Essays by Leigh Hunt. The Indicator. The Seer

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Introduction

The Indicator, a series of papers originally published in weekly numbers, having been long out of print, and repeated calls having been made for it among the booksellers, the author has here made a selection, comprising the greater portion of the articles, and omitting such only as he unwillingly put. forth in the hurry of periodical publication, or as seemed otherwise unsuited for present publication, either by the nature of their disquisitions, or from containing commendatory criticisms now rendered superfluous by the reputation of the works criticised.

The Companion, a subsequent publication of the same sort, has been treated in the like manner.

The author has little further to say, by way of advertisement to these pages, except that both the works were written with the same view of inculcating a love of nature and imagination, and of furnishing a sample of the enjoyment which they afford ; and he cannot give a better proof of that enjoyment, as far as he was capable of it, than by stating, that both were written during times of great trouble with him, and both helped him to see much of that fair play between his own anxieties and his natural cheerfulness, of which an indestructible belief in the good and the beautiful has rendered him perhaps not undeserving.

London, Dec. 6, 1833.