Page:Fitz-Greene Halleck, A Memorial.djvu/16

8 Men as Magazine critics. They are the Euclids of imaginative composition, and reduce every thing in the sphere of fancy to a demonstration. Twelve times a year do these “inglorious Miltons” appear upon the surface of the earth. Twelve times a year are they quietly buried.

As time rolls on, Posterity rakes among the ashes of the Past for some live coals of genius, but it never disturbs the dust of critics. A magazine a month old is very old indeed. It is true, that some undiscriminating persons invoke the aid of the book-binder, and preserve these volumes,—persons with palatial residences, and a yawning chaos of shelves in that part of the mansion which the architect has set apart—The Library. Its lower rounds are filled with standard works; and then the Magazines, in rich bindings, are high uplifted above the topmost round of the library-ladder. There—in dust and cobwebs—row on row—the serried volumes stand! never to be disturbed—except by the Auctioneer.

Prominent among the contributors to these luckless volumes are the literary critics. They vainly imagine that they have been hewing their way to the foremost rank in public opinion. By detracting from the reputation of those who have earned their bitter laurels—amidst toil, and poverty, and privation—they presume that the path to that glorious Temple is open and secure to them. It is a most unfortunate mistake. The true path for an American author to take is not to under-rate “Fanny” or the “Croakers,” not to show how “Alnwick Castle” or “Marco Bozzaris” might have been improved, if the creator of these