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diff --git a/18766.txt b/18766.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e9509c --- /dev/null +++ b/18766.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9900 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Early Reviews of English Poets, by John Louis Haney + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Early Reviews of English Poets + +Author: John Louis Haney + +Release Date: July 6, 2006 [EBook #18766] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EARLY REVIEWS OF ENGLISH POETS *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + +EARLY REVIEWS + +OF + +ENGLISH POETS + + +EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION + +BY + +JOHN LOUIS HANEY, PH.D. + +_Assistant Professor of English and History, Central High School, +Philadelphia; Research Fellow in English, University of Pennsylvania_ + + +PHILADELPHIA +THE EGERTON PRESS +1904 + +COPYRIGHT, 1904 +BY JOHN LOUIS HANEY + + +PRESS OF +THE NEW ERA PRINTING COMPANY, +LANCASTER, PA. + + + + +TO + +MY FRIEND AND TEACHER + +PROFESSOR FELIX E. SCHELLING + +OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA + + + + +PREFACE + + +"Among the amusing and instructive books that remain to be written, one +of the most piquant would be a history of the criticism with which the +most celebrated literary productions have been greeted on their first +appearance before the world." It is quite possible that when Dr. William +Matthews began his essay on _Curiosities of Criticism_ with these words, +he failed to grasp the full significance of that future undertaking. Mr. +Churton Collins recently declared that "a very amusing and edifying +record might be compiled partly out of a selection of the various +verdicts passed contemporaneously by reviews on particular works, and +partly out of comparisons of the subsequent fortunes of works with their +fortunes while submitted to this censorship." Both critics recognize the +fact that such a volume would be entertaining and instructive; but, from +another point of view, it would also be a somewhat doleful book. Even a +reader of meagre imagination and rude sensibilities could not peruse +such a volume without picturing in his mind the anguish and the +heart-ache which those bitter and often vicious attacks inflicted upon +the unfortunate victims whose works were being assailed. + +Authors (particularly sensitive poets) have been at all times the sport +and plaything of the critics. Mrs. Oliphant, in her _Literary History of +England_, said with much truth: "There are few things so amusing as to +read a really 'slashing article'--except perhaps to write it. It is +infinitely easier and gayer work than a well-weighed and serious +criticism, and will always be more popular. The lively and brilliant +examples of the art which dwell in the mind of the reader are +invariably of this class." Thus it happens that we remember the witty +onslaughts of the reviewers, and often ignore the fact that certain +witticisms drove Byron, for example, into a frenzy of anger that called +forth the most vigorous satire of the century; and others so completely +unnerved Shelley that he felt tempted to write no more; and still others +were so unanimously hostile in tone that Coleridge thought the whole +detested tribe of critics was in league against his literary success. +There were, of course, such admirable personalities as Wordsworth's--for +the most part indifferent to the strongest torrent of abuse; and clever +craftsmen like Tennyson, who, although hurt, read the criticisms and +profited by them; but, on the other hand, there are still well-informed +readers who believe that the _Quarterly Review_ at least hastened the +death of poor Keats. + +It has been suggested that such a volume of the "choice crudities of +criticism" as is here proposed would likewise fulfill the desirable +purpose of avenging the author upon his ancient enemy, the critic, by +showing how absurd the latter's utterances often are, and what a +veritable farrago of folly those collected utterances can make. We may +rest assured that however much hostile criticism may have pained an +author, it has never inflicted a permanent injury upon a good book. If +there appear to be works that have been thus more or less obscured, the +fault will probably be found not in the critic but in the works +themselves. According to this agreeable theory, which we would all fain +believe, the triumph of the ignorant or malevolent critic cannot endure; +sooner or later the author's merit will be recognized and he will come +into his own. + +The present volume does not attempt to fulfill the conditions suggested +by Dr. Matthews and Mr. Collins. A history of contemporary criticism of +famous authors would be a more ambitious undertaking, necessitating an +extensive apparatus of notes and references. It seeks merely to gather a +number of interesting anomalies of criticism--reviews of famous poems +and famous poets differing more or less from the modern consensus of +opinion concerning those poems and their authors. Although most of the +chosen reviews are unfavorable, several others have been selected to +afford evidence of an early appreciation of certain poets. A few +unexpectedly favorable notices, such as the _Monthly Review's_ critique +of Browning's _Sordello_, are printed because they appear to be unique. +The chief criterion in selecting these reviews (apart from the effort to +represent most of the periodicals and the principal poets between Gray +and Browning) has been that of interest to the modern reader. In most +cases, criticisms of a writer's earlier works were preferred as more +likely to be spontaneous and uninfluenced by his growing literary +reputation. Thus the volume does not attempt to trace the development of +English critical methods, nor to supply a hand-book of representative +English criticism; it offers merely a selection of bygone but readable +reviews--what the critics thought, or, in some cases, pretended to +think, of works of poets whom we have since held in honorable esteem. +The short notices and the well-known longer reviews are printed entire; +but considerations of space and interest necessitated excisions in a few +cases, all of which are, of course, properly indicated. The spelling and +punctuation of the original texts have been carefully followed. + +The history of English critical journals has not yet been adequately +written. The following introduction offers a rapid survey of the +subject, compiled principally from the sources indicated in the +bibliographical list. I am indebted to Professor Felix E. Schelling of +the University of Pennsylvania, and to Dr. Robert Ellis Thompson and +Professor Albert H. Smyth of the Philadelphia Central High School for +many suggestions that have been of value in writing the introduction. +Dr. Edward Z. Davis examined at my request certain pamphlets in the +British Museum that threw additional light upon the history of the early +reviews. Dr. A.S.W. Rosenbach and Professor J.H. Moffatt read the proofs +of the introduction and notes respectively, and suggested several +noteworthy improvements. + +J.L.H. + +CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL, +PHILADELPHIA. + + + + +CONTENTS + + +Preface vii +Introduction xiii +Bibliography lvi + +REVIEWS + +GRAY Odes (_Monthly Review_) 1 +GOLDSMITH The Traveller (_Critical Review_) 5 +COWPER Poems, 1782 (_Critical Review_) 10 +BURNS Poems, 1786 (_Edinburgh Magazine_) 13 + Poems, 1786 (_Critical Review_) 15 +WORDSWORTH Descriptive Sketches (_Monthly Review_) 16 + An Evening Walk (_Monthly Review_) 19 + Lyrical Ballads (_Critical Review_) 20 + Poems, 1807 (_Edinburgh Review_) 24 +COLERIDGE Christabel (_Edinburgh Review_) 47 +SOUTHEY Madoc (_Monthly Review_) 60 +LAMB Blank Verse (_Monthly Review_) 65 + Album Verses (_Literary Gazette_) 66 +LANDOR Gebir (_British Critic_) 68 + Gebir (_Monthly Review_) 69 +SCOTT Marmion (_Edinburgh Review_) 70 +BYRON Hours of Idleness (_Edinburgh Review_) 94 + Childe Harold (_Christian Observer_) 101 +SHELLEY Alastor (_Monthly Review_) 115 + The Cenci (_London Magazine_) 116 + Adonais (_Literary Gazette_) 129 +KEATS Endymion (_Quarterly Review_) 135 + Endymion (_Blackwood's Magazine_) 141 +TENNYSON Timbuctoo (_Athenaeum_) 151 + Poems, 1833 (_Quarterly Review_) 152 + The Princess (_Literary Gazette_) 176 +BROWNING Paracelsus (_Athenaeum_) 187 + Sordello (_Monthly Review_) 188 + Men and Women (_Saturday Review_) 189 + +Notes 197 +Index 223 + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +To the modern reader, with an abundance of periodicals of all sorts and +upon all subjects at hand, it seems hardly possible that this wealth of +ephemeral literature was virtually developed within the past two +centuries. It offers such a rational means for the dissemination of the +latest scientific and literary news that the mind undeceived by facts +would naturally place the origin of the periodical near the invention of +printing itself. Apart from certain sporadic manifestations of what is +termed, by courtesy, periodical literature, the real beginning of that +important department of letters was in the innumerable _Mercurii_ that +flourished in London after the outbreak of the Civil War. Although the +_British Museum Catalogue_ presents a long list of these curious +messengers and news-carriers, the only one that could be of interest in +the present connection is the _Mercurius Librarius; or a Catalogue of +Books Printed and Published at London_[A] (1668-70), the contents of +which simply fulfilled the promise of its title. + +Literary journals in England were, however, not a native development, +but were copied, like the fashions and artistic norms of that period, +from the French. The famous and long-lived _Journal des Scavans_ was +begun at Paris in 1665 by M. Denis de Sallo, who has been called, since +the time of Voltaire, the "inventor" of literary journals. In 1684 +Pierre Bayle began at Amsterdam the publication of _Nouvelles de la +Republique des Lettres_, which continued under various hands until +1718. These French periodicals were the acknowledged inspiration for +similar ventures in England, beginning in 1682 with the _Weekly Memorial +for the Ingenious: or an Account of Books lately set forth in Several +Languages, with some other Curious Novelties relating to Arts and +Sciences_. The preface stated the intention of the publishers to notice +foreign as well as domestic works, and to transcribe the "curious +novelties" from the _Journal des Scavans_. Fifty weekly numbers appeared +(1682-83), consisting principally of translations of the best articles +in the French journal. + +A few years later (1686), the Genevan theologian, Jean Le Clerc, then a +resident of London, established the _Universal Historical Bibliotheque; +or, an Account of most of the Considerable Books printed in All +Languages_, which was continued by various hands until 1693 in a series +of twenty-five quarto volumes. Contemporary with this review was a +number of similar publications which had for the most part a brief +existence. Among them was the _Athenian Mercury_, published on Tuesdays +and Saturdays (1691-1696), the _History of Learning_, which appeared for +a short time in 1691 and again in 1694; _Works of the Learned_ +(1691-92); the _Young Student's Library_ (1692) and its continuation, +the _Compleat Library_ (1692-94); _Memoirs for the Ingenious_ (1693); +the _Universal Mercury_ (1694) and _Miscellaneous Letters, etc._ +(1694-96). Samuel Parkes includes among the reviews of this period Sir +Thomas Pope Blount's remarkable _Censura Celebrium Authorum_ (1690). +That popular bibliographical dictionary of criticism (reprinted 1694, +1710 and 1718) is only remembered now for its omission of Shakespeare, +Spenser, Jonson and Milton from its list of "celebrated authors." +Neither that volume nor the same author's _De Re Poetica_ (1694) finds a +proper place in a list of periodicals. They should be grouped with such +works as Phillips' _Theatrum Poetarum_ (1675) and Langbaine's _Account +of the English Dramatic Poets_ (1691) among the more deliberate attempts +at literary criticism. + +Between 1692-94 appeared the _Gentleman's Journal; or, the Monthly +Miscellany. Consisting of News, History, Philosophy, Poetry, Music, +Translations, etc._ This noteworthy paper, edited by Peter Anthony +Motteux while he was translating Rabelais, included among its +contributors Aphra Behn, Oldmixon, Dennis, D'Urfey and others. In many +ways it anticipated the plan of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ (1731), which +has usually been accorded the honor of priority among English literary +magazines. The _History of the Works of the Learned; or, an Impartial +Account of Books lately printed in all Parts of Europe_ was begun in +1699 and succumbed after the publication of its thirteenth volume +(1711). Among its editors was George Ridpath, who was afterwards +immortalized in Pope's _Dunciad_. The careers of the _Monthly +Miscellany_ (1707-09) and _Censura Temporum_ (1709-10) were brief. About +the same time an extensive series of periodicals was begun by a Huguenot +refugee, Michael De la Roche, who fled to England after the revocation +of the Edict of Nantes and became an Episcopalian. After several years +of hack-work for the booksellers, he published (1710) the first numbers +of his _Memoirs of Literature, containing a Weekly Account of the State +of Learning at Home and Abroad_, which he continued until 1714 and for a +few months in 1717. In the latter year he began at Amsterdam his +_Bibliotheque Angloise_ (1717-27), continued by his _Memoires +Litteraires de la Grande Bretagne_ (1720-1724) after the editorship of +the former had been placed in other hands on account of his pronounced +anti-Calvinistic views. At Amsterdam, Daniel Le Clerc, a brother of the +Jean Le Clerc already mentioned, published his _Bibliotheque Choisee_ +(1703-14) and his _Bibliotheque Ancienne et Moderne_ (1714-28). Both of +these periodicals suggested numerous ideas to De la Roche, who returned +to London and conducted the _New Memoirs of Literature_ (1725-27). His +last venture was a _Literary Journal, or a Continuation of the Memoirs +of Literature_, which lasted about a year. + +Contemporary with De la Roche, Samuel Jebb conducted _Bibliotheca +Literaria_ (1722-24), dealing with "inscriptions, medals, dissertations, +etc." In 1728 Andrew Reid began the _Present State of the Republick of +Letters_, which reached its eighteenth volume in 1736. It was then +incorporated with the _Literary Magazine; or the History of the Works of +the Learned_ (1735-36) and the joint periodical was henceforth published +as a _History of the Works of the Learned_ until 1743. Other less +extensive