may neither grow discouraged with ourselves nor exacting to our
neighbours. So the body of contemporary literature, ephemeral and
feeble in itself, touches in the minds of men the springs of
thought and kindness, and supports them (for those who will go at
all are easily supported) on their way to what is true and right.
And if, in any degree, it does so now, how much more might it do so
if the writers chose! There is not a life in all the records of
the past but, properly studied, might lend a hint and a help to
some contemporary. There is not a juncture in to-day's affairs but
some useful word may yet be said of it. Even the reporter has an
office, and, with clear eyes and honest language, may unveil
injustices and point the way to progress. And for a last word: in
all narration there is only one way to be clever, and that is to be
exact. To be vivid is a secondary quality which must presuppose
the first; for vividly to convey a wrong impression is only to make
failure conspicuous.

But a fact may be viewed on many sides; it may be chronicled with
rage, tears, laughter, indifference, or admiration, and by each of
these the story will be transformed to something else. The
newspapers that told of the return of our representatives from
Berlin, even if they had not differed as to the facts, would have
sufficiently differed by their spirits; so that the one description
would have been a second ovation, and the other a prolonged insult.
The subject makes but a trifling part of any piece of literature,
and the view of the writer is itself a fact more important because
less disputable than the others. Now this spirit in which a
subject is regarded, important in all kinds of literary work,
becomes all-important in works of fiction, meditation, or rhapsody;
for there it not only colours but itself chooses the facts; not