To this world of invisible beings-in some respects the good and evil genii of the living, with whom these hold converse by what is known of them through books, though they themselves are unconscious of the dominion which they exercise-like the stars, in their guidance of the mariner on the deep, the moon in her government of the tide, and the sun in his reign over animal and vegetable existence;-to this world of invisible beings, there are continual accessions of many temporary, and a few imperishable names, consisting of every one who leaves a memorial of himself, from which posterity receives either a transient, or more enduring impression. The multitude of these pass away from ideal, as soon, or even sooner, than they did from real existence; but in every age, at this advanced period of civilization, there are some, who, having once lived, never die, in the perpetuated consequences, whether good or evil, of their bodily appearance, and intercourse with their species. Now, these more effectually colour and shape the character of society, than they could, if their disembodied spirits were permitted to hold communion with the living, and suggest, control, or inspire them with the same feelings and sentiments which their memory or their productions absolutely do impress. How little could the soul of Milton have done, had it been walking to and fro, and going up and down in the earth, during the hundred and fifty years since his death,-how little could it have done, by awakening genius, and guiding its aspirations, in a few solitary individuals, (without ascribing to it inconceivable and miraculous powers,) in comparison with what that soul, embodied in divine

poetry, has actually done for thousands and tens of thousands, by ennobling, adorning, and enriching the meanest readers with a measure of the grandeur, beauty, and wealth of his own high intellect, which (fixed in the eternity of verse) can no more be exhausted by communicating itself than the sun by shining, or the atmosphere by giving breath. Could the magnificent spirit that dictated the numbers of Paradise Lost, from the lips of "the poet blind yet bold,"could that spirit, by any imaginable process of secret communication, through half a human life, have raised in one mind, that exaltation of feeling, to which the perusal of the first book alone must carry every mind of sufficient capacity to comprehend it? No, certainly; for to have done this, the visitant must have inspired his disciple with the power of producing a poem equal to that, the mere perusal of which gives any body the means of enjoying, at once, and without cost, all the fruits of all the labours of thought that produced the original.

The last forty years have added more to the class of invisibles whom we recognize here than any former period of thrice that term; while the press, by its everlasting operations, in every edition of an author's works, renews the lease of each of the fraternity of every foregoing era, who, in his pages, are made to live, and move, and have a being, among

us.

Numerous, indeed, are the warriors, politicians, philosophers, and authors, who have flourished since the commencement of the French revolution'; and of whom it cannot be doubted, that they are destined to go down to remote posterity as angels of light, or spirits of darkness, assuming the forms of such to

those who may be deluded by them, till the consummation of all things; when, at the general resurrection, all distinctions of rank, age, and country, shall be obliterated,all generations shall be contemporary, and congregated, to receive, not in mass, but individually, as if each stood alone before the Judge of quick and dead, "the deeds done in the body." As a part of these, for a deed is never done till it has ceased in its consequences,-long after the stone has sunk to the bottom, never to rise again, the surface of the stream is troubled with the whirls of its plunge,as a part of these, will be reckoned all the evil thoughts and unholy passions excited by profligate writers, in the hearts and minds of persons who lived centuries after their decease; with all the ambitious, vindictive, and oppressive actions, which the examples of successful tyrants and heroic destroyers of their species have tempted the latest inhabitants of the earth to perpetrate, in imitation of them, and under the sanction of their authority. Nor will the good " deeds done in the body" terminate at their seeming accomplishment, but shall last, in their happy and diversified issues, through all ages, on all individuals who may be affected and ameliorated by them. Oh then, of what infinite importance must it be to those, who, when they die, do not "all die," that what they leave behind to immortalize them among men, and make men resemble themselves, should be that which will benefit, in the highest degree, the greatest number of their successors and imitators.

To win a name and rank in this world of invisible beings, has been the ambition of the mightiest minds

that ever felt houses of clay too narrow for their dwelling, and life too brief for the spirit within them. This might be illustrated by all history and biography extant, as well as proved by the thoughts of many great hearts long perished in the dust, whose secrets have been revealed. These, therefore, have counted no sacrifice too dear, that they might obtain the prize for which they contended, against time, and death, and fortune, and each other. It seldom occurs, then, that the achievements or the productions of individuals, in whom existed no intense degree of the desire to be known and honoured in after years, have secured to them that moral and influential immortality of which we treat. More frequently the sufferings of unambitious personages, whom tyranny and persecution, for their worth, or the vengeance of justice, for their enormous crimes, have dragged into the light of history, have thereby become examples or warnings. But it is the rarest of all cases, that those who have simply filled up the measure of their days, in the humble yet honourable performance of the duties that belonged to a private station, which required, indeed, no splendid qualifications, but, what is far more effective, though to be acquired by all, great grace to fulfil,it is the rarest of all cases, that such have gone down into the darkness of the grave, whether the eye of affection had followed them, and then turned away for ever, and yet have left an unexpected light, like an undecaying sunset, behind them; in the comfort of which, not relatives and friends only, but strangers and foreigners, and many born in distant ages after them, have delighted to walk.

Such a one, however, it may be presumed, was MRS. SUSAN HUNTINGTON, whose Memoirs and Remains are presented in this Volume, not for the first time, nor probably for the last by many times, to the British public. She is yet too little known, either in her own land or ours, for the most experienced and sagacious critic to pronounce, whether she will speedily disappear with the millions among whom she was, while living, but a unit, or continue to shine alone, as the survivor and representative of unremembered millions, who, like her, having served their generations, fell on sleep, and have seen corruption, dissolution, and extinction of memory itself from the earth. It may now be deemed an even point, whether, embalmed within these leaves, which are sweet with the odour of sanctity, she shall continue to bless the Christian world wherever the language of her mother is spoken; or whether the partiality of friendship has too fondly, not too highly, estimated the precious fragments of her journals and letters, endeared as they were to her personal acquaintance, but, possibly, not capable of exciting in the breasts of strangers corresponding interest in what she was, what she did, what she suffered, and what she has written. That the point should be already even in the balance, is so far in her favour as to be proof positive, that extraordinary unction and piety, combined with talent of no mean, though certainly no ostentatious, kind, must characterize her compositions. What, therefore, has raised her so early" above a vulgar fate," may, in its progress, at length fix her in holy and abiding distinction among the just, whose memory is blessed, and the