literary journals of the same period were Archibald Bower's +_Historia Literaria_ (1730-34); the _Bee; or, Universal Weekly Pamphlet_ +(1733-35), edited by Addison's cousin, Eustace Budgell; the _British +Librarian, exhibiting a Compendious Review or Abstract of our most +Scarce, Useful and Valuable Books, etc._, published anonymously by the +antiquarian William Oldys, from January to June, 1737, and much esteemed +by modern bibliophiles as a pioneer and a curiosity of its kind; a +_Literary Journal_ (1744-49) published at Dublin; and, finally, the +_Museum; or the Literary and Historical Register_. This interesting +periodical printed essays, poems and reviews by such contributors as +Spence, Horace Walpole, the brothers Warton, Akenside, Lowth and others. +It was published fortnightly from March, 1746 to September, 1747, making +three octavo volumes. + +The periodicals enumerated thus far can hardly be regarded as literary +in the modern acceptation of the term; they were, for the most part, +ponderous, learned and scientific in character, and, with the exception +of the _Gentleman's Journal_ and Dodsley's _Museum_, rarely ventured +into the domain of _belles-lettres_. An occasional erudite dissertation +on classical poetry or on the French canons of taste suggested a +literary intent, but the bulk of the journals was supplied by articles +on natural history, curious experiments, physiological treatises and +historical essays. During the latter half of the eighteenth century +theological and political writings, and accounts of travels in distant +lands became the staple offering of the reviews. + +A new era in the history of English periodicals was marked by the +publication, on May 1, 1749, of the first number of the _Monthly +Review_, destined to continue through ninety-six years of varying +fortune and to reach its 249th volume. It bore the subtitle: _A +Periodical Work giving an Account, with Proper Abstracts of, and +Extracts from, the New Books, Pamphlets, etc., as they come out. By +Several Hands._ The publisher was Ralph Griffiths, who continued to +manage the review until his death in 1803. It seems remarkable that this +periodical which set the norm for half a century should have appeared +not only without preface or advertisement, but likewise without +patronage or support of any kind. From the first it reviewed poetry, +fiction and drama as well as the customary classes of applied +literature, and thus appealed primarily to the public rather than, like +most of its predecessors, to the learned. Its politics were Whig and its +theology Non-conformist. Griffiths was not successful at first, but +determined to achieve popularity by enlisting Ruffhead, Kippis, +Langhorne and several other minor writers on his critical staff. In +1757 Oliver Goldsmith became one of those unfortunate hacks as a result +of his well-known agreement with Griffiths to serve as an +assistant-editor in exchange for his board, lodging and "an adequate +salary." About a score of miscellaneous reviews from Goldsmith's +pen--including critiques of Home's _Douglas_, Burke's _On the Sublime +and the Beautiful_, Smollett's _History of England_ and Gray's +_Odes_--appeared in the _Monthly Review_ during 1757-58. The contract +with Griffiths was soon broken, probably on account of incompatibility +of temper. Goldsmith declared that he had been over-worked and badly +treated; but it is quite likely that his idleness and irregular habits +contributed largely to the misunderstanding. + +Meanwhile, a Tory rival and a champion of the Established Church had +appeared on the field. A printer named Archibald Hamilton projected the +_Critical Review: or, Annals of Literature. By a Society of Gentlemen_, +which began to appear in February, 1756, under the editorship of Tobias +Smollett and extended to a total of 144 volumes when it ceased +publication in 1817. Its articles were of a high order for the time and +the new review soon became popular. The open rivalry between the reviews +was fostered by an exchange of editorial compliments. Griffiths +published a statement that the _Monthly_ was not written by "physicians +without practice, authors without learning, men without decency, +gentlemen without manners, and critics without judgment." Smollett +retorted that "the _Critical Review_ is not written by a parcel of +obscure hirelings, under the restraint of a bookseller and his wife, who +presume to revise, alter and amend the articles occasionally. The +principal writers in the _Critical Review_ are unconnected with +booksellers, unawed by old women, and independent of each other." Such +literary encounters did not fail to stimulate public interest in both +reviews and to add materially to their circulation. + +When the first volume of the _Critical Review_ was complete, the +"Society of Gentlemen" enriched it with an ornate, self-congratulatory +Preface in which they said of themselves: + + "However they may have erred in judgment, they have declared their + thoughts without prejudice, fear, or affectation; and strove to + forget the author's person, while his works fell under their + consideration. They have treated simple dulness as the object of + mirth or compassion, according to the nature of its appearance. + Petulance and self-conceit they have corrected with more severe + strictures; and though they have given no quarter to insolence, + scurrility and sedition, they will venture to affirm, that no + production of merit has been defrauded of its due share of + applause. On the contrary, they have cherished with commendation, + the very faintest bloom of genius, even when vapid and unformed, in + hopes of its being warmed into flavour, and afterwards producing + agreeable fruit by dint of proper care and culture; and never, + without reluctance disapproved, even of a bad writer, who had the + least title to indulgence. The judicious reader will perceive that + their aim has been to exhibit a succinct plan of every performance; + to point out the most striking beauties and glaring defects; to + illustrate their remarks with proper quotations; and to convey + these remarks in such a manner, as might best conduce to the + entertainment of the public." + +Moreover, these high ideals were entertained under the most unfavorable +circumstances. By the time the second volume was complete, the editors +took pleasure in announcing that in spite of "open assault and private +assassination," "published reproach and printed letters of abuse, +distributed like poisoned arrows in the dark," yea, in spite of the +"breath of secret calumny" and the "loud blasts of obloquy," the +_Critical Review_ was more strongly entrenched than before. + +There was more than mere rhodomontade in these words. Not only did open +rivalry exist between the two reviews, but they were both made the +subject of violent attacks by authors whose productions had been +condemned on their pages. John Brine (1755), John Shebbeare (1757), +Horace Walpole (1759), William Kenrick (1759), James Grainger (1759) and +Joseph Reed (1759) are the earliest of the many writers who issued +pamphlets in reply to articles in the reviews. In 1759 Smollett was +tried at the King's Bench for aspersions upon the character of Admiral +Sir Charles Knowles published in the _Critical Review_. He was declared +guilty, fined L100, and sentenced to three months' imprisonment. Yet in +spite of such difficulties, the _Critical Review_ continued to find +favor among its readers. The articles written by its "Society of +Gentlemen" were on the whole far more interesting in subject and +treatment than the work of Griffiths' unfortunate hacks; but the +_Monthly_ was also prospering, as in 1761 a fourth share in that review +was sold for more than L755. + +In 1760 appeared a curious anonymous satire entitled _The Battle of the +Reviews_, which presented, upon the model of Swift's spirited account of +the contest between ancient and modern learning, a fantastic description +of the open warfare between the two reviews. After a formal declaration +of hostilities both sides marshal their forces for the struggle. The +"noble patron" of the _Monthly_ is but slightly disguised as the Right +Honourable Rehoboam Gruffy, Esq. His associates Sir Imp Brazen, Mynheer +Tanaquil Limmonad, Martin Problem, and others were probably recognized +by contemporary readers. To oppose this array the _Critical_ summons a +force that contains only two names of distinction, Sampson MacJackson +and Sawney MacSmallhead (_i.e._, Smollett). The ensuing battle, which is +described at great length, results in a victory for the _Critical +Review_, and the banishment of Squire Gruffy to the land of the +Hottentots. + +Dr. Johnson's well-known characterization of the two reviews was quite +just. On the occasion of his memorable interview (1767) with George III, +Johnson gave the King information concerning the _Journal des Savans_ +and said of the two English reviews that "the _Monthly Review_ was done +with most care; the _Critical_ upon the best principles; adding that the +authors of the _Monthly Review_ were enemies to the Church." Some years +later Johnson said of the reviews: + + "I think them very impartial: I do not know an instance of + partiality.... The Monthly Reviewers are not Deists; but they are + Christians with as little Christianity as may be; and are for + pulling down all establishments. The Critical Reviewers are for + supporting the constitution both in church and state. The Critical + Reviewers, I believe, often review without reading the books + through; but lay hold of a topick and write chiefly from their own + minds. The Monthly Reviewers are duller men and are glad to read + the books through." + +Goldsmith's successor on the _Monthly_ staff was the notorious libeller +and "superlative scoundrel," Dr. William Kenrick, who signalized his +advent (November, 1759) by writing an outrageous attack upon Goldsmith's +_Enquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe_. His +utterances were so thoroughly unjustified that Griffiths, who had scant +reason for praising poor Oliver, made an indirect apology for his +unworthy minion by a favorable though brief review (June, 1762) of _The +Citizen of the World_. During 1759 the _Critical Review_ published a +number of Goldsmith's articles which probably enabled the impecunious +author to effect his removal from the garret in Salisbury Square to the +famous lodgings in Green Arbour Court. After March, 1760, we find no +record of his association with either review, although he afterwards +wrote for the _British Magazine_ and others. + +During the latter half of the century several reviews appeared and +flourished for a time without serious damage to their well-established +rivals. The _Literary Magazine; or Universal Review_ (1756-58) is +memorable for Johnson's cooeperation and a half-dozen articles by +Goldsmith. Boswell tells us that Johnson wrote for the magazine until +the fifteenth number and "that he never gave better proofs of the force, +acuteness and vivacity of his mind, than in this miscellany, whether we +consider his original essays, or his reviews of the works of others." +The _London Review of English and Foreign Literature_ (1775-80) was +conducted by the infamous Kenrick and others who faithfully maintained +the editor's well-recognized policy of vicious onslaught and personal +abuse. Paul Henry Maty, an assistant-librarian of the British Museum, +conducted for five years a _New Review_ (1782-86), often called _Maty's +Review_, and dealing principally with learned works. It apparently +enjoyed some authority, but both Walpole and Gibbon spoke unfavorably of +Maty's critical pretensions. _The English Review; or, an Abstract of +English and Foreign Literature_ (1783-96), extended to twenty-eight +volumes modelled upon the plan of the older periodicals. In 1796 it was +incorporated with the _Analytical Review_ (1788) and survived under the +latter title until 1799. The _Analytical Review_ deprecated the +self-sufficient attitude of contemporary criticism and advocated +extensive quotations from the works under consideration so that readers +might be able to judge for themselves. It likewise hinted at the tacit +understanding then existing between certain authors, publishers and +reviews for their mutual advantage, but which was arousing a growing +feeling of distrust on the part of the public. The _British Critic_ +(1793-1843) was edited by William Beloe and Robert Nares as the organ of +the High Church Party. This "dull mass of orthodoxy" concerned itself +extensively with literary reviews; but its articles were best known for +their lack of interest and authority. The foibles of the _British +Critic_ were satirized in Bishop Copleston's _Advice to a Young +Reviewer_ (1807) with an appended mock critique of Milton's _L'Allegro_. +In 1826 it was united with the _Quarterly Theological Review_ and +continued until 1843. + +_The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine; or, Monthly Political and +Literary Censor_ (1799-1821) played a strenuous role in the troublous +times of the Napoleonic wars. It continued the policy of the +_Anti-Jacobin, or Weekly Examiner_ (1797-98) conducted with such marked +vigor by William Gifford, but it numbered among its contributors none of +the brilliant men whose witty verses for the weekly paper are still read +in the popular _Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin_. The _Review_ was conducted +by John Richards Green, better known as John Gifford. Its articles were +at times sensational in character, viciously abusing writers of known or +suspected republican sentiments. From its pages could be culled a new +series of "Beauties of the Anti-Jacobin" which for sheer vituperation +and relentless abuse would be without a rival among such anthologies. + +At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the principal reviews in +course of publication were the _Monthly_, the _Critical_, the _British +Critic_, and the _Anti-Jacobin_. The latter was preeminently vulgar in +its appeal, the _Critical_ had lost its former prestige, and the other +two had never risen above a level of mediocrity. There was more than a +lurking suspicion that these periodicals were, to a certain extent, +booksellers' organs, quite unreliable on account of the partial and +biassed criticisms which they offered the dissatisfied public. The time +was evidently ripe for a new departure in literary reviews--for the +establishment of a trustworthy critical journal, conducted by capable +editors and printing readable notices of important books. People were +quite willing to have an unfortunate author assailed and flayed for +their entertainment; but they did not care to be deceived by laudatory +criticisms that were inspired by the