Characteristics of Literature Author:Henry T Tuckerman Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: It is seldom that ethjcal writings interest the multitude. The abstract nature of the topics they discuss, and the formal style in which they are usually embodie... more »d, are equally destitute of that popular charm that wins the common heart. A remarkable exception is presented in the literary remains of Channing. The simple yet comprehensive ideas upon which he dwells, the tranquil gravity of his utterance, and the winning clearness of his style, render many of his productions universally attractive as examples of OjUiet and persuasive eloquence. And this result is entirely independent of any sympathy with his theological opinions, or experience of his pulpit oratory.' Indeed, the genuine interest of Dr. Channing's writings is ethical. As the champion of a sect, his labours have but a temporary value; as the exponent of a doctrinal system, he will not long be remembered with gratitude, because 'the world is daily better appreciating the religious sentiment as of infinitely more value than any dogma; but as a moral essayist, some of the more finished writings of Channing will have a permanent hold upon reflective and tasteful minds. His nephew has compiled his biography with singular judgment. He has followed the method of Lockhart in the Life of Scott. As far as possible, the narrative is woven from letters and diaries,—the subject speaks for himself, and only such intermediate observations of the editor are given as are necessary to form a connected whole. Uneventful as these memoirs are, they are interesting as revelations of the process of culture, the means and purposes of one whose words have winged their way, bearing emphatic messages, over both hemispheres, —who, for many years, successfully advocated important truths; and whose memory is one of the most honoured of New England's...« less