the most trite idea. They clothe it in a language so obscure and metaphysical, that the reader is not about to comprehend their pages without some labour. This is called a great "range of thought;" and not improperly, as I can testify; for, in my own case, I have frequently ranged the universe of ideas, and come back again in as perfect ignorance of their meaning as when I set out. It is delightful, to see the literati of a circulating library get hold of one of these difficult periods! Their praise of the performance is exactly commensurate with its obscurity. Every body knows, that to seem wise is the first requisite in a great man.
A common word in the mouths of all Reviewers, readers of magazines, and young ladies, when speaking of novels, is "keeping;" and yet there are but few who attach the same meaning to it. I belong, myself, to the old school, in this particular, and think that it applies more to the subject in hand, than to any use of terms, or of cant expressions. As a man might just as well be out of the world as out of "keeping," I have endeavoured to confine myself, in this tale, strictly to its ob-