publisher's name instead of the +intrinsic merits of the work itself. + +Such was the state of affairs when Francis Jeffrey, Henry Brougham and +Sydney Smith launched the _Edinburgh Review_ in 1802, choosing a name +that had been borne in 1755-56 by a short-lived semi-annual review. +There were several significant facts associated with the new enterprise. +It was the first important literary periodical to be published beyond +the metropolis. It was the first review to appear quarterly--an interval +that most contemporary journalists would have condemned as too long for +a successful review. Moreover, it was conducted upon an entirely +different principle than any previous review; by restricting its +attention to the most important works of each quarter, it gave extensive +critiques of only a few books in each number and thus avoided the +multitude of perfunctory notices that had made previous reviews so +dreary and unreadable. + +The idea of founding the _Edinburgh Review_ was apparently suggested by +Sydney Smith in March, 1802. Jeffrey and Francis Horner were his +immediate associates; but during the period of preparation Henry +Brougham, Dr. Thomas Brown, Dr. John Thomson and others became +interested. After some delay, the first number appeared on October 10, +1802, containing among its twenty-nine articles three by Brougham, five +by Horner, six by Jeffrey and nine by Smith. Although there was a +slight feeling of disappointment over the mild political tone of the new +review, its success was immediate. The edition of 750 copies was +speedily disposed of, and within a month a second edition of equal size +was printed. There was no regular editor at first, although the +publication of the first three numbers was practically superintended by +Smith. Afterwards Jeffrey became editor at a salary of L300. He had +previously written some articles (including a critique of Southey's +_Thalaba_) for the _Monthly Review_ and was pessimistic enough to +anticipate an early failure for the new venture. However, at the time he +assumed control (July, 1803) the circulation was 2500, and within five +years it reached 8,000 or 9,000 copies. Jeffrey's articles were +recognized and much admired; but the success of the _Edinburgh_ was due +to its independent tone and general excellence rather than to the +individual contributions of its editor. Its prosperity enabled the +publishers to offer the contributors attractive remuneration for their +articles, thus assuring the cooeperation of specialists and of the most +capable men of letters of the day. At the outset, ten guineas per sheet +were paid; later sixteen became the minimum, and the average ranged from +twenty to twenty-five guineas. When we recall that the _Critical Review_ +paid two, and the _Monthly Review_ sometimes four guineas per sheet, we +can readily understand the distinctly higher standard of the _Edinburgh +Review_. + +Horner left Scotland for London in 1803 to embark upon a political +career. During the next six years occasional articles from his pen--less +than a score in all--appeared in the review. Smith and Brougham likewise +left Edinburgh in 1803 and 1805 respectively; but they ably supported +Jeffrey by sending numerous contributions for many years. During the +first quarter-century of the review's existence, this trio, with the +cooeperation of Sir James Mackintosh and a few others, constituted the +mainstay of its success. Jeffrey's remarkable critical faculty was +displayed to best advantage in the wide range of articles (two hundred +in number) which he wrote during his editorship. It is true that his +otherwise sound judgment was unable to grasp the significance of the new +poetic movement of his day, and that his best remembered efforts are the +diatribes against the Lake Poets. Hence, in the eyes of the modern +literary dilettante, he figures as a misguided, domineering Zoilus whose +mission in life was to heap ridicule upon the poetical efforts of +Wordsworth, Coleridge and the lesser disciples of romanticism. + +There are in the early volumes of the _Edinburgh_ no more conspicuous +qualities than that air of vivacity and graceful wit, so thoroughly +characteristic of Sydney Smith. The reader who turns to those early +numbers may be disappointed in the literary quality of the average +article, for he will instinctively and unfairly make comparison with +more recent standards, instead of considering the immeasurably inferior +conditions that had previously prevailed; but we may safely assert that +the majority of Smith's articles can be read with interest to-day. He +was sufficiently sedate and serious when occasion demanded; yet at all +times he delighted in the display of his native and sparkling humor. +Although most of his important articles have been collected, far too +much of his work lies buried in that securest of literary +sepulchres--the back numbers of a critical review. + +Henry Brougham at first wrote the scientific articles for the +_Edinburgh_. Soon his ability to deal with a wide range of subjects was +recognized and he proved the most versatile of the early reviewers. In +the first twenty numbers are eighty articles from his pen. A story that +does not admit of verification attributes to Brougham a whole number of +the _Edinburgh_, including an article on lithotomy and another on +Chinese music. Later he became especially distinguished for his +political articles, and remained a contributor long after Jeffrey and +Smith had withdrawn. A comparatively small portion of his _Edinburgh_ +articles was reprinted (1856) in three volumes. + +Although the young men who guided the early fortunes of the review were +Whigs, the _Edinburgh_ was not (as is generally believed) founded as a +Whig organ. In fact, the political complexion of their articles was so +subdued that even stalwart Tories like Walter Scott did not refrain from +contributing to its pages. Scott's _Marmion_ was somewhat sharply +reviewed by Jeffrey in April, 1808, and in the following October +appeared the article by Jeffrey and Brougham upon Don Pedro Cevallos' +_French Usurpation of Spain_. The pronounced Whiggism of that critique +led to an open rupture with the Tory contributors. Scott, who was no +longer on the best terms with Constable, the publisher of the +_Edinburgh_, declared that henceforth he could neither receive nor read +the review. He proposed to John Murray--then of Fleet Street--the +founding of a Tory quarterly in London as a rival to the northern review +that had thus far enjoyed undisputed possession of the field, because it +afforded "the only valuable literary criticism which can be met with." +Murray, who had already entertained the idea of establishing such a +review, naturally welcomed the prospect of so powerful an ally. Like a +good Tory, Scott felt that the "flashy and bold character of the +_Edinburgh's_ politics was likely to produce an indelible impression +upon the youth of the country." He ascertained that William Gifford, +formerly editor of the _Anti-Jacobin_ newspaper, was willing to take +charge of the new review, which Scott desired to be not exclusively nor +principally political, but a "periodical work of criticism conducted +with equal talent, but upon sounder principle than that which had gained +so high a station in the world of letters." + +In February, 1809, appeared the first number of the _Quarterly Review_. +Three of its articles were by Scott, who continued to contribute for +some time and whose advice was frequently sought by both editor and +publisher. Canning, Ellis, and others who had written for the then +defunct _Anti-Jacobin_ became interested in the _Quarterly_; but the +principal contributors for many years were Robert Southey, John Wilson +Croker and Sir John Barrow. This trio contributed an aggregate of almost +five hundred articles to the _Quarterly_. In spite of its high standard, +the new venture was a financial failure for at least the first two +years; later, especially in the days of Tory triumph after the overthrow +of Napoleon, the _Quarterly_ flourished beyond all expectation. +Gifford's salary as editor was raised from the original L200 to L900; +for many years Southey was paid L100 for each article. Gifford was +distinctly an editor of the old school, with well-defined ideas of his +official privilege of altering contributed articles to suit himself--a +weakness that likewise afflicted Francis Jeffrey. While it appears that +Gifford wrote practically nothing for the review and that the savage +_Endymion_ article so persistently attributed to him was really the work +of Croker, he was an excellent manager and conducted the literary +affairs of the _Quarterly_ with considerable skill. His lack of system +and of business qualifications, however, resulted in the frequently +irregular appearance of the early numbers. + +On account of his failing health, Gifford resigned the editorship of the +_Quarterly_ in 1824, and was succeeded by John Taylor Coleridge, whose +brief and unimportant administration served merely to fill the gap until +an efficient successor for Gifford could be found. The choice fell upon +Scott's son-in-law, John Gibson Lockhart, who, from 1825 to 1853, proved +to be a most capable editor. The subsequent history of the review under +Whitwell Elwin (1853-1860), William Macpherson (1860-1867), Sir William +Smith (1867-1893), Mr. Rowland Prothero (1894-1899) and the latter's +brother, Mr. George Prothero, the present editor, naturally lies beyond +the purposes of this introduction. + +The period of Lockhart's editorship of the _Quarterly_ was likewise the +golden epoch of the _Edinburgh_. Sydney Smith's contributions ceased +about 1828. In the following year Jeffrey was elected Dean of the +Faculty of Advocates. He felt that the tenure of his new dignity +demanded the relinquishment of the editorship of an independent literary +and political review; accordingly, after editing the ninety-eighth +number of the _Edinburgh_, he retired in favor of Macvey Napier, who had +been a contributor since 1805. Napier conducted the review with great +success from 1829 until his death in 1847. His policy was to prefer +shorter articles than those printed when he assumed control. At first, +each number contained from fifteen to twenty-five articles; but the +growing length and importance of the political contributions had reduced +the average to ten. The return to the original policy naturally resulted +in a greater variety of purely literary articles. + +Macaulay had begun his association with the _Edinburgh_ by his +remarkable essay on _Milton_ in 1825--a bold, striking piece of +criticism, full of the fire of youth, which established his literary +reputation and gave a renewed impetus to the already prosperous review. +During Napier's editorship he contributed his essays on _Croker's +Boswell_, _Hampden_, _Burleigh_, _Horace Walpole_, _Lord Chatham_, +_Bacon_, _Clive_, _Hastings_ and many others. Napier experienced some +difficulty in steering a middle course for the review between Lord +Brougham, who sought to use its pages to further his own political +ambitions, and Macaulay, who vigorously denounced the procedure. The +_Edinburgh_ was no longer conspicuous among its numerous contemporaries; +but the literary quality was much higher than at first. Among the other +famous contributors of this period were Carlyle, John Stuart Mill, +Thackeray, Bulwer, Hallam, Sir William Hamilton and many others. This +was undoubtedly the greatest period in the history of the review. Its +power in Whig politics is shown by the fact that Lord Melbourne and Lord +John Russell sought to make it the organ of the government. + +Napier's successor in 1847 was William Empson, who had contributed to +the _Edinburgh_ since 1823 and who held the editorship until his demise +in 1852. Next followed Sir George Cornewall Lewis, who, however, +resigned in 1855 to become Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord +Palmerston's cabinet. During his regime he wrote less than a score of +articles for the review. His immediate successor was the late Henry +Reeve, whose forty years of faithful service until his death in 1895 +brings the review practically to our own day. When Reeve began his +duties by editing No. 206 (April, 1855) Lord Brougham was the only +survivor of the contributors to the original number. In 1857, when a +discussion arose between editor and publisher concerning the +denunciatory attitude assumed by the review toward Lord Palmerston's +ministry, Reeve drew up a list of his contributors at that time, +including Bishop (afterwards Archbishop) Tait, George Grote, John +Forster, M. Guizot, the Duke of Argyll, Rev. Canon Moseley, George S. +Venables, Richard Monckton Milnes and a score of others--most of them +"names of the highest honour and the most consistent adherence to +Liberal principles." Within the four decades that followed, the +personnel of the review has made another almost complete change. A new +group of contributors, under the editorship of Hon. Arthur R.D. Elliot, +is now striving to maintain the standards of old "blue and yellow." A +caustic note in the (1890) Annual Index of _Review of Reviews_ said of +the _Edinburgh_: + + "It has long since subsided into a respectable exponent of high and + dry Whiggery, which in these later days has undergone a further + degeneration or evolution into Unionism.... Audacity, wit, + unconventionality, enthusiasm--all these qualities have long since + evaporated, and with them has disappeared the political influence + of the _Edinburgh_." + +The two great rivals which are now reaching their centenary[B] are still +the most prominent, in fact the only well-known literary quarterlies of +England. During their life-time many quarterlies have risen, flourished +for a time and perished. The _Westminster Review_, founded 1824, by +Jeremy Bentham, appeared under the editorship of Sir John Bowring and +Henry Southern. As the avowed organ of the Radicals it lost no time in +assailing (principally through the vigorous pens of James Mill and John +Stuart Mill) both the _Edinburgh_ and the _Quarterly_. In 1836 Sir +William Molesworth's recently established _London Review_ was united +with the _Westminster_, and, after several changes of joint title, +continued since 1851 as the _Westminster Review_. Since 1887 it has been +published as a monthly of Liberal policy and "high-class philosophy." +The _Dublin Review_ (London, 1836) still continues quarterly as a Roman +Catholic organ; similarly the _London Quarterly Review_, a Wesleyan +organ, has been published since 1853. Of the quarterlies now defunct, it +will suffice to mention the dissenting _Eclectic Review_ (1805-68) owned +and edited for a time by Josiah Conder; the _British Review_ (1811-25); +the _Christian