form his apology for retaining certain ftrictures, as in the Effay on Popular Criticism, which he would otherwife have chofen to omit. Most of the remaining papers are difcurfive rather than critical; and fome of the earliest in date are not free from a rhetorical emphafis of style which belongs to inexperience. The author has given them a place in this collection because they harmonize with the general contents of his volume, and also because, with all their imperfection, he still holds them to be fubftantially juft. He will fay no more in their behalf, left he should be thought to deprecate that free criticism of his own performances which he has never fcrupled to exercise on the works of other men; and so, standing

quite afide, he leaves them to their fortune.

T. M.

Chelsea, Feb. 22, 1861.

E are affured by philofophers that there is nothing futile or fuperfluous in the material world. Even the refufe of man becomes the resource of Nature, who weaves her gayeft mantle from the fhreds he scatters, and in whofe wonderful economy there is ufe as well as place for all that we contemptuously call "rubbish." Indeed, there is no end to the intereft and the beauty of many trivial and offenfive things. Ignorance on the one hand, and engroffing worldlinefs on the other, are hourly blinding us to the most valuable truths enshrined in very humble forms, and confirming our habits of indifference towards a world of common wonders. If our eyes were really open, the most common-place of daily objects would affume a romantic novelty, and invite a more intimate research. With a limited clafs of perfons, this is actually the cafe, bleft as they are with an active intelligence and a scientific curiofity, and these contributing to induce a conftant habit of ん

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