by consulting him, or by hearing him consulted, upon intellectual difficulties, or upon schemes literary and philosophic. Such applications, come from what point of the compass they might, found him always prepared. Nor did it seem to make any difference, whether it were the erudition of words or things that was wanted." It may—and ought to—be added, that he is just as unostentatious of his mental wealth, as the foregoing legend makes Porson demonstrative of his. At any rate Sir William has no occasion to load his pockets with bijou editions of the classics, nor inclination to appal undergraduates by haling from the stores of memory as exhaustless an array of authorities, as (O the illegitimate triumphs of the legitimate drama, in days of yore!) the grave-digger in "Hamlet" used to doff of waistcoats, in the bleak churchyard of Elsinore.
M. Victor Cousin has somewhere pronounced Sir William Hamilton the greatest critic of the age. His celebrated edition of "Reid" attracted and fixed the attention of Christendom at large. That his own part in it should be left unfinished in the middle of a sentence, has had the effect of suggesting words of censure and objection to criticasters who could find no other weak point for which to rate him. His recently published "Discussions on Philosophy"—comprising some of his most valued contributions to the Edinburgh Review, with a mass of supplementary matter, which for various extrinsic reasons, polemical and personal,[1] as well as for its intrinsic worth simply as coming from him, had a special interest to all concerned—have deservedly enhanced his reputation, and present a noble collection of essays, the result of laborious thought (ille gravern duro terram vertit aratro), wide-sweeping vision, and indefatigable research. "The results of his reading are now sown and rooted at Paris, not less than at Berlin; are blossoming on the Rhine; and are bearing fruit on the Danube." We have seen these "Discussions" pooh-poohed in one London journal, as though they involved, after all, nothing better than verbal subtleties, and were expended on shadows and chaff, and airy nothings. Sir William is not the man to spend his strength for nought, in that sort of way. He must have tangible interest for his solid capital. He is not to be satisfied with Bank of Elegance notes, payable during the next Greek Calends. His philosophy is not a system of dry chopping logic. Nor can it content itself—for it is of British, not Deutsch growth—with transcendental reveries of baseless fabric, nor put up with unfurnished apartments in castles of the air. His spirit, though
Habitant, par l'essor d'un grand et beau génie,
Les hautes régions de la philosophie,"
is far too practical and sagacious to become absorbed in profitless abstractions. He is as impatient as the veriest utilitarian can be, of that pompeux galimatias, that spécieux babil, which, as Molière says, "vous donue des mots pour des raisons, et dps promesses pour des effets." Words, with him, must represent things, and scientific formulæ must show cause for their use, and find bail for their good behaviour.
No officious slave
Is he of that false secondary power
By which we multiply distinction, then
- ↑ E. g., his tilt with Archdeacon Hare.
