Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/82

346 "Mourier on the Influence of the French Revolution," was the first in the work. His importance in the future character and success of the "Review" was even thus early predicted by Homer, also one of the contributors, who made the following entry in his private journal:—"Jeffrey is the person who will derive most honour from this publication, as his articles in this number are generally known, and are incomparably the best. I have received the greater pleasure from this circumstance, because the genius of that little man has remained almost unknown to all but his most intimate acquaintances. His manner is not at first pleasing ; what is worse, it is of that cast which almost irresistibly impresses upon strangers the idea of levity and superficial talents. Yet there is not any man whose real character is so much the reverse. He has, indeed, a very sportive and playful fancy, but it is accompanied with an extensive and varied information, with a readiness of apprehension almost intuitive, with judicious and calm discernment, with a profound and penetrating understand- ing." It was no small praise that Jeffrey should already have acquired so high a character in a talented community such as we might now look for in vain in Edinburgh. The chief of these, besides Homer himself and Sydney Smith, were Lord Brougham; Brown the professor of Moral Philosophy; Lord Webb Seymour; Mr. Hamilton, afterwards professor of Sanscrit at Haley bury College; Dr. John Thomson, who became professor of Pathology in the University of Edinburgh; Mr. Reddie, afterwards town-clerk of Glasgow; Mr. Thomas Thomson, the eminent Scottish antiquary; and Lord Murray, now judge of the Court of Session. All these were young men full of talent and ambition, to whom the "Edinburgh Review," at its commencement, was a vent for feelings and theories that had been accumulating for years. Above all, it enabled them to give full utterance to those political principles that were so obnoxious to the rulers of the day, and so doubly proscribed in Scotland. Each individual no longer stood alone, but was part of a collected and well-disciplined phalanx; and instead of being obliged to express his opinions in bated breath, and amidst an overwhelming uproar of contradiction, he could now announce them in full and fearless confidence, through a journal which was sure of being heard and feared, at least, if not loved and respected.

As the "Edinburgh Review" was a new experiment in literary adventure, its outset was accompanied with many difficulties, arising from want of expertence among its chief conductors; and therefore it was obliged, in the first two or three years of its existence, to grope its way, step by step, as it best could. It was launched even without a pilot, for Sydney Smith edited no more than the first number. The meetings of the contributors were held with all the dread and mystery of a state conspiracy, in a little room off. Willison's printing-office in Craig's Close, to which each member was requested to steal singly, by whatever by-way would be least suspected; and there they examined and criticised each other's productions, and corrected the proof-sheets as they were thrown off. These contributions, also, for the first three numbers at least, were given gratuitously. No journal, it was soon felt, could long make head against such deficiencies; and the first important advance in improvement was, to appoint Jeffrey sole and responsible editor. The dismal and ludicrous secret meetings in the back room of the printing-office quickly disappeared for what author, however in love with the anonymous, could long continue to be ashamed of being a writer in the Edinburgh Review? "The rapid sale of the work, and the large profits it realized, made the payment of articles a necessary