The Scotch Novels had not then been heard
of: so we said nothing about them. In general we were hard upon the
moderns. The author of the "Rambler" was only tolerated in Boswell's Life
of him; and it was as much as any one could do to edge in a word for
Junius. Lamb could not bear _Gil Blas_: this was a fault. I remember the
greatest triumph I ever had was in persuading him, after some years'
difficulty, that Fielding was better than Smollett. On one occasion he was
for making out a list of persons famous in history that one would wish to
see again, at the head of whom were Pontius Pilate, Sir Thomas Browne, and
Dr. Faustus; but we black-balled most of his list! But with what a gusto
would he describe his favorite authors, Donne or Sir Philip Sidney, and
call their most crabbed passages _delicious_! He tried them on his palate,
as epicures taste olives, and his observations had a smack in them, like a
roughness on the tongue. With what discrimination he hinted a defect in
what he admired most,--as in saying the display of the sumptuous banquet,
in "Paradise Regained," was not in true keeping, as the simplest fare was
all that was necessary to tempt the extremity of hunger; and stating that
Adam and Eve in "Paradise Lost" were too much like married people.
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