There is great harmony, too, in the versification, as well as purity and elegance in the diction.
How much some works make us wish to know their authors, and _vice versa_! I feel, while reading her poems, that I should like Madame Amabel Tastu; while other books, whose cleverness I admit, convince me I should not like the writers.
A book must always resemble, more or less, its author.

It is the mind, or at least a portion of it, of the individual; and, however circumstances may operate on it, the natural quality must always prevail and peep forth in spite of every effort to conceal it.
Living much in society seldom fails to deteriorate the force and originality of superior minds; because, though unconsciously, the persons who possess them are prone to fall into the habits of thought of those with whom they pass a considerable portion of their time, and suffer themselves to degenerate into taking an interest in puerilities on which, in the privacy of their study, they would not bestow a single thought.

Hence, we are sometimes shocked at observing glaring inconsistencies in the works of writers, and find it difficult to imagine that the grave reflection which pervades some of the pages can emanate from the same mind that dictated the puerilities abounding in others.

The author's profound thoughts were his own, the puerilities were the result of the friction of his mind with inferior ones: at least this is my theory, and, as it is a charitable one, I like to indulge it.
A pleasant party at dinner yesterday.

Mr.W.Spencer, the poet, was among the guests, He was much more like the William Spencer of former days than when he dined here before, and was occasionally brilliant, though at intervals he relapsed into moodiness.