Essays Æsthetical

It is an essay book. 'Many a deep glance, and often with unspeakable precision, has he cast into mysterious Nature, and the still more mysterious Life of man. Wonderful it is with what cutting words, now and then, he severs as under the confusion; sheers down, were it fur longs deep, into the true center of the matter; and there not only hits the nail on the head, but with crushing force smites it home and buries it. 'Occasionally, as above hinted, we find consummate vigor, a true inspiration; his burning thoughts step forth in fit burning words, like so many full-formed Minervas, issuing amid flame and splendor from Jove’s head; a rich idiomatic diction, picturesque allusions, fiery poetic emphasis, or quaint tricksy twins; all the graces and terrors of a wild imagination, wedded to the clearest intellect, alternate in beautiful vicissitude. Were it not that sheer sleeping and soporific passages, circumlocutions, repetitions, touches even of pure doting jargon so often intervene. A wild tone pervades the whole utterance of the man, like its key-note and regulator; now screwing itself aloft as into the Song of Spirits, or else the shrill mockery of fiends; now sinking in cadences, not without melodious heartiness, though sometimes abrupt enough, into the common pitch, when we hear it only as a monotonous hum; of which the true character is extremely difficult to fix.