Remembrancer_ (1819-68), which was a monthly during its +early history; the _Retrospective Review_ (1820-26, 1853-54) conducted +by Henry Southern and afterwards Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas as a +critical review for old and curious books; the _English Review_ +(1844-53); and the _North British Review_ (1844-71), published at +Edinburgh. The impulse toward the study of continental literature during +the third decade of the century gave rise to the _Foreign Quarterly +Review_ (1827-46); the _Foreign Review and Continental Miscellany_ +(1828-30) and the _British and Foreign Review_ (1835-44), continued as +the _British Quarterly Review_ (1845-86). + +A most determined effort to rival the older quarterlies resulted in the +_National Review_, founded in 1855 by Walter Bagehot and Richard Holt +Hutton. Its articles were exhaustive, well-written and thoroughly +characteristic of their class. In addition to the excellent work of both +editors, there were contributions by James Martineau, Matthew Arnold, +and Hutton's brother-in-law, William Caldwell Roscoe. Yet, in spite of +the high standards maintained until the end, the _National_ ceased +publication in 1864. The many failures in this class of periodicals seem +to indicate quite clearly that the spirit of the age no longer favors a +quarterly. For our energetic and progressive era such an interval is too +long. The confirmed admirer of the elaborate essays of the _Edinburgh_ +and the _Quarterly_ will continue to welcome their bulky numbers; but +the average reader is strongly prejudiced in favor of the more frequent, +more attractive and more thoroughly entertaining monthlies. + +It is one of the curiosities in the history of periodical literature +that no popular monthly developed during the first half of the +nineteenth century: the great quarterlies apparently usurped the entire +field. We have already seen that the _Critical Review_ came to an end in +1817 whilst the _Monthly_ continued until 1843. In both cases, however, +the publication amounted to little more than a sheer struggle for +existence. The _Monthly's_ attempt to imitate in a smaller way the plan +of the quarterlies proved an unqualified failure. Neither of the two +periodicals established at the beginning of the century ever achieved a +position of critical authority. The _Christian Observer_, started (1802) +by Josiah Pratt and conducted by Zachary Macaulay until 1816, was +devoted mainly to the abolition of the slave-trade. Its subsequent +history until its demise in 1877 is confined almost wholly to the +theological pale. The second periodical was the _Monthly Repository of +Theology and General Literature_ (1806-37), which achieved some literary +prominence for a time under the editorship of W.J. Fox. During the last +two years of its existence, Richard Hengist Horne and Leigh Hunt became +its successive editors, but failed to avert the final collapse. + +It would be useless to enumerate the many short-lived attempts, such as +the _Monthly Censor_ (1822) and Longman's _Monthly Chronicle_ (1838-41) +that were made to provide a successful monthly review. The first of the +modern literary monthlies was the _Fortnightly Review_, established in +1865, evidently upon the model of _Revue des Deux Mondes_, which had +been published at Paris since 1831. Like the great French periodical, +it was issued fortnightly (at first) and printed signed articles. It was +Liberal in politics, agnostic in religion and abreast of the times in +science. The publishers, Messrs. Chapman and Hall, secured an +experienced editor in George Henry Lewes, who had contributed +extensively to most of the reviews then in progress. The success of the +new review was assured by the presence of such names as Walter Bagehot, +George Eliot, Sir John Herschel, Mr. Frederic Harrison and Herbert +Spencer on its list of contributors. It provided articles of timely +interest in politics, literature, art and science; in its early volumes +appeared serially Anthony Trollope's _Belton Estate_ and Mr. George +Meredith's _Vittoria_. + +Lewes edited the first six volumes, covering the years 1865-66. The +review was then made a monthly without, however, changing its now +inappropriate name, and the editorship was accepted by Mr. John Morley, +who conducted the _Fortnightly_ with great success for sixteen years. +Most of the earlier contributors were retained; others like Mr. +Swinburne, J.A. Symonds, Professor Edward Dowden and (Sir) Leslie +Stephen established a standard of literary criticism that was +practically unrivalled. The authority of its scientific and political +writers was equally high; as for serial fiction, Mr. Morley published +Mr. Meredith's _Beauchamp's Career_ and _The Tragic Comedians_, besides +less important novels by Trollope and others. More recently the +publication of fiction has been exceptional. The (1890) _Review of +Reviews_ Index said of the _Fortnightly_: + + "While disclaiming 'party' or 'editorial consistency,' and + proclaiming that its pages were open to all views, the + _Fortnightly_ seldom included the orthodox among its contributors. + The articles which startled people and made small earthquakes + beneath the crust of conventional orthodoxy, political and + religious, usually appeared in the _Fortnightly_. It was here that + Professor Huxley seemed to foreshadow the expulsion of the + spiritual from the world, by his paper on 'The Physical Basis of + Life,' and that Professor Tyndall propounded his famous suggestion + for the establishment of a prayerless union or hospital as a + scientific method for testing the therapeutic value of prayer. Mr. + Frederic Harrison chanted in its pages the praises of the Commune, + and prepared the old ladies of both sexes for the imminent advent + of an English Terror by his plea for Trade Unionism. It was in the + _Fortnightly_ also that Mr. Chamberlain was introduced to the + world, when he was permitted to explain his proposals for Free + Labour, Free Land, Free Education, and Free Church. Mr. Morley's + papers on the heroes and saints (Heaven save the mark!) of the + French Revolution appeared here, and every month in an editorial + survey he summed up the leading features of the progress of the + world." + +Since Mr. Morley's retirement in 1883, the editors of the _Fortnightly_ +have been Mr. T.H.S. Escott (1883-86), Mr. Frank Harris (1886-94) and +the present incumbent, Mr. W.L. Courtney. + +The _Fortnightly_ was not long permitted to enjoy undisputed possession +of the field. In 1866, while it was still published semi-monthly, the +_Contemporary Review_ was launched. Alexander Strahan, the publisher, +selected Dean Alford as its editor in order to assure a more reserved +tone than that of its popular predecessor. Although Liberal in politics, +like the _Fortnightly_, it assumed a very different and apparently +corrective attitude in religious matters. Most of its articles for many +years were upon theological subjects and were written by scholars +comparatively unknown to the public. The gradual change in policy +furthered by its later editors, especially Mr. James Knowles and Mr. +Percy Bunting has brought the _Contemporary_ nearer to the general type +of popular monthlies. Its principles seem to tend toward "broad +evangelical, semi-socialistic Liberalism." + +In 1877 Mr. Knowles found it impossible to conduct the _Contemporary_ +any longer in the independent manner that seemed essential to him; +accordingly, he withdrew and established the _Nineteenth Century_, which +in deference to the new era and a desire to be abreast of the times, +recently adopted the somewhat awkward title of the _Nineteenth Century +and After_. Like the _Fortnightly_, it presented a brilliant array of +names from the first. The initial number contained a Prefatory Sonnet by +Tennyson, and articles by Gladstone, Matthew Arnold, Cardinal Manning, +and the Dean of Gloucester and Bristol. It is sufficient to state that +this standard has since been maintained by Mr. Knowles and has made his +_Nineteenth Century and After_ the most popular of the monthlies. + +The _National Review_ (not to be confounded with Bagehot and Hutton's +quarterly of that name), is the youngest and least important of the +monthly reviews. It was established in 1883 as a Conservative organ +under the editorship of Mr. Alfred Austin and Professor W.J. Courthope. +Well-known writers have contributed to its pages, yet it has never +assumed a place of first importance in the periodical world. Its present +editor is Mr. Louis J. Maxse. + +It is well to bear in mind that these reviews all seek to discuss the +most important subjects of contemporary interest, and to secure the +services of writers best qualified to treat those subjects. In the +narrow sense of the term, they are not literary reviews; the function of +periodicals that discuss present day politics, sociology, theology, +history, science, art and numerous other generic subjects is more +inclusive and appeals to a much larger audience than the periodical of +literary criticism. In the quarterlies and monthlies we look for the +most authoritative reviews of the important books of the day; but for +general literary review and gossip, a new class of monthlies, best +represented by Dr. Robertson Nicoll's _Bookman_ (1891) and the American +_Bookman_ (1895) and _The Critic_ (1881) has appeared. These fill a gap +between the more substantial monthlies and the very popular weekly +papers. + +The last-mentioned class was practically developed during the nineteenth +century. The frequency of publication forbade a strict devotion to the +cause of _belles-lettres_; hence, in most cases, politics or music and +art were included in the scheme. At first literature was granted meagre +space in newspapers of the _Weekly Register_ and _Examiner_ type. +William Cobbett, profiting by his previous experience with _Porcupine's +Gazette_ and the _Porcupine_, began his _Weekly Political Register_ in +1802 and continued its publication until his death in 1835. It was so +thoroughly political in character that it hardly merits recognition as a +literary periodical. The _Examiner_, begun in 1808 by John Hunt, enjoyed +during the thirteen years of his brother Leigh's cooeperation a wide +reputation for the excellence of its political and literary criticism. +Under Albany Fonblanque, John Forster and William Minto it continued +with varying success until 1880. + +The first truly literary weekly review was the _Literary Gazette_, +established in 1817 by Henry Colburn, of the _New Monthly Magazine_, +under the joint editorship of Mr. H.E. Lloyd and Miss Ross. After the +first half-year of its existence, Colburn sold a third share to the +Messrs. Longman and another third to William Jerdan, who became sole +editor and eventually (1842) sole proprietor. The original price of a +shilling was soon reduced to eight pence. Jerdan set the prototype for +later literary weeklies in his plan, which embraced "foreign and +domestic correspondence, critical analyses of new publications, +varieties connected with polite literature, philosophical researches, +scientific inventions, sketches of society, biographical memoirs, essays +on fine arts, and miscellaneous articles on drama, music and literary +intelligence." Thus Jerdan followed his friend Canning's advice by +avoiding "politics and polemics" and by aiming to present "a clear and +instructive picture of the moral and literary improvement of the times, +and a complete and authentic chronological literary record for general +reference." He secured the services of Crabbe, Barry Cornwall, Maginn, +Campbell, Mrs. Hemans and others: with such an array of contributors he +was able to crush the several rival weeklies that soon entered the +field. + +Toward the end of its prosperous first decade, however, the misfortunes +of the _Literary Gazette_ began. Colburn's publications had been roughly +handled in its pages and he accordingly aided James Silk Buckingham in +founding the _Athenaeum_. The first number appeared on January 2, 1828, +as an evident rival of the older weekly. For a time the new venture was +on the verge of failure and the proprietors actually offered to sell it +to Jerdan. Within half a year Buckingham was succeeded by John Sterling +as editor. Frederic Denison Maurice's friends purchased the _Literary +Chronicle and Weekly Review_ (begun 1819) and merged it with the +_Athenaeum_ in July, 1828. For a year Sterling and Maurice contributed +some of the most brilliant critical articles that have appeared in its +pages. The working editor at that time was Henry Stebbing who had been +associated with the _Athenaeum_ since its inception and who was the only +survivor[C] of the original staff when the semi-centennial number was +published on January 5, 1878. + +Even the high standards set by Maurice and Sterling failed to win +public favor. The crisis came about the middle of 1830 when Charles +Wentworth Dilke became "supreme editor," enlisted Lamb, George Darley, +Barry Cornwall and others on his staff, and reduced the price of the +_Athenaeum_ from eightpence to fourpence. The apparent folly of reducing +the price and increasing the expenses did not lead to the generally +prophesied collapse; this first experiment in modern methods resulted in +the rapid growth of the _Athenaeum's_ circulation, to the serious +detriment of the _Literary Gazette_. Jerdan tried to stem the tide by +publishing lampoons on the dullness of Dilke's paper; but when the +_Athenaeum_ was enlarged in 1835 from sixteen to twenty-four pages +Dilke's triumph was evident. The _Literary Gazette_ was compelled to +reduce its price to fourpence in its effort to regain the lost +subscriptions. Dilke labored earnestly to improve his paper and when, in +1846, he felt that it was established on a firm basis, he made Thomas +Kibble Hervey editor and devoted his own time to furthering his +journalistic enterprises. However, he continued to contribute to the +weekly; his valuable articles on Junius and Pope together with several +others were afterwards reprinted as _Papers of a Critic_. + +Jerdan withdrew from the _Literary Gazette_ in 1850. The hopeless +struggle with the _Athenaeum_, involving a third reduction in price to +threepence, lasted until 1862, when the _Gazette_ was incorporated with +the _Parthenon_ and came to an end during the following year. Hervey +edited the _Athenaeum_ until 1853 when ill-health necessitated his +resignation. The later editors include William Hepworth Dixon, Norman +MacColl and at present Mr. Vernon Rendall. After the withdrawal of Dixon +in 1869 a reformation in the staff and management of the _Athenaeum_ took +place. + + "Some old writers were parted with, and a great many fresh + contributors were found. While special