The favor with which “The Lay of the Last Minstrel” was received, greater than that of any narrative poem of equal length which had appeared for two generations, even since Dryden’s day, naturally brought great commendation from Jeffrey, the keenest critic of the age, in the famous magazine of which he was the editor.  The Edinburgh Review had been started only in 1802 by three young men of genius,—­Jeffrey, Brougham, and Sydney Smith,—­and had already attained great popularity, but not such marvellous influence as it wielded ten years afterwards, when nine thousand copies were published every three months, and at such a price as gave to its contributors a splendid remuneration, and to its editors absolute critical independence.  The only objection to this powerful periodical was the severity of its criticisms, which often also were unjust.  It seemed to be the intent of the reviewers to demolish everything that was not of extraordinary merit.  Fierce attacks are not criticism.  The articles in the Edinburgh Review were of a different sort from the polished and candid literary dissections which made Ste.-Beuve so justly celebrated.  In the beginning of the century, however, these savage attacks were all the fashion and to be expected; yet they stung authors almost to madness, as in the case of the review of Byron’s early poetry.  Literary courtesy did not exist.  Justice gave place generally to ridicule or sarcasm.  The Edinburgh Review was a terror to all pretenders, and often to men of real merit.  But it was published when most judges were cruel and severe, even in the halls of justice.

The friendship between Scott and Jeffrey had been very close for ten years before the inception of the Edinburgh Review; and although Scott was (perhaps growing out of his love for antiquarian researches and admiration of the things that had been) an inveterate conservative and Tory, while the new Review was slashingly liberal and progressive, he was drawn in by friendship and literary interest to be a frequent contributor during its first three or four years.  The politics of the Edinburgh Review, however, and the establishment in 1808 of the conservative Quarterly Review, caused a gradual cessation of this literary connection, without marring the friendly relations between the two men.

About this time began Scott’s friendship with Wordsworth, for whom he had great respect.  Indeed, his modesty led him to prefer everybody’s good poetry to his own.  He felt himself inferior not only to Burns, but also to Wordsworth and Campbell and Coleridge and Byron,—­as in many respects he undoubtedly was; but it requires in an author discernment and humility of a rare kind, to make him capable of such a discrimination.