New Monthly Magazine (Volume 20) (Paperback)

Book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1827. Excerpt: ... RECOLT/ECTIONS OF MATURIN.--NO. III. It was not until after his marriage, and his translation to the parish of St. Peter's in Dublin, that Maturin became an author. His being a clergyman induced him to publish his early works anonymously, as they were not of that class which the evangelical critics of Dublin would have deemed strictly professional. The objections raised to the levity of his productions were answered by the situation in which he was placed, with a narrow income and hopeless prospects. It must be admitted that other and less objectionable modes of literary exertion were open to him, but there were none so easy of access, and so quickly profitable, as that which he embraced. For the sake of the objects which forced him to look a little beyond his profession, he was obliged to be popular in the form and matter of his writings; and it must be confessed, his own inclination never rebelled against that obligation. In those works which he published before he avowed his name, there are many proofs that he felt he was writing irresponsibly. His first two or three romances bear traces of carelessness, where, perhaps, youthful impatience would not permit him to polish. In other places, there are formalities as of over care; but still these works are evidences of a young and ardent mind, considerable genius, and inexhaustible fancy. His first publication was " The Family of Montorio, or the Fatal Revenge," a romance replete with horrors, with an occasional dash of metaphysics and delineation of human character. In his preface he bespeaks indulgence: --" If youth, unacquaintance with literary habits, and the ' original sin' of national dulness, be any mitigation of severity, critical ox eclectic, or of the cold and bitter blasts of the North, let this serve to inform my readers, t...