which are saddened or brightened, like the face of the sea in April, as
more or less of the sunshine of rhetoric breaks forth upon them.

_Greatness_.--What renders it difficult for ordinary minds to
discover a great man before he has, like a tree, put forth his blossoms,
is the manner, various and dissimilar, in which such persons evolve their
powers. For as in nature the finest days are sometimes in the morning
overclouded and dark, so the developement of genius follows no rule, but
is hastened or retarded by position and circumstance. But to a keen eye
there always appear, even in the first obscurity of extraordinary men,
certain internal commotions and throes, denoting some _magna vis
animi_ at work within.

_Physiognomy_.--When Atticus advised Cicero to keep strict watch over
his face, in his first interview with Cæsar after the civil wars, he could
not mean that he might thereby conceal his _character_ from Cæsar,
who knew well enough what that was; but he meant, that by such precaution
he might conceal from the tyrant his actual hatred and disgust for his
person. Yet for the character and secret nature of a man, _fronti nulli
fides_.

_Writing_.--It was Addison, we believe, who observed of the
schoolmen, that they had not genius enough to write a small book, and
therefore took refuge in folios of the largest magnitude. We are getting
as fast as possible into the predicament of the schoolmen. No one knows
when he has written enough; but, like a player at chess, still goes on
with the self-same ideas, merely altering their position. This must arise
from early habits and prejudices, from having been taught to regard with
veneration vast collections of common-places, under the titles of this or
that man's _works_. Tacitus may be carried about in one's pocket,