LIBRARY OF OLD AUTHORS. 351 



edition of the most graceful of our lyric poets. Perhaps 

 discrimination is not, after all, the right word, for we 

 have sometimes seen cause to doubt whether Mr. Hazlitt 

 ever reads carefully the very documents he prints. For 

 example, in the Biographical Notice prefixed to the 

 Herrick he says (p. xvii) : " Mr. W. Perry Herrick has 

 plausibly suggested that the payments made by Sir 

 William to his nephew were simply on account of the 

 fortune which belonged to Kobert in right of his father, 

 and which his uncle held in trust ; this was about £ 400 ; 

 and I think from allusions in the letters printed else- 

 where that this view may be the correct one." May be ! 

 The poet says expressly, " I entreat you out of my little 

 possession to deliver to this bearer the customer ye £ 10, 

 without which I cannot meate []] my ioyrney." The 

 words we have italicized are conclusive. By the way, 

 Mr. Hazlitt's wise-looking query after " meate " is con- 

 clusive also as to his fitness for editorship. Did he 

 never hear of the familiar phrase " to meet the expense " 1 

 If so trifling a misspelling can mystify him, what must 

 be the condition of his mind in face of the more than 

 Protean travesties which words underwent before they 

 were uniformed by Johnson and Walker ? Mr. Hazlitt's 

 mind, to be sure, like the wind Cecias, always finds its 

 own fog. In another of Herrick's letters we find, " For 

 what her monie can be effected (sic) when there is di- 

 uision 'twixt the hart and hand V "Her monie" of 

 course means harmonie, and effected is therefore right. 

 What Mr. Hazlitt may have meant by his " (sic) " it 

 were idle to inquire. 



We have already had occasion to examine some of 

 Mr. Hazlitt's work, and we are sorry to say that in the 

 four volumes before us we find no reason for changing 

 our opinion of his utter disqualification for the duties of 

 editorship. He seldom clears up a real difficulty (never, 



