philosophy is shrewd and instructive, uttering many a homely hint of
value in its way: as where we are reminded that if marrying _for_
money is to be justified only in the case of those unhappy persons who
are fit for nothing better, it does not follow that marrying _without_
money is to be justified in others; and again, that the negotiations
and transactions connected with marriage-settlements are eminently
useful, as searching character and testing affection, before an
irrevocable step be taken; and again, that when two very young persons
are joined together in matrimony, it is as if one sweet-pea should be
put as a prop to another. The essay on _Wisdom_ is elevated and
thoughtful, like most of the essayist's papers, but somewhat too heavy
for miscellaneous readers. With his wonted clearness he distinguishes
Wisdom from understanding, talents, capacity, ability, sagacity,
sense, &c. and defines it as that exercise of the reason into which
the heart enters--a structure of the understanding rising out of the
moral and spiritual nature. Then follows a section on _Children_,
which explodes not a few educational fallacies, and propounds certain
articles of faith and practice wholesome for these times, though it
will probably wear a prim and quakerish aspect to the admirers of Jean
Paul's famous tractate[10] on the same theme. The concluding paper in
this series, entitled _The Life Poetic_, is the liveliest, if not the
most valuable of the six: it has, however, been charged, with
considerable show of justice, with a tendency to strip genius of all
that is individual and spontaneous, or to accredit it only 'when it
moves abroad sedately, clad in the uniform of a peculiar college.' Mr
Taylor's 'solicitous and premeditated formalism' of poetical doctrine
is, it must be confessed, a little too strait-laced. The true poet is
born, not made. Still, in their place, our author's dogmas have their
use, and might, if duly marked and inwardly digested, annually deter
many aspirants who are _not_ poets from proving so incontestably to