LETTERS ON LIFE BY "CLAUDIVS CLEAR."
Letters on Life. By Claudius Clear. (Hodder and Stoughton. 3s. (Id.)—" Claudius Clear" does not belong to the select order of essayists who say things so well that it is difficult to say them hereafter save in their words. He is a rough-and-ready writer, but 'he has been s shrewd observer of life, and he records his impressions in frank, interesting manner. The essays vary con- siderably in merit. The serious essays are for the most part excellent ; those in a lighter vein are hardly so successful, the wit and humour being somewhat forced. The essay on "The Happy Life" will well repay perusal. In other essays in the volume the same subject is touched upon. always in a way that shows that the author has pondered much on a subject which concerns all. He rejects the idea that the way to happiness is the smooth and easy way, and says with great troth that to seek happiness is often the surest way to miss it. "Always in the long run there is something higher, nearer, and more commanding than our own happiness." With regard to conferring happiness on others, he gives the warning not to adopt the role of the flatterer out of good nature. " We are not injured but benefited by the honest commendation of what we have honestly done. But we are injured by all eulogy which has not been earned." The essayist attempts a difficult subject when he writes of "Good Manuers,"-a subject on which, from Lord Chesterfield downwards, many clever men have failed to hit the mark. It seems more difficult, indeed, to describe good manners than to possess them. Some of the counsels of "Claudius Clear " are good, as when he insists on sincerity as the only true foundation of good manners ; but some of his cautions are, we should say, hardly needed. For example, he warns his readers not to ask their acquaintances the amount of their income; but does any one do so, except officers of the Inland Revenue ?
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