Another complaint lodged periodically by discontents is that the author gains no real light from the comments passed upon his work, which are irritating and annoying without being in the smallest degree helpful. This is the substance of those sad grumblings which we heard some years ago from Mr. Lewis Morris; and this is the argument offered by Mr. Howells, who appears to think that Canon Farrar dealt a death-blow to reviewers in the simple statement that he never profited by their reviews. But at whose door lay the blame? It does not follow that, because a lesson is unlearned, it has never been taught. The Bourbons, it is said, gained nothing from some of the sharpest admonitions ever given by history. It is worth while to consider, in this regard, an extract from the Journal of Sir Walter Scott in which he mentions an anonymous letter sent him from Italy, and full of acute, acrid criticisms on the “Life of Bonaparte.” “The tone is decidedly hostile,” says Sir Walter calmly, “but that shall not prevent my making use of all his corrections, where just.” It is a hard matter perhaps for smaller men to preserve this admirable tranquillity under assault; to say with Epictetus, “He little knew of my other shortcomings or he would not have mentioned these alone.” Yet after all, it is an advantage to be told plainly what we need to know and cannot see for ourselves, I am sure that the most valuable lesson in literary perspective I ever received came from an anonymous reviewer, who reminded me curtly that “Mr. Saltus and Leopardi are not twins of the intellect.” When I first saw that sentence I felt a throb of indignation that any one should believe, or affect to believe, that I ever for a moment supposed Mr. Saltus and Leopardi _were_ twins of the intellect. Afterwards, when in calmer mood I re-read the essay criticised, I was forced to acknowledge that, if such were not my conviction, I had, to say the least, been unfortunate in my manner of putting things. I had used the two names indiscriminately and as if I thought one man every whit as worthy of illustrating my text as the other. Such moments ought to be salutary, they are so eminently cheerless. A disagreeable lesson, disagreeably imparted, is apt to be taken to heart with very beneficial results. If it is wasted, the fault does not lie with the surly truth-teller, whose thankless task has been performed with most ungracious efficacy. “Truth,” says Saville, “has become such a ruining virtue, that mankind seems to be agreed to commend and avoid it.”