DISSATISFIED WITH HIS BOOK. 39 



in the present, cannot surely be merely local in its in- 

 terest. What does it matter that we examine but only 

 a little part of anything, if from that part we acquire an 

 ability to judge of the whole ! The philosopher can 

 subject but comparatively small portions of any sub- 

 stance to the test of experiment, but of how wide an 

 application are the laws which he discovers in the pro- 

 cess ! 



' You will perceive at a glance the conception I thus 

 formed of my task was somewhat too high to leave me 

 any very great chance of satisfying myself in the exe- 

 cution of it. I have not done so, and, indeed, could be 

 almost sorry if I had. I have frequently met with an 

 ingenious argument for the immortality of the soul, drawn 

 from the dissatisfaction which it always experiences in 

 the imperfect good of the present, and from its fondly- 

 cherished expectations of a more complete good in the 

 future ; and so long as I am dissatisfied with what I 

 write, and with how I think, I solace myself, on a nearly 

 similar principle, with the hope that I shall one day 

 write better, and think more justly. My traditional 

 history, however, is, I trust, not a very dull one ; it is 

 a different sort of work, in some respects, from any of a 

 merely local cast I have yet chanced to see ; and I am of 

 opinion, though I dare say I may be mistaken by that 

 partiality which men insensibly form for any pursuit in 

 which they have long been engaged, that a set of works 

 of a similar character would not be quite without its 

 use in the literature of our country. The occurrences of 

 even common life constitute, if I may so speak, a kind of 

 alphabet of invention the types, rather, which genius 

 employs in setting up her forms. She picks them out in 

 little broken bits from those cells of the memory in which 

 they have been stored up, and composes with them entire 



