MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 189 



Sweetheart," all barked at him, from Fmser's Threepenny to the Fai tiling Rush- 

 light of Costermongers' Hall. The autiior, however, like the great men who have 

 been in advance of their aije some centuiies, bore all things patiently : he |irinted, 

 he pubhshed, he chalked the walls, he billed the B.bles, — DIVARICATION 

 stared us in the face at every angle, and every body wanted to know what the 

 Divarication could be. There was a mystical union of red, while, and blue — 

 there were rays of sunshine, glory, and cloudiness ; soul and body ; angles and 

 triangles; and a variety of symbols, which appeared calculated to perplex reason 

 through all its calculations. Yet one fact stood clear — one that was understood 

 — one that found an answer from every bosom, — and that was, PRICE ONE 

 GUINEA (that did not own a ninny,) at the bottom of '.he title-page— so people 

 read no further. 



But what is the DIVARICATION — this Jesus Natura — this mental Sala- 

 mander — this moral sea serpent, — seen, and not seen — conceived, but not ima- 

 gined ? What is its author — is he a man or an orang-outang? Does he not 

 want to take a very reverend personage by the horns, and swear Lucifer his true 

 liege man, on the cross of a Welsh hook? Yea, verily, he is a man who would 

 take a beam of the sun for his shoe-tie — knock down the great wall of China — 

 measure the spectre of the Bodken for a pair of unmentionables— and sup sulphur 

 posset out of the crater of Mount Vesuvius. There are few things to be ill done 

 when it is well done, from a beefsteak to a mistake, that Thomas Wirgman cannot 

 do. But what is the DIVARICATION ? To this we will come presently ; but 

 first, for the author of it, — the " shunned," the " forsaken," the " rejected," the 

 " beset," the " belaboured," the " abused, ' who writes upon his banner, " I am 

 m conlroversy with all the world — but yet, not so, for I have found tiie tiiilh, 

 and therefore controversy is for fools — 



EUREKA." 

 We had imagined the author of the Divarication to be one of those " unearthly 

 horrors" who walk about with greere spectacles, s«//ow grec« complexion, and in 

 a brown stud, tipped with the blues and dejicet of the i/elloius. But how were we 

 surprised when we s^w a " full and proper man," with a rosy cheek and brilliant 

 eye, hopping over sixty years with as much alacrity as a flea would over a coun- 

 terpane, and chirping as merrily as a brown cricket in a hay-field. " Philosophy, 

 not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose," but full of fun and fiolic as a 

 Christmas pantomime, though not so full of tricks. The DIVARICATION — 

 that book of books, which made the hairs of the Bishop of London's wig uncurl 

 themselves and push his hat off, standing up therefrom like skewers in a side of 

 bacon; — that tome of tomes, that volume of volumes, which concentrates within 

 itself all that exists, and on which is written, as was on the temple of the Egyp- 

 tian Isis — 



" I am wha:ever is, 



I am whatever was, 



I am whatever shall be, 

 And the veil that covers my features 

 No mortal hand has ever raised." 



That sword of the mind, which, unable to unravel the web of human existence, 

 and the mysterious connection of body and soul, would seek to cut it — not as the 

 Duke of Wellington is said to have cut the " Dog Billy," but as the sword of 

 Alexander cut the gordian knot — with an asseveration to make a deseveration, 

 and which, by cutting one in the middle, can turn three into one. Without, how- 

 ever, wishing to perform so formidable a task, we may be permitted to make some 

 observations on the work before us. The sul;ject of mental philosophy, involving 

 !is it does mf-taphysical inrpury, has hitherto baffled the most splendid minds of 

 former as of modern times Dr. Rrid, with his common sense, put all common 

 sense to the blush ; and Du^ald Stewart, that elegant and splendid writer, from 

 his immense erudition, has given us the literature of many important questions, 

 but nothing that can be called the philosophy of the human mind. That acute 

 reasoner, Dr. Thomas IJrown, whom Scotchmen think the ne plus ultra of rneta- 



