"➖➖➖➖ still prompts the eternal sigh,

For which we wish to live, or dare to die !"

The leading characters in 'Don Quixote' are strictly individuals; that is, they do not so much belong to, as form a class by themselves. In other words, the actions and manners of the chief dramatis persona do not arise out of the actions and manners of those around them, or the situation of life in which they are placed, but out of the peculiar dispositions of the persons themselves, operated upon by certain impulses of caprice and accident. Yet these impulses are so true to nature, and their operation so exactly described, that we not only recognise the fidelity of the representation, but recognise it with all the advantages of novelty superadded. They are in the best sense originals, namely, in the sense in which nature has her originals. They are unlike anything we have seen before-may be said to be purely ideal; and yet identify themselves more readily with our imagination, and are retained more strongly in memory, than perhaps any others: they are never lost in the crowd. One. test of the truth of this ideal painting is the number of allusions which 'Don Quixote' has furnished to the whole of civilised Europe; that is to say, of appropriate cases and striking illustrations of the universal principles of our nature. The detached incidents and occasional descriptions of human life are more familiar and obvious; so that we have nearly the same insight here given us into the characters of innkeepers. bar-maids, ostlers, and puppet-show men, that we have in Fielding. There is a much greater mixture, however, of the pathetic and sentimental with the quaint and humorous, than there ever is in Fielding. I might instance the story of the countryman whom Don Quixote and Sancho met in their doubtful search after Dulcinea, driving his mules to plough at break of day, and "singing the ancient ballad of Roncesvalles!" The episodes, which are frequently introduced, are excellent, but have, upon the whole, been overrated. They derive their interest from their connexion with the main story. We are so pleased with that, that we are disposed to receive pleasure from everything else. Compared, for instance, with the serious tales in Boccaccio, they are slight

remain an everlasting memento of the weakness of human vanity; and the account of Gil Blas' legacy, of the uncertainty of human expectations. This novel is also deficient in the fable as well as in the characters. It is not a regularly constructed story; but a series of amusing adventures told with equal gaiety and good sense, and in the most graceful style imaginable

It has been usual to class our own great novelists as imitators of one or other of these two writers. Fielding, no doubt, is re-re like 'Don Quixote' than 'Gil Blas; Smollett is more like “Gil Blas' than Don Quixote; but there is not much resemblance in either case. Sterne's Tristram Shandy' is a more direct instance of imitation. Richardson can scarcely be called an intator of any one; or if he is, it is of the sentimental refinement of Marivaux, or of the verbose gallantry of the writers of the seventeenth century.

There is very little to warrant the common idea that Fielding was an imitator of Cervantes, except his own declaration of su-h an intention in the title-page of Joseph Andrews' the romantie turn of the character of Parson Adams (the only romantic character in his works,) and the proverbial humour of Partridge, which is kept up only for a few pages Fielding's novels are, in general, thoroughly his own; and they are thoroughly English What they are most remarkable for, is neither sentiment, nor imagination, nor wit, nor even humour, though there is an immense deal of this last quality: but profound knowledge of human nature, at least of English nature, and masterly pictures of the characters of men as he saw them existing This quality disinguishes all his works, and is shown almost equally in all of them99. As a painter of real life, he was equal to Hogarth : as a mere ob server of human nature, he was little inferior to Shakspeare, though without any of the genius and poetical qualities of his mind His humour is less rich and laughable than Smollett's - h's wit as often misses as hits, he has none of the fine pathos of Richardson or Sterne; but he has brought together a greater variety of charters in common life, narked with more distinct peenharines, and without an atem of caricature, than any other novel writer whatever The extreme subtlety of observation on the springs of human conduct in ordinary characters, is only equal

led by the ingenuity of contrivance in bringing those springs into play, in such a manner as to lay open their smallest irregularity. The detection is always complete, and made with the certainty and skill of a philosophical experiment, and the obviousness and familiarity of a casual observation. The truth of the imitation is indeed so great, that it has been argued that Fielding must have had his materials ready-made to his hands, and was merely a transcriber of local manners and individual habits. For this conjecture, however, there seems to be no foundation. His representations, it is true, are local and individual; but they are not the less profound and conclusive. The feeling of the general principles of human nature operating in particular circumstances, is always intense, and uppermost in his mind; and he makes use of incident and situation only to bring out character.

