238 Literary Journals. 



The Reviews of the eighteenth century are pub- 

 lications of a very different character from the 

 literary Journals of the seventeenth. A great por- 

 tion of the latter were in the Latin language ; and 

 almost all of such a nature as to be intelligible 

 only to the learned. Of course they were seen 

 and perused by few persons, and their influence' 

 on public taste and opinion was comparatively 

 small. But the Reviews of the last age, besides 

 being multiplied to an unexampled extent, have 

 received a popular cast, which has enabled them 

 to descend from the closets of philosophers, and 

 from the shelves of polite scholars, to the compting 

 house of the merchant, to the shop of the artizan, 

 to the bower of the husbandman, and, indeed, to 

 every class of the community, excepting the most 

 indigent and laborious. In fact, they have con- 

 tributed to give a new aspect to the republic of 

 letters, and may be considered as among the most 

 important literary engines that distinguished the 

 period under consideration. 



These publications have produced many advant- 

 ages. They have excited a more general attention 

 to the progress of literature than any former period 

 could boast. They have diffused a knowledge of 

 books, a taste for reading, and a spirit of curiosity 

 and criticism, more widely than was ever before 

 known, and among a portion of mankind which had 

 never before been reached by such a taste. When 

 well conducted, they have served to correct public 

 opinion ; to lay a salutary restraint on adventurers 



time, the one in Philadelphia, and the other in Boston. They were, con- 

 ducted, however, on a very small scale, with little of the boldness and im- 

 partiality of true criticism, and commanded little attention from the pub- 

 lic. They were, consequently, soon laid aside, as were several other under- 

 takings cf a similar kind, for like reasons. In 1799 a more full and for- 

 mal Review was begun in New- York, which has continued to the present 

 time, and which, from the share of public patronage and attention bests . : I 

 upon it, bids fair to be longer lived than any of its predecessors. 



