the instruction and delight of the world, that we could not afford to see it banished, even though a more efficient teacher should occupy its place. Nor can such a fate now in reality overtake it. Even should the number of its votaries ever be diminished, or should it ever fall into hands too feeble to sustain it, we would still have access to the ancient well-springs of its power, whose waters, though incapable of extension, can yet never run dry. It is a consolation to know that, though it may be impossible to add anything of sterling value to what has already been written, the great works of literary genius, treasured up in so many different languages, can never be taken away from us, and that their influence survives the manifold changes that happen to society in so many other respects.
Now, if it be true—that complaint of Labruyère—that "we are come into the world too late to produce anything new, that nature and life are preoccupied, and that description and sentiment have been long exhausted"; if it be true that literary labor, in times past, has spent itself in producing those wonderful creations which, by the common consent of mankind, stand as the highest models of composition and the highest types of literary excellence, then we must conclude that literature has reached its climax and fulfilled its mission, and that consequently there is no reason to regret its decadence. Better employ the measure of strength and talent with which we are endowed in exploring new lands and cultivating new soils than waste them in a field that is already gleaned of its harvests and exhausted of its fertility. To such a gloomy view of the present condition and future prospects of literature many men of sound judgment are unwilling to subscribe. And yet it seems to me, if they carefully consider the subject, especially in connection with the new direction which has been given of late years to the studies and aspirations of the noblest minds, they must see good reason for modifying their judgment. Let us examine it for a few moments with respect to two of the departments of letters that are regarded among scholars at least with the highest esteem and veneration of any—I mean poetry and history.
Those who are most familiar with the poetry of different countries, and of ancient and modern times, must admit the remarkable resemblance and repetition to be found in it. Under the garb perhaps of a new diction, in one poet, will be found lurking the identical idea expressed by another. As Emerson says: "The originals are not original. There is imitation, model and suggestion, to the very archangels, if we knew their history. The first book tyrannizes over the second. Read Tasso, and you think of Virgil; read Virgil, and you think of Homer; and Milton forces you to reflect how narrow are the limits of human invention." And as Dry den somewhere says about the modern poets, "You may track them in the snow of the ancients." Even the imagery and what is called the "machinery" of poetry repeat themselves in different ages, in the pages of different writers. The