'Tom

It is scarcely necessary to give any illustrations. Jones' is full of them. There is the account, for example, of the gratitude of the elder Blifil to his brother, for assisting him to obtain the fortune of Miss Bridget Alworthy by marriage; and of the gratitude of the poor in his neighbourhood to Alworthy himself, who had done so much good in the country that he had made every one in it his enemy. There is the account of the Latin dialogues between Partridge and his maid, of the assault made on him during one of these by Mrs. Partridge, and the severe bruises he patiently received on that occasion, after which the parish of Little Baddington rung with the story, that the schoolmaster had killed his wife. There is the exquisite keeping in the character of Blifil, and the want of it in that of Jones. There is the gradation in the lovers of Molly Seagrim, the philosopher Square succeeding to Tom Jones, who again finds that he himself had succeeded to the accomplished Will Barnes who had the first possession of her person, and had still possession of her heart, Jones being only the instrument of her vanity, as Square was of her interest. Then there is the discreet honesty of Black George, the learning of Thwackum and Square, and the profundity of Squire Western, who considered it as a physical impossibility that his daughter should fall in love with Tom Jones. We have also that gentleman's disputes with his sister,

and the inimitable appeal of that lady to her niece: “I was never so handsome as you, Sophy; yet I had something of you formerly. I was called the cruel Parthenissa. Kingdoms and states, as Tully Cicero says, undergo alteration, and so must the human form!" The adventure of the same lady with the highwayman, who robbed her of her jewels while he complimented her beauty, ought not to be passed over; nor that of Sophia and her muff, nor the reserved coquetry of her cousin Fitzpatrick, nor the description of Lady Bellaston, nor the modest overtures of the pretty widow Hunt, nor the indiscreet babblings of Mrs. Honour. The moral of this book has been objected to with ut much reason; but a more serious objection has been made to the want of refinement and elegance in two principal characters. We never feel this objection, indeed, while we are reading the book; but at other times we have something like a lurking suspicion that Jones was but an awkward fellow, and Sophia a pretty simpleton. I do not know how to account for this effect, unless it is that Fielding's constantly assuring us of the beauty of his hero, and the good sense of his heroine, at last produces a distrust of both The story of Tom Jones' is allowed to ban unrivalled; and it is this circumstance, together with the vast variety of characters, that has given the History of a Founding" so decided a preference over Fielding's other novels The characters themselves, both in Amelia' and Joseph Andrews,' are quite equal to any of those in ‘Tom Jones.' The account of Miss Matthews and Ensign Hibbert in the former of the se— the way in which that lady reconciles herself to the death of her father, the flexible Colonel Bath, the insipid Mrs James, the complaisant Colonel Trent, the demure, sly, intriguing, equit ocal Mrs. Bennet, the lord who is her seducer, and who attem;ss afterwards to seduce Amelia by the same mechanical process d a concert-ticket, a book, and the disguise of a great coat,— La little, fat, short-nosed, red-faced, good-humoure i accom-pise, tie keeper of the lodging house, who, having no protezavo las ta lantry herif, has a disinterestel deight in forwarding t intrigues and pleasures of others (to say nothing of honest. Alkinson, the story of the miniature picture of Ameha, and the hashed mutton, which are in a different style,) are master parves

of description. The whole scene at the lodging-house, the masquerade, &c., in 'Amelia,' are equal in interest to the parallel scenes in Tom Jones,' and even more refined in the knowledge of character. For instance, Mrs. Bennet is superior to Mrs. Fitzpatrick in her own way. The uncertainty in which the event of her interview with her former seducer is left, is admirable. Fielding was a master of what may be called the double entendre of character, and surprises you no less by what he leaves in the dark (hardly known to the persons themselves) than by the unexpected discoveries he makes of the real traits and circumstances in a character with which, till then, you find you were unacquainted. There is nothing at all heroic, however, in the usual style of his delineations. He does not draw lofty characters or strong passions; all his persons are of the ordinary stature as to intellect, and possess little elevation of fancy, or energy of purpose. Perhaps, after all, Parson Adams is his finest character. It is equally true to nature and more ideal than any of the others. Its unsuspecting simplicity makes it not only more amiable, but doubly amusing, by gratifying the sense of superior sagacity in the reader. Our laughing at him does not once lessen our respect for him. His declaring that he would willingly walk ten miles to fetch his sermon on vanity, merely to convince Wilson of his thorough contempt of this vice, and his consoling himself for the loss of his schylus by suddenly recollecting that he could not read it if he had it, because it is dark, are among the finest touches of naïveté. The night adventures at Lady Booby's with Beau Didapper and the amiable Slipslop are the most ludicrous; and that with the huntsman, who draws off the hounds from the poor parson because they would be spoiled by following vermin, the most profound. Fielding did not often repeat himself, but Dr. Harrison, in 'Amelia,' may be considered as a variation of the character of Adams; so also is Goldsmith's 'Vicar of Wakefield;' and the latter part of that work, which sets out so delightfully, an almost entire plagiarism from Wilson's account of himself, and Adams's domestic history.

Smollett's first novel, 'Roderick Random,' which is also his best, appeared about the same time as Fielding's 'Tom Jones,'