world-worlds, on the same principles, and by similar accidents, superseding the hypothesis of a Creator, and demonstrating the superfluity of church tithes and country parsons, takes up the stitch again with-But to return to the subject of dung. God bless you and your

Affectionate Friend,

S. T. COLERidge.

LETTER III. To Mr. Blackwood.

EAR SIR,-Here have I been sitting, this

Dwhole long-lagging, muzzy, mizly morning,

struggling without success against the insuperable disgust I feel to the task of explaining the abrupt chasm at the outset of our correspondence, and disposed to let your verdict take its course, rather than suffer over again by detailing the causes of the stoppage; though sure by so doing to acquit my will of all share in the result. Instead of myself, and of you, my dear sir, in relation to myself, I have been thinking, first, of the Edinburgh Magazine; then of the magazines generally and comparatively;then of a magazine in the abstract; and lastly, of the immense importance and yet strange neglect of that prime dictate of prudence and common sense -DISTINCT MEANS TO DISTINCT ENDS.-But here I must put in one proviso, not in any relation

though to the aphorism itself, which is of universal validity, but relatively to my intended application of it. I must assume- -I mean, that the individuals disposed to grant me free access and fair audience for my remarks, have a conscience—such a portion at least, as being eked out with superstition and sense of character, will suffice to prevent them from seeking to realize the ultimate end, (i. e. the maxim of profit) by base or disreputable means. This, therefore, may be left out of the present argument, an extensive sale being the common object of all publishers, of whatever kind the publications may be, morally considered. Nor do the means appropriate to this end differ. Be the work good or evil in its tendency, in both cases alike there is one question to be predetermined, viz. what class or classes of the reading world the work is intended for? I made the proviso, however, because I would not mislead any man even for an honest cause, and my experience will not allow me to promise an equal immediate circulation from a work addressed to the higher interests and blameless predilections of men, as from one constructed on the plan of flattering the envy and vanity of sciolism, and gratifying the cravings of vulgar curiosity. Such may be, and in some instances, I doubt not, has been, the result. But I dare not answer for it beforehand, even though both works should be equally well suited to their several purposes, which will not be thought a probable case, when it is considered, how much less talent, and of

how much commoner kind, is required in the latter. On the other hand, however, I am persuaded that a sufficient success, and less liable to draw-backs from competition, would not fail to attend a work on the former plan, if the scheme and execution of the contents were as appropriate to the object, which the purchasers must be supposed to have in view, as the means adopted for its outward attraction and its general circulation were to the interest of its proprietors.

During a long literary life, I have been no inattentive observer of periodical publications; and I can remember no failure, in any work deserving success, that might not have been anticipated from some error or deficiency in the means, either in regard to the mode of circulating the work, (as for instance by the vain attempt to unite the characters of author, editor, and publisher,) or to the typographical appearance; or else from its want of suitableness to the class of readers, on whom, it should have been foreseen, the remunerating sale must principally depend. It would be misanthropy to suppose that the seekers after truth, information, and innocent amusement, are not sufficiently numerous to support a work, in which these attractions are prominent, without the dishonest aid of personality, literary faction, or treacherous invasions of the sacred recesses of private life, without slanders, which both reason and duty command us to disbelieve as well as abhor; for what but false

hood, or that half truth, which is falsehood in its most malignant form, can or ought to be expected from a self-convicted traitor and ingrate ?

sup

If these remarks are well founded, we may narrow the problem to the few following terms, it being understood, that the work now in question, is a monthly publication, not devoted to any one branch of knowledge or literature, but a magazine of whatever may be supposed to interest readers in general, not excluding the discoveries, or even the speculations of science, that are generally intelligible and interesting, so that the portion devoted to any one subject or department, shall be kept proportionate to the number of readers for whom it may be posed to have a particular interest. Here, however, we must not forget, that however few the actual dilettanti, or men of the fancy may be, yet, as long as the articles remain generally intelligible, (in pugilism, for instance,) Variety and Novelty communicate attraction that interests all. Homo sum, nihil humani a me alienum. If to this we add the exclusion of theological controversy, which is endless, I shall have pretty accurately described the EDINBURGH MAGAZINE, as to its characteristic plan and purposes; which may, I think, be comprised in three terms, as a Philosophical, Philological, and *Esthetic Miscellany. The word miscella

I wish I could find a more familiar word than æsthetic, for works of taste and criticism. It is, however, in all respects better, and of more reputable origin, than belletristic.

ny however, must be taken as involving a predicate in itself, in addition to the three preceding epithets, comprehending, namely, all the ephemeral births of intellectual life, which add to the gaiety and variety of the work, without interfering with its express and regular objects.

To be sure, there is tasty; but that has been long ago emasculated for all unworthy uses by milliners, tailors, and the androgynous correlatives of both, formerly called its, and now yclept dandies. As our language, therefore, contains no other useable adjective, to express that coincidence of form, feeling, and intellect, that something, which, confirming the inner and outward senses, becomes a new sense in itself, to be tried by laws of its own, and acknowledging the laws of the understanding so far only as not to contradict them; that faculty which, when possessed in a high degree, the Greeks termed piλokaλía but when spoken of generally, or in kind only, rò aiolŋtɩкóv; and for which even our substantive, Taste, is asa-not inappropriate- but very inadequate metaphor; there is reason to hope, that the term asthetic, will be brought into common use as soon as distinct thoughts and definite expressions shall once more become the requisite accomplishment of a gentleman. So it was in the energetic days, and in the starry court of our English-hearted Eliza; when trade, the nurse of freedom, was the enlivening counterpoise of agriculture, not its alien and usurping spirit; when commerce had all the enterprize, and more than the romance of war; when the precise yet pregnant terminology of the schools gave bone and muscle to the diction of poetry and eloquence, and received from them in return passion and harmony; but, above all, when from the self-evident truth, that what in kind constitutes the superiority of man to animal, the same in degree must constitute the superiority of men to each other, the practical inference was drawn,