183L] [ 561 ] 



MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE, DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN. 



The Anatomy of Society, by James Au- 

 gustus St. John, 2 vols. \2rno. It is but 

 fair to warn the reader against looking 

 for what he may naturally expect, but 

 which he will not find some consecutive 

 discussion on the structure of society. 

 The title and the book have little to do 

 with each other. There is nothing ap- 

 proaching a dissection of the subject, 

 the interior is not at all thrown open, 

 and only a few kindly cuts made upon 

 portions of the surface. Nevertheless, 

 consisting, as the volumes do, of nothing 

 but loose and unconnected remarks, in 



the old fashioned shape of essays many 



of them already published in periodicals 

 r sometimes upon matters of life, but 

 oftener upon books, or the writers of 

 books it is an agreeable performance 

 enough soothing and dreamy full of 

 comfort and complacency. The sober 

 reader may be sure of never being startled 

 by any extravagance ; and if he thinks 

 at all, during the perusal, which is not 

 very likely to be the case the opium is 

 too predominating it will be to wonder 

 where the writer can have lived to find 

 every thing so soft and soporific. The 

 secret must be, he has encountered no 

 realities to roughen him his conversa- 

 tion must have been almost wholly with 

 quieting books ; and he in fact will be 

 found to be more frequently describing 

 the realms of some Utopia, than the 

 society of England. Nor are his senti- 

 ments, as might be expected, gathered 

 as they are from books, at all coherent ; 

 and indeed bear few other marks of pro- 

 ceeding from the same pen, than the sub- 

 dued tone that pervades them all, and 

 the uniformity of misconceptions. But 

 he is always in drawing-room costume 

 well dressed and well behaved his words 

 flowing like streams of milk and honey, 

 and his figures as rich and palling as a 

 bride-cake he is not only cultivated, but 

 superfine. 



The very best portions of Mr. St. John 

 are his estimates of More, Franklin, 

 Brutus, and Tacitus ; but they are full 

 of defects and illusions, when closely ex- 

 amined Tacitus, particularly. Mr. St. 

 John ascribes all his tours de malice, and 

 that is a very gentle term, to sagacity, 

 and a penetration that exposed the cha- 

 racter of the man he described like a sun- 

 beam. Let any body look coolly at the 

 account of Tiberius, a man of whom he 

 personally knew nothing he was dead 

 before Tacitus was born yet of whom 

 he pronounced, as to every action, as if 

 he had been his daily companion. He 

 has but one scale for him the prince 

 never meant what he said which we take 

 to be beyond the powers of mortal man. 



MM. New Series VOL. XL No. 65. 



More is lauded to the skies ; yet if any 

 regard be paid to his Utopia, he must 

 have spent his life in the profession of 

 sentiments in opposition to his convic- 

 tions while Franklin sinks in Mr. St. 

 John's estimate, because he loved money 

 and was not a poet. After playing the 

 patriot for half a life, he complained that 

 America had been ungrateful. " Did 

 Phocian ask for a reward ?" asks Mr. St. 

 John. We do not know we know much 

 of Franklin and mighty little of Phocian. 

 His biographer was as likely to be gulled 

 as any man who ever wielded a pen 

 Mr. St. John not excepted. 



We have little space for particulars ; 

 but we take the first essay a fair spe- 

 cimen of the whole. It is entitled Modes 

 of studying the World ; but to any body, 

 not observing the title, the writer would 

 seem to be employed in showing that 

 books are better vehicles than conversa- 

 tion for the conveyance of opinions. 

 Though many other matters appear to 

 have been passing through his brain, this 

 seems the leading idea the one most 

 frequently recurring ; but as to modes 

 of studying the world, in any intelligible 

 sense, the reader will learn absolutely 

 nothing. The author is rich, apparently, 

 in illustration, but which proves, on ex- 

 amination, to be the result of adven- 

 turousness to make up for the absence 

 of real information. " The periods," says 

 he, " of the thunder-tongued Demos- 

 thenes are said to have convulsed Greece 

 through all her states" which every 

 body knows is not true on the contrary, 

 on Demosthenes' own testimony, they 

 were comparatively ineffective, and only 

 roused his fellow-townsmen to occa- 

 sional and for the most part impotent 

 exertions. It is such men as Plutarch 

 and Mr. St. John in whose ears they 

 have sounded thunder-tongued. Hheto- 

 ricians and writers have universally ap- 

 plauded, and justly, but the speeches did 

 not convulse Greece through all her 

 states Philip has convinced us of the 

 contrary. Of these same " periods," with 

 which he appears so familiar, Mr. St. 

 John adds, that Demosthenes in them 

 " poured forth his fire and soul intp 

 every metaphor;" while, in fact, the 

 orator was remarkable for the simplicity, 

 or at least the plainness, of his manner. 

 There is pith, energy, and vigour, but 

 none of the ornaments of poetry. 



Cicero's " themes," again, are de- 

 scribed as " chiefly, if not entirely, of a 

 political nature, and written not so much 

 to exercise his powers as to call off his 

 mind from disagreeable reflections.' r Did 

 ever any body, acquainted with the mass 

 of his works, characterise them thus ? 

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