departments, such as + science, art, music and the drama, were of necessity entrusted to + regular hands, indeed, the reviewing of books, now more than ever + the principal business of 'The Athenaeum,' was distributed over a + very large staff, the plan being to assign each work to a writer + familiar with its subject and competent to deal with it + intelligently, but rigidly to exclude personal favouritism or + prejudice, and to secure as much impartiality as possible. The rule + of anonymity has been more carefully observed in 'The Athenaeum' + than in most other papers. Its authority as a literary censor is + not lessened, however, and is in some respects increased, by the + fact that the paper itself, and not any particular critic of great + or small account, is responsible for the verdicts passed in its + columns." (Fox Bourne.) + +Half a year after the inception of the _Athenaeum_, the first number of +the _Spectator_ was issued (July 6, 1828) by Robert Stephen Rintoul, an +experienced journalist who had launched the ill-fated semi-political +_Atlas_ two years before and therefore decided to confine his new +venture to literary and social topics. The political excitement of the +time soon aroused Rintoul's interest, and he undertook the advocacy of +the Reform Bill with all possible ardor. From him emanated the famous +battle-cry: "The Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill." He +conducted the _Spectator_ with great skill until 1858, when he sold it +two months before his death. Although he wrote little for its pages, +Rintoul made the _Spectator_ a power in furthering all reforms. The +literary standard, while somewhat obscured for a time by its politics, +was high. In 1861 the _Spectator_ passed into the hands of Mr. Meredith +Townsend who sold a half share to the late Richard Holt Hutton with the +understanding that they should act as political and literary editors +respectively. During the four years of the American Civil War, the +_Spectator_ espoused the cause of the North and was consequently +unpopular; but the outcome turned the sentiment in England and likewise +the fortunes of the _Spectator_. Hutton's contributions included his +most memorable utterances upon theological and literary subjects. In the +midst of religious controversy he was able to discuss delicate questions +without giving offense, to enlist all parties by refraining from +expressed allegiance to one. The _Spectator_ of Hutton's day was, in +Mrs. Oliphant's opinion, "specially distinguished by the thoughtful tone +of its writing, the almost Quixotic fairness of its judgments, and the +profoundly religious spirit which pervades its more serious articles." +Hutton retired shortly before his death in 1897. The present editor is +Mr. J. St. Loe Strachey. + +The _Saturday Review_ was established in November, 1855, by A.J. +Beresford Hope. Its first editor was John Douglass Cook, who had indexed +the early volumes of the _Quarterly_ for Murray and had gained his +journalistic experience with the _Times_ and the _Morning Chronicle_. +Though possessed of no great personal ability, Cook had the useful +editorial faculty of recognizing talent, and consequently gathered about +himself the most promising writers of the younger generation, including, +among others, Robert Talbot Cecil, the late Lord Salisbury. The +_Saturday Review_ at once became the most influential and most energetic +of the weekly papers. Its politics, independent at first, later assumed +a pronounced Conservative complexion. Cook remained editor until his +death (1868) when he was succeeded by his assistant, Philip Harwood. +Since the latter's retirement in 1883 the more recent editors include +Mr. Walter H. Pollock, Mr. Frank Harris and the present incumbent, Mr. +Harold Hodge. Professor Saintsbury wrote of the _Saturday Review_: + + "Its staff was, as a rule, recruited from the two Universities + (though there was no kind of exclusion for the unmatriculated; as a + matter of fact, neither of its first two editors was a son either + of Oxford or Cambridge), and it always insisted on the necessity of + classical culture.... It observed, for perhaps a longer time than + any other paper, the salutary principles of anonymity (real as well + as ostensible) in regard to the authorship of particular articles; + and those who knew were constantly amused at the public mistakes on + this subject." + +Such "salutary principles of anonymity" were not observed by the +_Academy, a Monthly Record of Literature, Learning, Science and Art_, +which began to appear in October, 1869, and was published for a short +time by John Murray. Its founder, Dr. Charles E. Appleton, edited the +_Academy_ until his death in 1879. All the leading articles bore the +authors' signatures, and, following the example of the more ambitious +monthlies, Dr. Appleton secured the best known writers as contributors. +The first number opened with an interesting unpublished letter of Lord +Byron's; its literary articles were by Matthew Arnold, Gustave Masson +and Mr. Sidney Colvin, theology was represented by the Rev. T.K. Cheyne +and J.B. Lightfoot (later Bishop of Durham), science by Thomas Huxley +and Sir John Lubbock (now Lord Avebury), and classical learning by Mark +Pattison and John Conington. This remarkable array of names did not +diminish in subsequent numbers. Besides those mentioned Mr. W.M. +Rossetti, Max Mueller, G. Maspero, J.A. Symonds, F.T. Palgrave and others +contributed to the first volume. Later such names as William Morris, +John Tyndall, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Walter Pater and Robert Louis +Stevenson appeared in its pages. + +In spite of its brilliant program, the size of the _Academy_, even at +its price of sixpence, was too slight to rank as a monthly. After four +years' experience, first as a monthly, then as a fortnightly, it became +and has remained a weekly. The editorial succession since the death of +Dr. Appleton has been C.E. Doble (1879-81); Mr. James Sutherland Cotton +(1881-96); Mr. C. Lewis Hind (1896-1903); and Mr. W. Teignmouth Shore. +The issue of November 7, 1896, announced Mr. Cotton's retirement and the +inauguration of a new policy, which, in addition to technical +improvements, promised the issue of occasional supplements of a purely +academic and educational character, and the beginning of the series of +_Academy Portraits_ of men of letters. At the same time the publication +of signed articles was abolished and the _Academy_ remained anonymous +until the recent editorial change. A new departure in October, 1898, +made the _Academy_ an illustrated paper--the most attractive though not +the most authoritative of the weeklies. It has departed widely from the +set traditions of Dr. Appleton, but most readers will agree that the +departure has been justified by the needs of the hour. There is small +satisfaction in reading a one-page review from the pen of an Arnold or a +Pater; we feel that such authorities should express themselves at length +in the pages of the literary monthlies; that the reader of the weekly +should be content with the anonymous (and less expensive) review written +by the staff-critic. Whatever the personal bias, it is at least certain +that under present conditions the _Academy_ appeals more generally to +the popular taste. Its recent absorption of a younger periodical is +indicated in the compounding of its title into the _Academy and +Literature_--a change that does not commend itself on abstract grounds +of literary fitness and tradition. + +A consideration of periodicals of the _Tatler_, _Spectator_ and +_Rambler_ class evidently lies beyond our present purpose; though +Addison's papers on _Paradise Lost_ and similar articles show an +occasional critical intent. The magazines, however, have in various +instances shown such an extensive interest in matters literary that a +brief account of their development will not be amiss. The primary +distinction between the review and the magazine is well understood; the +former criticizes, the latter entertains. Hence fiction, poetry and +essays are better adapted than book-reviews to the needs of the literary +magazine. As already stated, Peter Motteux's _Gentleman's Journal_ +(1692-94) probably deserves recognition as the first English magazine, +though its brief career is forgotten in the honor accorded to the +_Gentleman's Magazine_, established in 1731 by Edward Cave and which, +still under the editorship of "Sylvanus Urban, Gentleman," is now +approaching its three hundredth volume. In the early days its lists of +births, deaths, marriages, bankrupts, events, etc., must have made it a +useful summary for the public. In literature it printed merely a +"Register of New Books" without comment of any sort. It is exasperating +to find such books as _Pamela_ or _Tom Jones_ listed among "New +Publications" without a word of criticism or commendation. We could +spare whole reams of pages devoted to "Army Promotions" and "Monthly +Chronicle" for a few lines of literary review. + +Although the booksellers refused to aid Cave in establishing his +magazine, the demonstration of its success brought forth numerous +rivals. As they all followed Cave's precedent in ignoring literary +criticism, it will suffice to mention merely the names of the _London +Magazine_ (1732-79); the _Scots Magazine_ (1739-1817), continued as the +_Edinburgh Magazine_ until 1826; the _Universal Magazine_ (1743-1815); +the _British Magazine_ (1746-50); the _Royal Magazine_ (1759-71); and +finally the _British Magazine, or Monthly Repository for Gentlemen and +Ladies_ (1760-67) edited by Tobias Smollett, who published his _Sir +Launcelot Greaves_ in its pages--perhaps the first instance of the +serial publication of fiction. Goldsmith wrote some of his most +interesting essays for Smollett's magazine. + +An important addition to the ranks was the _Monthly Magazine_ begun in +1796 by Sir Richard Phillips under the editorship of John Aikin. The +principal contributor was William Taylor of Norwich who, during a period +of thirty years, supplied to the _Monthly Magazine_ and other +periodicals a series of 1,750 articles of remarkable quality. His +contributions gave the Magazine standing as a literary review. Hazlitt +accorded to Taylor the honor of writing the first reviews in the style +afterwards adopted by the Edinburgh Reviewers, which established their +reputations as original and impartial critics. He is remembered to-day +as the author of an unread _Historic Survey of German Poetry_ which was +vigorously assailed by Carlyle in the _Edinburgh Review_. The _New +Monthly Magazine_ was started in 1814 by Henry Colburn and Frederick +Shoberl in opposition to Phillips' magazine. Its first editors were Dr. +Watkins and Alaric A. Watts. At a later time Campbell, Bulwer, Theodore +Hook and Harrison Ainsworth successively assumed charge. Under such +capable direction the magazine naturally won a prominent place among the +periodicals of the day. During its later years the _New Monthly_ was +obscured by more ambitious ventures and came to an inglorious end in +1875--thirty-two years after the suspension of Phillips' _Monthly +Magazine_. + +A most significant event in the history of the magazine was the founding +of the _Edinburgh Monthly Magazine_ in April, 1817, by William +Blackwood. The new magazine was projected to counteract the influence +of the _Edinburgh Review_, but under its first editors, James Cleghorn +and Thomas Pringle, it failed to win favor. After six numbers were +issued, a final disagreement between Blackwood and the editors resulted +in the withdrawal of the latter. The name of the monthly was changed to +_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_--popularly _Blackwood's_ or "Maga"--and +henceforth until his death Blackwood was his own editor. John Wilson +(Christopher North) and John Gibson Lockhart, the most important of the +early contributors to _Blackwood's_, published in that famous seventh +number the clever _Chaldee Manuscript_--an audacious satire upon the +original editors, the rival publisher Constable, the _Edinburgh Review_ +and various literary personages under a thinly veiled allegory in +apocalyptic style. It at once attracted wide attention (including a +costly action for libel within a fortnight) and was suppressed in the +second impression of the number. The same number of _Blackwood's_ set +the precedent for the subsequent critical vituperation that made the +magazine notorious. It contained an abusive article on Coleridge's +_Biographia Literaria_ and the first of a series of virulent attacks on +"The Cockney School of Poetry." Much of the literary criticism in the +first few volumes is inexcusably brutal; fortunately, _Blackwood's_ soon +became less rampant in its critical outbursts. The cooeperation of James +Hogg and the ill-fated Maginn introduced new articles of varied +interest, particularly the witty letters and the parodies of "Ensign +O'Doherty." Wilson's _Noctes Ambrosianae_ became a characteristic feature +of _Blackwood's_; John Galt and Susan Ferrier won popularity among the +novel readers of the day; and in the trenchant literary criticism of +Lockhart, Wilson, Hogg and their confreres an equally high standard was +maintained. + +After the death of the elder Blackwood in 1834, the management of the +magazine passed to his sons successively. John Blackwood, the sixth son, +enjoyed the distinction of "discovering" George Eliot and beginning, by +the publication of her _Scenes of Clerical Life_ in 1857, a relationship +that was both pleasant and profitable to the firm. A few years earlier +appeared the first contributions of another remarkable literary +woman--Mrs. Margaret Oliphant, whose association with _Blackwood's_ +lasted over forty years. Her history of the house of Blackwood was +published in the year of her death (1897). + +_Blackwood's_ is still a strong conservative organ. The already quoted +Index of the _Review of Reviews_ says of it: "With a rare consistency it +has contrived to appear for over three score years and ten as a spirited +and defiant advocate of all those who are at least five years behind +their time. Sometimes _Blackwood_ is fifty years in the rear, but that +is a detail of circumstance. Five or fifty, it does not matter, so long +as it is well in the rear." Such gentle sarcasm merely emphasizes the +fact that _Blackwood's_ has always aimed to be more than a magazine of +_belles-lettres_. The publishers celebrated the appearance of the one +thousandth number in February, 1899, by almost doubling its size to a +volume of three hundred pages, including a latter-day addition to the +_Noctes Ambrosianae_ and other features. + +An important though short-lived venture was the _London Magazine_, begun +in January, 