fixed for the coronation. See p. 297. TAUNT (tänt or tawnt). TAYLOR, HENRY, born in England about the year 1802, has contributed to literature the fine historical drama of "Philip van Artevelde," from which see an extract, p. 372. TEDIOUS (te'de-us or tede'yus). TEM'PE, a beautiful valley of Thessaly, in ancient Greece, between Mounts Olympus and Ossa. TENNYSON, ALFRED, poet-laureate of England, was born in 1810, at Somersby, a small parish in Lincolnshire. The laureate's father, a clergyman, was an amalgam of poet, painter, architect, musician, linguist, and mathematician. At Trinity College, Cambridge, Alfred obtained the chancellor's medal for an English poem on Timbuctoo. The year following, a volume of "Poems, chiefly Lyrical," appeared from his pen. Three years afterward he put forth another volume which contained his "May Queen" and other popular poems. From this time onward the circle of his admirers began to widen; and in 1850, the publication of his "In Memoriam," a group of 129 poems, suggested by the death of the friend of his youth, Arthur Henry Hallam, gave Tennyson a rank among the greatest poets of England. His genius is essentially retiring, meditative, and spiritual. He is a thorough master of versifi

cation and melody of diction, and embodies his thoughts in the most musical, condensed, and enduring forms. He has at the same time the art to conceal art. Few English poets have given to their verse so much of that charm which seems independent of the thought, and to lie in the grace and appropriateness of the structure. At Farringford in the Isle of Wight, Tennyson has resided for many years, amid green undulating woodland, thick with apple-trees, and fringed with silver sand and rocks, on which the lightgreen summer sea and the black waves of winter flow with the changeful music of the seasons. Here in his quiet home he sees little society except that of a few chosen friends.

From the May Queen, p. 53.
Bugle Song, p. 60.
Welcome to Alexandra, p. 63.
Ring out, wild Bells, p. 117.

Charge of Light Brigade, p. 458. Independence on Fortune, p. 484. THACKERAY, WM. MAKEPEACE, novelist and essayist, was the son of a clergyman, and born in Calcutta in 1811. He studied at the university of Cambridge, in England, but left without taking a degree. His novel of "Vanity Fair," published in 1846, was the first work by which he rose to any great distinction, though he had previously written a number of satirical works for the Magazines. In 1855 he visited the United States, and delivered in the principal cities a series of lectures on the English humorists.

One of his best novels, "The Newcomes," appeared in 1855, after his return to England. During his editorship of the London " Cornhill Magazine' he wrote a series of articles under the title of Roundabout Papers," which were deservedly popular. Thackeray had, during his life, his full share of abuse; but he manfully lived, or rather wrote it down. He died quite suddenly, in 1863. A Plea for Dunces, p. 74. Irving and Macaulay, p. 351. THEATRE or THEATER. THEREFORE (ther fore fore; the former is the preferred mode). THOMSON, JAMES, author of "The Seasons," a poem, was born in 1700, at Ednam, in Roxburgshire, England, where his father was a clergy

or thare'

man.

James studied for several years at the University of Edinburgh, removed to London in 1726, and in 1730 published the whole of his celebrated poem, parts of which had previously appeared. It was remarkably successful. The style is in some parts pompous and inflated, but the closeness with which he has observed external nature has seldom been surpassed; and the poetic intuition with which he apprehends the features of a landscape, and the moral associations which clothe it with the finest part of its beauty, is keen and unerring. Thomson wrote tragedies, but they are now forgotten. His "Castle of Indolence," however, is a noble specimen of poetic art. It is Thomson's greatest poem, and on it he lavished the wealth of his ripened genius. Living in a cottage at Kew, the poet caught cold in sailing up the Thames, and died of fever in 1748. He was a friendly, shy, and indolent man.

Hymn of the Seasons, p. 331. THRALLDOM or THRALDOM. TI'ARA (tī-air'a). TIN'CHEL, a circle of sportsmen, who, by surrounding a great space, and gradually narrowing, brought immense quantities of deer together. TINY (ti'ny or tin'y). To (generally pronounced too, the oo rather short).

TOBIN, JOHN, an English dramatist, born at Salisbury, England, 1770, died 1804. He wrote the " HoneyMoon," from which see an extract, p. 73. TOCQUEVILLE, ALEXIS DE (tokʼvil), a distinguished French statesman and writer, author of "Democracy in America," was born at Verneuil in France, July 29, 1805, died 1859. See an eloquent account of his life by his friend Beaumont, p. 132. Quotations from De Tocqueville, pp. 337, 338.

Democracy adverse to Socialism,

p. 299.

An American Wilderness, p. 358. TORTOISE (tor'tiz or tor'tis). TOWARD or TOWARDS, prep. (to'urd or to'urdz). TOWARD, adj. (to'wurd). TOULMAIN, DR., an English scientifio writer; quoted, p. 469. TRANSVERSE, adj. (trans-vers'), running or passing in a cross direction. TRANSITION (tran-sizh'un).