Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 1.djvu/95

 phon;&emsp;*&emsp;*&emsp;but at the same time, our author's history has derived, from Herodotus, an air and character which will appear uncouth to a modern reader; oracles, dreams, prodigies, miraculous interpositions of the gods, and no less miraculous instances of credulity and folly among men, are the objects perpetually before him. The rage of reading novels, which has spread so wonderfully over Britain, may perhaps have accustomed the public ear to such improbabilities. To all true lovers of the marvellous, we therefore recommend our author's hero. His adventures, though related in a better style, are as far removed from truth, and very near as much connected with instruction, as most of those which of late years have been so diligently studied by a great part of the nation.

"We conclude this article with an admonition to the author. In any future performance, we advise him either to venture into the region of pure fiction, or to confine himself within the precincts of real history. In the former, by his talents for composition, he may become an agreeable writer; in the latter his industry may render him an instructive one."

It happens that the work thus noticed in the second number of the Edinburgh Review, was also the subject of a critique in the second number of the Critical Review, which had then been just started in London by Smollett. The article in the latter work bears such evident marks of the pen of the distinguished editor, and refers to such an extraordinary work, that we shall make no apology for the following extracts.

After remarking that the volume has-been chiefly compiled from the episodes of Herodotus, that it exhibits a miserable flatness of style, and that all the facts scattered throughout its two hundred and thirty-five pages might have been related in three or four, the critic proceeds to say—"we are apt to believe that this is the first essay of some young historian, who has been more intent upon forming his style and displaying his learning, than careful in digesting his plan, and combining his materials; the subject is too meagre to afford nourishment to the fancy or understanding; and one might as well attempt to build a first-rate man of war from the wreck of a fishing-boat, as to compose a regular history from such a scanty parcel of detached observations. The compiler has been aware of this deficiency, and has filled up his blank paper with unnecessary argument, and a legion of eternal truths, by way of illustration. What could be more unnecessary, for example, than a detail of reasons for doubting the divinity or daemoniacism of the ancient oracles? who believes, at this time of day, that they were either inspired by the deity, or influenced by the devil? What can be more superfluous than a minute commentary and investigation of the absurdities in the plea of the priestess, when she was taxed with falsehood and equivocation? But we beg the author's pardon; he wrote for readers that dwell beyond the Tweed, who have not yet renounced all commerce with those familiar spirits, which are so totally discarded from this part of the island. There is still a race of soothsayers in the Highlands, derived, if we may believe some curious antiquaries, from the Druids and Bards, that were set apart for the worship of Apollo. The author of the history now before us, may, for ought we know, be one of these venerable seers; though we rather take him to be a Presbyterian teacher, who has been used to expound apothegms that need no explanation."

The history of Crœsus king of Lydia, one of the most curious productions recognised in the history of literary mania, is now extremely rare—not by any means from the absorbing appreciation of the public, but rather, apparently, from the very limited extent of its first circulation.

The worthy author, though perhaps daunted a little by the reception of his first attempt, in time recovered the full tone of his literary ambition; and he