1820, under the editorship of John Scott. By its editorial +assaults upon the _Blackwood_ criticisms of the "Cockney School," it +became the recognized champion of that loosely defined coterie. The +initial attack in the May number was further emphasized by more vigorous +articles in November and December of 1820, and January, 1821. Lockhart, +who was the recipient of the worst abuse, demanded of Scott an apology +or a hostile meeting. The outcome of the controversy was a duel on +February 16th between Scott and Lockhart's intimate friend, Jonathan +Henry Christie. Scott was mortally wounded, and died within a fortnight; +the verdict of wilful murder brought against Christie and his second at +the inquest resulted in their trial and acquittal at the old Bailey two +months later. It would have been well for the _London Magazine_ and for +literature in general if that unfortunate duel could have been prevented +or at least diverted into such a ludicrous affair as the meeting between +Jeffrey and Tom Moore in 1806. + +The most famous contributions to the _London Magazine_ during Scott's +regime were Lamb's _Essays of Elia_. Those charming productions, now +ranked among our dearly treasured classics, were not received at first +with universal approbation. The long and justly forgotten Alaric A. +Watts said of them: "Charles Lamb delivers himself with infinite pain +and labour of a silly piece of trifling, every month, in this Magazine, +under the signature of Elia. It is the curse of the Cockney School that, +with all their desire to appear exceedingly off-hand and ready with all +they have to say, they are constrained to elaborate every sentence, as +though the web were woven from their own bowels. Charles Lamb says he +can make no way in an article under at least a week." In July, 1821, the +_London Magazine_ was purchased by Taylor and Hessey. Although Thomas +Hood was made working-editor, the _Blackwood_ idea of retaining +editorial supervision in the firm was followed. Within a few months De +Quincey contributed his _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_--the +most famous of all the articles that appeared in the magazine. Lamb[D] +and De Quincey continued to write for the magazine for several years. +Other contributors, especially of literary criticism, were Barry +Cornwall, Carlyle, Hazlitt, Henry Cary and, toward the end, Walter +Savage Landor. The magazine became less conspicuous after 1824 and +dragged out an obscure existence until 1829; but it is probable that no +other periodical achieved the standard of purely literary excellence +represented by the _London Magazine_ during the first five years of its +existence. + +In February, 1830, James Fraser published the first number of _Fraser's +Magazine for Town and Country_. The magazine was not named after the +publisher but after its sponsor, Hugh Fraser, a "briefless barrister" +and man about town. The latter enlisted the aid of Maginn who had +severed his connection with _Blackwood's_ in 1828. In general, +_Fraser's_ was modelled upon _Blackwood's_; but a unique and popular +feature was the publication of the "Gallery of Illustrious Literary +Characters" between 1830-38. This famous series of eighty-one caricature +portraits chiefly by Daniel Maclise, with letter-press by Maginn, has +been made accessible to present-day readers in William Bates' _Maclise +Portrait Gallery_ (1883) where much illustrative material has been added +to the original articles. It is evident that the literary standard of +_Fraser's_ soon equalled and possibly surpassed that of _Blackwood's_. +Among its writers were Carlyle (who contributed a critique to the first +number, published _Sartor Resartus_ in its pages, 1833-35, and, as late +as 1875, his _Early Kings of Norway_), Thackeray, Father Prout and +Thomas Love Peacock. Maclise's plate of "The Fraserians" also includes +Allan Cunningham, Theodore Hook, William Jerdan, Lockhart, Hogg, +Coleridge, Southey and several others. It is unlikely that all of them +wrote much for _Fraser's_; but the staff was undoubtedly a brilliant +assemblage. James Anthony Froude became editor in 1860 and was assisted +for a time by Charles Kingsley and Sir Theodore Martin. He was succeeded +by his sub-editor, William Allingham, during whose administration +(1874-79) the fortunes of _Fraser's_ suffered a decline. The gradual +failure was due to the competition of the new shilling magazines rather +than to incompetence on the part of the editor. The end came in October, +1882, when _Fraser's_ was succeeded by _Longman's Magazine_ which is +still in progress. + +The magazines established soon after _Fraser's_ followed for the most +part a policy that demands for them mere passing mention in the present +connection. Literary criticism and reviews were largely abandoned in +favor of lighter and more entertaining material. The _Dublin University +Magazine_ (1833-80) and _Tait's Edinburgh Magazine_ (1832-61) best +represent the transitional stage. During its early history, the latter +employed prominent contributors, who gave it an important position. Such +magazines as the _Metropolitan_ (1831-50) and _Bentley's Miscellany_ +(1837-68) set the standards for similar periodicals since that time. +Charles Dickens' experience with _Bentley's_ led to the publication of +his weeklies, _Household Words_ (1850 to date) and _All the Year Round_ +(1859), which was incorporated in 1895 with the former. _Macmillan's +Magazine_, first of the popular shilling monthlies, began in 1859 and +was soon followed by Thackeray's _Cornhill Magazine_ (1860) and _Temple +Bar_ (1860). All of these magazines are still in progress. The +occasional publication of an article by a literary critic hardly +justifies their inclusion within the category of critical reviews, as +their essential purpose is to instruct and entertain, rather than to sit +in judgment upon contemporary letters. + +There are in course of publication to-day numerous literary periodicals +of varying scope and importance that have not even been mentioned by +title in our hasty survey. Enough has been said, however, to give some +idea of the magnitude of the field, and to show that most of the great +names of modern English literature have been more or less closely +associated with the history of the literary reviews. Those reviews have +usually sought to foster all that is highest and best in our +intellectual development; and although English literary criticism has +been, on the whole, less convincing, less brilliant and less +authoritative than that of France, it has during the past century set a +fairly high standard of excellence. It seems difficult to understand why +the literary conditions in England, instead of developing critics like +Sainte-Beuve, Gaston Paris, Brunetiere and others whose utterances +redound to the lasting glory of French criticism, should be steadily +tending toward a lower and less influential level. Mr. Churton Collins +in his pessimistic discussion of "The Present Functions of Criticism" +deplores the spirit of tolerance and charity manifested toward the +mediocre productions of contemporary writers; he attributes the +degradation of criticism to the lack of critical standards and +principles, and indirectly to the neglect of the study of literature at +the English Universities. The plea for an English Academy has been made +at different times and with different ends in view, but under modern +conditions such an institution would hardly solve the problem. Mr. +Collins shows how the intellectual aristocracy of the past has been +superseded by the present omnivorous reading-public afflicted with a +perpetual craving for literary novelty. The inevitable rapidity of +production results in a deluge of poor books which are foisted upon +readers by a "detestable system of mutual puffery." This condition of +affairs naturally offers few opportunities for the development of +critical ideals; but it hardly applies to the incorruptible reviews of +recognized standing. The reasons for the lack of authority in modern +English criticism are more deeply grounded in an inherent objection to +the restraint imposed upon an artist by artificial canons of taste, and +in a well-founded impression that many of the greatest literary +achievements evince a violation of such canons. + +It is not to be inferred that criticism is thereby disdained and +disregarded. The critical dicta of a Dryden or a Johnson, a Coleridge or +a Hazlitt, and, more recently, an Arnold or a Pater, are valued and +studied because they emphasize the vital elements essential to the +proper appreciation of a literary product; and, moreover, because such +critics, in transcending the limitations of their kind, establish higher +and juster standards for the criticism of the future. On the other hand, +the great majority of critical utterances must necessarily be ephemeral; +they may exert considerable contemporary influence, but are usually +forgotten long before the works that called them forth. Unless this +criticism is more than a perfunctory examination of the merits and +defects of the work under consideration, it cannot endure beyond its own +brief day. + +Several fruitless attempts have been made to reduce criticism to an +exact science, which, quite disregarding the factor of personal taste, +could refer all literature to a more or less fixed and arbitrary set of +critical principles. The champions of this objective criticism point to +the occasionally ludicrous divergence of the views expressed in +criticism of certain poets or novelists, and insist that there is no +occasion for such a bewildering difference of opinion. They seem to +forget that the criticism which we esteem most highly at all times is +the subjective criticism in which the personality of a competent and +sincere critic is manifest. Literature, like music, painting and the +other arts, has its own laws of technique--fundamental canons that must +be observed in the successful pursuit of the art; but at a certain point +difference of opinion is not only possible but profitable. The critics +who would unite in condemning a thirteen-line sonnet or a ten-act +tragedy could not be expected to agree on the relative merits of +Milton's and Wordsworth's sonnets. Unanimity of opinion is as impossible +and undesirable concerning the poetic achievement of Browning and +Whitman as it is concerning the music of Brahms and Wagner, or the +painting of Turner and Whistler. Great artists who have taken liberties +with traditions and precedents have done much to prevent the critics +from falling into a state of self-complacency over their scientific +methods and formulas. + +The most helpful form of criticism is the interpretative variety, not +necessarily the laudatory "appreciation" that is so popular in our day, +but an honest effort to understand and elucidate the intention of the +writer. The proper exercise of this art occasionally demands rare +qualifications on the part of the critic; at the same time it adds +dignity to his calling and value to his utterance. It serves to dispel +the popular conception of a critic as a disappointed _litterateur_ who +begrudges his more brilliant fellow craftsmen their success and who dogs +their triumphs with his ill-tempered snarling. Interpretative criticism +needs few rules and no system; yet it serves a noble purpose as a guide +and monitor for subsequent literary effort. + +The question of anonymous criticism has occasioned much thoughtful +discussion. In former times anonymity was often a shield for the +slanderer who saw fit to abuse and assail his victim with the rancorous +outburst of his malice; but it is also clear that the earlier reviewers +were mere literary hacks whose names would have given no weight to the +critique and hence could be omitted without much loss. The authorship of +important _Edinburgh_ and _Quarterly_[E] articles in the days of their +greatness was usually an open secret. Later periodicals, like the +_Fortnightly_ and the _Academy_ found it a profitable advertisement to +publish the signatures of their eminent critics. The tendency of the +present day is largely in favor of anonymity; no longer as a cover for +the dispensation of malicious vituperation, but as a necessary +safe-guard for the unbiased and untrammeled exercise of the critical +function. Certain abuses of the privilege are inevitable. Mr. Sidney +Colvin in looking over the criticisms of Mr. Stephen Phillips' poetry +recently discovered in three periodicals convincing parallels that led +Mr. Arthur Symons to confess to the authorship of all three critiques. +The average reader would in most cases be strongly influenced by the +united verdict of the critics of the _Saturday Review_, the _Athenaeum_ +and the _Quarterly Review_; in this instance his convictions would +undoubtedly be rudely shattered when he learned the truth. Under such +conditions anonymous criticism is a menace, not an aid to the reader's +judgment. + +In conclusion, it must be borne in mind that criticism is not an end but +a means to an end. All the literary criticism ever uttered would be +useless as such if it did not evince a desire to further the development +of literary art. The _Iliad_ and the _Oedipus_ were written long +before Aristotle's _Poetics_, and it is not likely that either Homer or +Sophocles would have been a greater poet if he could have read the +Stagirite's treatise. Yet the _Poetics_, as a summary of the essential +features of that art, served an important purpose in later ages and +exerted far-reaching influences. Criticism in all ages has necessarily +been of less importance than art itself--it guides and suggests, but +cannot create. Literary history shows that true criticism must be in +conformity with the spirit of the age; it cannot oppose the trend of +intelligent opinion. It may praise, censure, advise, interpret--but it +will always remain subservient to the art that called it forth. There is +no reason to believe that criticism can ever be established in the +English-speaking world upon a basis that will subject to an arbitrary +and irrevocable ruling the form and spirit of the artist's message to +mankind. + +[Footnote A: Reprinted in Professor Arber's _The Term Catalogues_ +(1668-1709). London, privately printed, 1903.] + +[Footnote B: See the centenary number of the _Edinburgh Review_ +(October, 1902). During the editor's recent tenure of government office, +the review was temporarily edited by Mr. E.S. Roscoe.] + +[Footnote C: See his letter in _Athenaeum_, January 19, 1878. See also +"Our Seventieth Birthday," _Athenaeum_, January 1, 1898.] + +[Footnote D: Mr. Bertram Dobell in his _Side-Lights on Charles Lamb_ +(1903) directs attention to some hitherto unknown articles of Lamb's in +the _London Magazine_.] + +[Footnote E: In July, 1902, the _Quarterly Review_ published its first +signed article--the widely-discussed paper on Charles Dickens by Mr. +Algernon Charles Swinburne. Since then several other noteworthy articles +have appeared over the authors' signatures.] + + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + + +British Museum. Catalogue of Printed Books. Periodicals. (Revised ed., +1900.) + +Dictionary of National Biography. + +Encyclopedia Britannica. Article on Periodicals, by H.R. Tedder. + +Barrow, Sir John. Autobiography. London, 1847. + +Bourne, H.R. Fox. English Newspapers. Chapters in the History of +Journalism. 