His best biography is his own work, "From the Diary of a Seminarist.

Biography was his delight.

] BIOGRAPHY AND BIBLIOGRAPHY Horatio Alger, Jr., an author who lived among and for boys and himself remained a boy in heart and association till death, was born at Revere, Mass., January 13, 1834.

For the diplomacy of the middle of the nineteenth century, when the present national forces of Europe were being created, the following biographies are useful: Life of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, by Lane-Poole.

Biography was at this time a favourite form of literature, and some of the memoirs then written were available for use by later writers, such as Valerius Maximus, Suetonius, and Plutarch; yet it is curious how little has come down to us of the childhood or boyhood of the great men of the time.

But biographies generally are a disease of English literature.

The biography of a supreme poet is the history of his kind.

Biography was his favourite study; history, his aversion.

The poem is an exquisite performance; but the biography, with due allowance for the Shepherd's claim, is a most objectionable preface.

My biography, parentage, place of birth, is a strange mistake, part founded on some nonsense I wrote about Elia, and was true of him, the real Elia, whose name I took....

Auto-biography of men, who held no distinguished rank in the political world, is often very pleasant reading; especially where the writer has a strong tincture of vanity, and is obviously blind to his own character; for, if he does not know it himself, he is sure to let his readers know it; if he does not see the dark spots, he will not endeavour to conceal them; and, if he thinks them bright ones, he will blazon them.

But Condivi's biography is the sole authentic source which we possess for the great master's own recollections of his past life.

Altogether the auto-biography of Jane Eyre is pre-eminently an anti-Christian composition.

History is worse than useless if it does not accurately chronicle and describe events; and biography is valueless and misleading if it does not truly set forth individual character.

"A Psychological Auto-Biography" would be too sesquipedalian a title; but "My Life Psychologically Related," or "The Psychology of my Life," or some such title, might be substituted.

The biography becomes a mixture of disinfectants and perfumes, as if it were all meant to hide some putrid thing.

The result of it all is that a bad biography is the worst of books, because it quenches our interest in life, and makes life insupportably dull.