MODERN PnbsE \VRJT£R3 7^ 



tnent of enjoyment derived fipm commupion ^vltl' i.ature, an-^ 

 consequently, also, to give impetus to its irseparable acconi* 

 paniment, the love ot" distant travels, we may mention i>* 

 France Jean Jacques E-ousseau, Buffon, and Bernardin de 

 St. Pierre, and, exceptionally to include a still living author- 

 I would name my old friend Auguste de Chateaubriand ;* m 

 Great Britain, the intellectual Play fair ; and in Germany. 

 Cook's companion on his second voyage of circumnavigation 

 the eloquent George Forster, who was endowed with so pe 

 culiarly happy a faculty of generalization in the study of natui'e 

 It would be foreign to the present work were I to under 

 take to inquire into the characteristics of these writers, aiidf. 

 investigate the causes which at one time lend a charm 0.^6 

 grace to the descriptions of natural scenery contained in th<;i) 

 universally-diffused works, and at another disturb the impies- 

 sions which they were designed to call forth ; but as a trixv- 

 eler, who has derived the greater portion of his knowleoi^e 

 from immediate observation, I may perhaps be permitted to 

 introduce a few scattered remarks on a recent, and, on \/ic 

 whole, but httle cultivated branch of literature. Buffon — 

 great and earnest as he was — simultaneously embracing & 

 knowledge of the planetary structures, of organization, and of 

 the laws of light and magnetic forces, and far more profbunjlv 

 versed in physical investigations than his cotemporaries sup- 

 posed, shows more artificial elaboration of style and more jiie- 

 torical pomp than individualizing truthfulness when he pa^sses 

 from the description of the habits of animals to the deliixea' 

 tion of natural scenery, inclining the mind to the receptioxi of 

 exalted impressions rather than seizing upon the imagin&tion 

 by presenting a visible picture of actual nature, or convt^ying 

 to the senses the echo, as it were, of reality. Even through- 

 out the most justly celebrated of his works in this department 

 of literature, we instinctively feel that he could never have 

 left Central Europe, and that he is deficient in personj«,l ob- 

 servation of the tropical world, which he believes he iti cor- 

 rectly describing. But that which we most especially miss 

 in the writings of the great naturalist is a harmonious mode 

 of connecting the representation of nature with the expression 

 of awakened feelings ; he is, in fact, deficient in almost all 

 that flows from the mysterious analogy existing between the 

 mental emotions of the mind and th(5 phenomena of the per- 

 ceptive world. 



* [This distingiisbed writer dieJ July 4tli of tho present yeal 

 (l848).V-r/-. 