2 vols. 8vo. London, 1887. + +Cockburn, Lord. Life of Lord Jeffrey. With a Selection from his +Correspondence. 2 vols. 8vo. London, 1852. + +Copinger, W.A. 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Contains _Curiosities of Criticism_. + +Repplier, Agnes. Books and Men. 16mo. Boston, 1888. Contains +_Curiosities of Criticism_. + +Robertson, John M. Essays toward a Critical Method. Sm. 8vo. London, +1889. Contains _Science in Criticism_. + +Robertson, John M. New Essays toward a Critical Method. Sm. 8vo. London, +1897. + +Sears, Lorenzo. Principles and Methods of Literary Criticism. 12mo. New +York and London, 1898. + +Stevenson, E. Early Reviews of Great Writers (1786-1832): Selected and +Edited with an Introduction. 12mo. London, n.d. + +Trent, W.P. The Authority of Criticism and other Essays. 12mo. New York, +1899. + +Winchester, C.T. Some Principles of Literary Criticism. 12mo. New York, +1899. + +Worsfold, W. Basil. The Principles of Criticism. An Introduction to the +Study of Literature. New Edition. 8vo. New York, 1902. + +Wylie, Laura Johnson. Studies in the Evolution of English Criticism. +16mo. Boston, 1894. + + +Allen, Grant. The Decay of Criticism. In _Fortnightly Review_, XXXVII +(339-351). + +Clarke, Helen A. The Value of Contemporary Judgment. In _Poet-Lore_, V +(201-209). + +Critical Errors. In _Chamber's Journal_, XLII (164-166). + +Criticism Extraordinary. In _All the Year Round_, XXXIII (558-563). + +G.L.A. Some Curiosities of Criticism. In _Temple Bar_, LXXX (241-247). + +Howe, Herbert Crombie. The Contradictions of Literary Criticism. In +_North American Review_, CLXXV (399-408). + +Hunt, T.W. Critics and Criticism. In _Modern Language Notes_, IV, p. +161. + + + + +EARLY REVIEWS OF ENGLISH POETS + + + + +THOMAS GRAY + + +ODES. _By Mr._ Gray. 4to. 1s. Dodsley. + +As this publication seems designed for those who have formed their taste +by the models of antiquity, the generality of Readers cannot be supposed +adequate Judges of its merit; nor will the Poet, it is presumed, be +greatly disappointed if he finds them backward in commending a +performance not entirely suited to their apprehensions. We cannot, +however, without some regret behold those talents so capable of giving +pleasure to all, exerted in efforts that, at best, can amuse only the +few; we cannot behold this rising Poet seeking fame among the learned, +without hinting to him the same advice that Isocrates used to give his +Scholars, _Study the People_. This study it is that has conducted the +great Masters of antiquity up to immortality. Pindar himself, of whom +our modern Lyrist is an imitator, appears entirely guided by it. He +adapted his works exactly to the dispositions of his countrymen. +Irregular[,] enthusiastic, and quick in transition,--he wrote for a +people inconstant, of warm imaginations and exquisite sensibility. He +chose the most popular subjects, and all his allusions are to customs +well known, in his day, to the meanest person.[F] + +His English Imitator wants those advantages. He speaks to a people not +easily impressed with new ideas; extremely tenacious of the old; with +difficulty warmed; and as slowly cooling again.--How unsuited then to +our national character is that species of poetry which rises upon us +with unexpected flights! Where we must hastily catch the thought, or it +flies from us; and, in short, where the Reader must largely partake of +the Poet's enthusiasm, in order to taste his beauties. To carry the +parallel a little farther; the Greek Poet wrote in a language the most +proper that can be imagined for this species of composition; lofty, +harmonious, and never needing rhyme to heighten the numbers. But, for +us, several unsuccessful experiments seem to prove that the English +cannot have Odes in blank Verse; while, on the other hand, a natural +imperfection attends those which are composed in irregular rhymes:--the +similar sound often recurring where it is not expected, and not being +found where it is, creates no small confusion to the Reader,--who, as we +have not seldom observed, beginning in all the solemnity of poetic +elocution, is by frequent disappointments of the rhyme, at last obliged +to drawl out the uncomplying numbers into disagreeable prose. + +It is, by no means, our design to detract from the merit of our Author's +present attempt: we would only intimate, that an English Poet,--one whom +the Muse has _mark'd for her own_, could produce a more luxuriant bloom +of flowers, by cultivating such as are natives of the soil, than by +endeavouring to force the exotics of another climate: or, to speak +without a metaphor, such a genius as Mr. Gray might give greater +pleasure, and acquire a larger portion of fame, if, instead of being an +imitator, he did justice to his talents, and ventured to be more an +original. These two Odes, it must be confessed, breath[e] much of the +spirit of Pindar, but then they have caught the seeming obscurity, the +sudden transition, and hazardous epithet, of his mighty master; all +which, though evidently intended for beauties, will, probably, be +regarded as blemishes, by the generality of his Readers. In short, they +are in some measure, a representation of what Pindar now appears to be, +though perhaps, not what he appeared to the States of Greece, when they +rivalled each other in his applause, and when Pan himself was seen +dancing to his melody. + +In conformity to the antients, these Odes consist of the _Strophe_, +_Antistrophe_, and _Epode_, which, in each Ode, are thrice repeated. The +Strophes have a correspondent resemblance in their str[u]cture and +numbers: and the Antistrophe and Epode also bear the same similitude. +The Poet seems, in the first Ode particularly, to design the Epode as a +complete air to the Strophe and Antistrophe, which have more the +appearance of Recitative. There was a necessity for these divisions +among the antients, for they served as directions to the dancer and +musician; but we see no reason why they should be continued among the +moderns; for, instead of assisting, they will but perplex the Musician, +as our music requires a more frequent transition from the Air to the +Recitative than could agree with the simplicity of the antients. + +The first of these Poems celebrates the Lyric Muse. It seems the most +laboured performance of the two, but yet we think its merit is not equal +to that of the second. It seems to want that regularity of plan upon +which the second is founded; and though it abounds with images that +strike, yet, unlike the second, it contains none that are affecting. + +In the second Antistrophe the Bard thus marks the progress of Poetry. + + II. [2.] + + In climes beyond the solar road, + Where shaggy forms o'er ice-built mountains roam, + The Muse has broke the twilight-gloom + To cheer the shivering natives dull abode + And oft beneath the od'rous shade + Of Chili's boundless forests laid, + She deigns to hear the savage youth repeat, + In loose numbers wildly sweet + Their feather-cinctured Chiefs, and dusky loves. + Her track, where'er the Goddess roves, + Glory pursue, and generous shame, + Th' unconquerable Mind, and Freedom's holy flame. + +There is great spirit in the irregularity of the numbers towards the +conclusion of the foregoing stanza. + +[II, 3, and III, 2, of _The Progress of Poesy_ are quoted without +comment.] + +The second 'Ode is founded on a tradition current in Wales, that Edward +the first, when he compleated the conquest of that country, ordered all +the Bards that fell into his hands to be put to death.' The Author seems +to have taken the hint of this subject from the fifteenth Ode of the +first book of Horace. Our Poet introduces the only surviving Bard of +that country in concert with the spirits of his murdered brethren, as +prophetically denouncing woes upon the Conqueror and his posterity. The +circumstances of grief and horror in which the Bard is represented, +those of terror in the preparation of the votive web, and the mystic +obscurity with which the prophecies are delivered, will give as much +pleasure to those who relish this species of composition, as anything +that has hitherto appeared in our language, the Odes of Dryden himself +not excepted. + +[I, 2, I, 3, part of II, 1, and the conclusion of _The Bard_ are +quoted]--_The Monthly Review_. + +[Footnote F: The best Odes of Pindar are said to be those which have +been destroyed by time; and even they were seldom recited among the +Greeks, without the adventitious ornaments of music and dancing. Our +Lyric Odes are seldom set off with these advantages, which, trifling as +they seem, have alone given immortality to the works of Quinault.] + + + + +OLIVER GOLDSMITH + + +_The Traveller, or a Prospect of Society. A Poem_. _Inscribed to the +Rev. Mr._ Henry Goldsmith. _By_ OLIVER GOLDSMITH, _M.B. 4to. Pr. 1s. +6d_. Newbery. + +The author has, in an elegant dedication to his brother, a country +clergyman, given the design of his poem:--'Without espousing the cause +of any party, I have attempted to moderate the rage of all. I have +endeavoured to shew, that there may be equal happiness in other states, +though differently governed from our own; that each state has a peculiar +principle of happiness; and that this principle in each state, +particularly in our own, may be carried to a mischievous excess.' + +That he may illustrate and enforce this important position, the author +places himself on a summit of the Alps, and, turning his eyes around, in +all directions, upon the different regions that lie before him, +compares, not merely their situation or policy, but those social and +domestic manners which, after a very few deductions, make the sum total +of human life. + + 'Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow, + Or by the lazy Scheld, or wandering Po; + Or onward, where the rude Carinthian boor + Against the houseless stranger shuts the door; + Or where Campania's plain forsaken lies, + A weary waste expanded to the skies. + Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see, + My heart untravell'd fond turns to thee; + Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain, + And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.-- + Even now, where Alpine solitudes ascend, + I sit me down a pensive hour to spend; + And, plac'd on high above the storm's career, + Look downward where an hundred realms appear; + Lakes, forests, cities, plains extended wide, + The pomp of kings, the shepherd's humbler pride. + When thus creation's charms around combine, + Amidst the store 'twere thankless to repine. + 'Twere affectation all, and school-taught pride, + To spurn the splendid things by heaven supply'd. + Let school-taught pride dissemble all it can, + These little things are great to little man; + And wiser he, whose sympathetic mind + Exults in all the good of all mankind.' + +The author already appears, by his numbers, to be a versifier; and by +his scenery, to be a poet; it therefore only remains that his sentiments +discover him to be a just estimator of comparative happiness. + +The goods of life are either given by nature, or procured by ourselves. +Nature has distributed her gifts in very different proportions, yet all +her children are content; but the acquisitions of art are such as +terminate in good or evil, as they are differently regulated or +combined. + + 'Yet, where to find that happiest spot below, + Who can direct, when all pretend to know? + The shudd'ring tenant of the frigid zone + Boldly asserts that country for his own, + Extols the treasures of his stormy seas, + And live-long nights of revelry and ease; + The naked Negro, panting at the line, + Boasts of his golden sands and palmy wine, + Basks in the glare, or stems the tepid wave, + And thanks his Gods for all the good they gave.-- + Nature, a mother kind alike, to all, + Still grants her bliss at Labour's earnest call; + And though rough rocks or gloomy summits frown, + These rocks, by custom, turn to beds of down. + From Art more various are the blessings sent; + Wealth, splendours, honor, liberty, content: + Yet these each other's power so strong contest, + That either seems destructive of the rest. + Hence every state, to one lov'd blessing prone, + Conforms and models life to that alone. + Each to the favourite happiness attends, + And spurns the plan that aims at other ends; + Till, carried to excess in each domain, + This favourite good begets peculiar pain.' + +This is the position which he conducts through Italy, Swisserland, +France, Holland, and England; and which he endeavours to confirm by +remarking the manners of every country. + +Having censured the degeneracy of the modern Italians, he proceeds thus: + + 'My soul turn from them, turn we to survey + Where rougher climes a nobler race display, + Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansions tread, + And force a churlish soil for scanty bread; + No product here the barren hills afford, + But man and steel, the soldier and his sword. + No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array, + But winter lingering chills the lap of May; + No Zephyr fondly soothes the mountain's breast, + But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest. + Yet still, even here, content can spread a charm, + Redress the clime, and all its rage disarm. + Though poor the peasant's hut, his feasts though small, + He sees his little lot, the lot of all; + See no contiguous palace rear its head + To shame the meanness of his humble shed; + No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal + To make him loath his vegetable meal; + But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil, + Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.' + +But having found that the rural life of a Swiss has its evils as well as +comforts, he turns to France. + + 'To kinder skies, where gentler manners reign, + We turn; and France displays her bright domain. + Gay sprightly land of mirth and social ease, + Pleas'd with thyself, whom all the world can please.-- + Theirs are those arts that mind to mind endear, + For honour forms the social temper here.