text: " If it be that some abstract idea is to be developed or illustrated we can neither subscribe to the canon nor discover the leading idea of this specimen of the author's productions; but we rather suppose that he only means to say that there should be a main stream of interest running through the whole story to which the others are tributary--and in this sense he has acted on the rule; for the _heretic_ from his birth to his burial is never lost sight of and almost the whole action from the beginning to the end is either directly or indirectly connected with his fortunes which preserve their interest throughout amidst sovereigns and ambassadors officials and nobles court intrigues and affairs of state of love of war and of religion