-- + From courts to camps, to cottages it strays, + And all are taught an avarice of praise; + They please, are pleas'd, they give to get esteem, + Till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.' + +Yet France has its evils: + + 'For praise too dearly lov'd, or warmly sought, + Enfeebles all internal strength of thought, + And the weak soul, within itself unblest, + Leans all for pleasure on another's breast.-- + The mind still turns where shifting fashion draws, + Nor weighs the solid worth of self-applause.' + +Having then passed through Holland, he arrives in England, where, + + 'Stern o'er each bosom reason holds her state, + With daring aims, irregularly great, + I see the lords of human kind pass by, + Pride in their port, defiance in their eye, + Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band, + By forms unfashion'd, fresh from Nature's hand.' + +With the inconveniences that harrass [_sic_] the sons of freedom, this +extract shall be concluded. + + 'That independence Britons prize too high, + Keeps man from man, and breaks the social tie; + See, though by circling deeps together held, + Minds combat minds, repelling and repell'd; + Ferments arise, imprison'd factions roar, + Represt ambition struggles round her shore, + Whilst, over-wrought, the general system feels + Its motions stopt, or phrenzy fires the wheels. + Nor this the worst. As social bonds decay, + As duty, love, and honour fail to sway, + Fictitious bonds, the bonds of wealth and law, + Still gather strength, and force unwilling awe. + Hence all obedience bows to these alone, + And talent sinks, and merit weeps unknown; + Till time may come, when, stript of all her charms, + That land of scholars, and that nurse of arms; + Where noble stems transmit the patriot flame, + And monarchs toil, and poets pant for fame; + One sink of level avarice shall lie, + And scholars, soldiers, kings unhonor'd die.' + +Such is the poem, on which we now congratulate the public, as on a +production to which, since the death of Pope, it will not be easy to +find any thing equal.--_The Critical Review_. + + + + +WILLIAM COWPER + + +_Poems by William Cowper, of the Inner Temple, Esq._ _8vo. 5s._ Johnson. + +These Poems are written, as we learn from the title-page, by Mr. Cowper +of the Inner Temple, who seems to be a man of a sober and religious turn +of mind, with a benevolent heart, and a serious wish to inculcate the +precepts of morality; he is not, however, possessed of any superior +abilities, or powers of genius, requisite to so arduous an undertaking; +his verses are, in general, weak and languid, and have neither novelty, +spirit, or animation, to recommend them; that mediocrity so severely +condemned by Horace, + + Non Dii non homines, &c. + +pervades the whole; and, whilst the author avoids every thing that is +ridiculous or contemptible, he, at the same time, never rises to any +thing that we can commend or admire. He says what is incontrovertible, +and what has already been said over and over, with much gravity, but +says nothing new, sprightly, or entertaining; travelling on in a plain, +level, flat road, with great composure, almost through the whole long, +and rather tedious volume, which is little better than a dull sermon, in +very indifferent verse, on Truth, the Progress of Error, Charity, and +some other grave subjects. If this author had followed the advice given +by Caraccioli,[G] and which he has chosen for one of the mottos +prefixed to these Poems, he would have clothed his indisputable truths +in some becoming _disguise_, and rendered his work much more agreeable. +In its present state, we cannot compliment him on its shape or beauty; +for, as this bard himself _sweetly_ sings, + + 'The clear harangue, and cold as it is clear, + Falls soporific on the listless ear.' + +In his learned dissertation on _Hope_, we meet with the following lines + + [Quotes some fifty lines from _Hope_ beginning, + Build by whatever plan caprice decrees, + With what materials, on what ground you please, etc.] + +All this is very true; but there needs no ghost, nor author, nor poet, +to tell us what we knew before, unless he could tell it to us in a new +and better manner. Add to this, that many of our author's expressions +are coarse, vulgar, and unpoetical; such as _parrying_, _pushing by_, +_spitting abhorrence_, &c. The greatest part of Mr. Cowper's didactics +is in the same strain. He attempts indeed sometimes to be lively, +facetious, and satirical; but is seldom more successful in this, than in +the serious and pathetic. In his poem on Conversation there are two or +three faint attempts at humour; in one of them he tells us that + + 'A story in which native humour reigns + Is often useful, always entertains, + A graver fact enlisted on your side, + May furnish illustration, well applied; + But sedentary weavers of long tales, + Give me the fidgets and my patience fails. + 'Tis the most asinine employ on earth, + To hear them tell of parentage and birth, + And echo conversations dull and dry, + Embellished with, _he said_, and _so said I_. + At ev'ry interview their route the same, + The repetition makes attention lame, + We bustle up with unsuccessful speed, + And in the saddest part cry--droll indeed! + The path of narrative with care pursue, + Still making probability your clue, + On all the vestiges of truth attend, + And let them guide you to a decent end. + Of all ambitions man may entertain, + The worst that can invade a sickly brain, + Is that which angles hourly for surprize, + And baits its hook with prodigies and lies. + Credulous infancy or age as weak + Are fittest auditors for such to seek, + Who to please others will themselves disgrace, + Yet please not, but affront you to your face.' + +In the passage above quoted, our readers will perceive that the wit is +rather aukward, [_sic_] and the verses, especially the last, very +prosaic. + +Toward the end of this volume are some little pieces of a lighter kind, +which, after dragging through Mr. Cowper's long moral lectures, afforded +us some relief. The fables of the Lily and the Rose, the Nightingale and +Glow-worm, the Pine-apple and the Bee, with two or three others, are +written with ease and spirit. It is a pity that our author had not +confined himself altogether to this species of poetry, without entering +into a system of ethics, for which his genius seems but ill +adapted.--_The Critical Review_. + +[Footnote G: Nous sommes nes pour la verite, et nous ne pouvons souffrir +son abord. Les figures, les paraboles, les emblemes, sont toujours des +ornements necessaires pour qu'elle puisse s'annoncer: on veut, en la +recevant, qu'elle soit _deguisee_.] + + + + +ROBERT BURNS + + +_Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect_. _By_ ROBERT BURNS, +_Kilmarnock_. + +When an author we know nothing of solicits our attention, we are but too +apt to treat him with the same reluctant civility we show to a person +who has come unbidden into company. Yet talents and address will +gradually diminish the distance of our behaviour, and when the first +unfavourable impression has worn off, the author may become a favourite, +and the stranger a friend. The poems we have just announced may probably +have to struggle with the pride of learning and the partiality of +refinement; yet they are intitled to particular indulgence. + +Who are you, Mr. Burns? will some surly critic say. At what university +have you been educated? what languages do you understand? what authors +have you particularly studied? whether has Aristotle or Horace directed +your taste? who has praised your poems, and under whose patronage are +they published? In short, what qualifications intitle you to instruct or +entertain us? To the questions of such a catechism, perhaps honest +Robert Burns would make no satisfactory answers. 'My good Sir, he might +say, I am a poor country man; I was bred up at the school of Kilmarnock; +I understand no languages but my own; I have studied Allan Ramsay and +Ferguson. My poems have been praised at many a fireside; and I ask no +patronage for them, if they deserve none. I have not looked on mankind +_through the spectacle of books_. An ounce of mother-wit, you know, is +worth a pound of clergy; and Homer and Ossian, for any thing that I have +heard, could neither write nor read.' The author is indeed a striking +example of native genius bursting through the obscurity of poverty and +the obstructions of laborious life. He is said to be a common ploughman; +and when we consider him in this light, we cannot help regretting that +wayward fate had not placed him in a more favoured situation. Those who +view him with the severity of lettered criticism, and judge him by the +fastidious rules of art, will discover that he has not the doric +simplicity of Ramsay, nor the brilliant imagination of Ferguson; but to +those who admire the exertions of untutored fancy, and are blind to many +faults for the sake of numberless beauties, his poems will afford +singular gratification. His observations on human characters are acute +and sagacious, and his descriptions are lively and just. Of rustic +pleasantry he has a rich fund; and some of his softer scenes are touched +with inimitable delicacy. He seems to be a boon companion, and often +startles us with a dash of libertinism, which will keep some readers at +a distance. Some of his subjects are serious, but those of the humorous +kind are the best. It is not meant, however, to enter into a minute +investigation of his merits, as the copious extracts we have subjoined +will enable our readers to judge for themselves. The Character Horace +gives to Osellus is particularly applicable to him. + + _Rusticus abnormis sapiens, crassaque Minerva._ + +[Quotes _Address to the Deil_, from the _Epistle to a Brother Bard_, +from _Description of a Sermon in the Fields_, and from +_Hallowe'en_.]--_The Edinburgh Magazine_. + + +_Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect_. _By Robert Burns._ Printed at +Kilmarnock. + +We have had occasion to examine a number of poetical productions, +written by persons in the lower rank of life, and who had hardly +received any education; but we do not recollect to have ever met with a +more signal instance of true and uncultivated genius, than in the author +of these Poems. His occupation is that of a common ploughman; and his +life has hitherto been spent in struggling with poverty. But all the +rigours of fortune have not been able to repress the frequent efforts of +his lively and vigorous imagination. Some of these poems are of a +serious cast; but the strain which seems most natural to the author, is +the sportive and humorous. It is to be regretted, that the Scottish +dialect, in which these poems are written, must obscure the native +beauties with which they appear to abound, and renders the sense often +unintelligible to an English reader. Should it, however, prove true, +that the author has been taken under the patronage of a great lady in +Scotland, and that a celebrated professor has interested himself in the +cultivation of his talents, there is reason to hope, that his +distinguished genius may yet be exerted in such a manner as to afford +more general delight. In the meantime, we must admire the generous +enthusiasm of his untutored muse; and bestow the tribute of just +applause on one whose name will be transmitted to posterity with +honour.--_The Critical Review_. + + + + +WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + + +_Descriptive Sketches_, in Verse. Taken during a Pedestrian Tour in the +Italian, Grison, Swiss and Savoyard Alps. By W. WORDSWORTH, B.A. of St. +John's, Cambridge. 4to. pp. 55. 3s. Johnson. 1793. + +More descriptive poetry! (See page 166, &c.) Have we not yet enough? +Must eternal changes be rung on uplands and lowlands, and nodding +forests, and brooding clouds, and cells, and dells, and dingles? Yes; +more, and yet more: so it is decreed. + +Mr. Wordsworth begins his descriptive sketches with the following +exordium: + + 'Were there, below, a spot of holy ground, + By Pain and her sad family _un_found, + Sure, Nature's God that spot to man had giv'n, + Where murmuring _rivers join_ the song of _ev'n_! + Where _falls_ the purple morning far and wide + _In flakes_ of light upon the mountain side; + Where summer suns in ocean sink to rest, + Or moonlight upland lifts her hoary breast; + Where Silence, on her night of wing, o'er-broods + Unfathom'd dells and undiscover'd woods; + Where rocks and groves the _power_ of waters _shakes_ + In cataracts, or sleeps in quiet lakes.' + +May we ask, how it is that rivers join the song of ev'n? or, in plain +prose, the evening! but, if they do, is it not true that they equally +join the song of morning, noon, and night? The _purple morning falling +in flakes_ of light is a bold figure: but we are told, it falls far and +wide--Where?--On the mountain's _side_. We are sorry to see the purple +morning confined so like a maniac in a straight waistcoat. What the +night of wing of silence is, we are unable to comprehend: but the +climax of the passage is, that, were there such a spot of holy ground as +is here so sublimely described, _unfound_ by Pain and her sad family, +Nature's God had surely given that spot to man, though its _woods_ were +_undiscovered_. + +Let us proceed, + + 'But doubly pitying Nature loves to show'r + Soft on his _wounded heart_ her healing pow'r, + Who _plods_ o'er hills and vales his road _forlorn_, + Wooing her varying charms from eve to morn. + _No sad vacuities_ his heart _annoy_, + _Blows_ not a Zephyr but it _whispers joy_; + For him _lost_ flowers their _idle_ sweets _exhale_; + He _tastes_ the meanest _note_ that swells the gale; + For him sod-seats the cottage-door adorn, + And _peeps_ the far-off _spire_, his evening bourn! + Dear is the forest _frowning_ o'er his head, + And dear the green-sward to his _velvet tread_; + Moves there a _cloud_ o'er mid-day's flaming eye? + Upwards he looks--and calls it luxury; + Kind Nature's _charities_ his steps attend, + In every babbling brook he finds a friend.' + +Here we find that _doubly_ pitying Nature is very kind to the traveller, +but that this traveller has a _wounded heart_ and _plods_ his road +_forlorn_. In the next line but one we discover that-- + + 'No _sad vacuities_ his heart _annoy_; + Blows not a Zephyr but it whispers _joy_.' + +The flowers, though they have lost themselves, or are lost, exhale their +idle sweets for him; the _spire peeps_ for him; sod-seats, forests, +clouds, nature's charities, and babbling brooks, all are to him luxury +and friendship. He is the happiest of mortals, and plods, is forlorn, +and has a wounded heart. How often shall we in vain advise those, who +are so delighted with their own thoughts that they cannot forbear from +putting them into rhyme, to examine those thoughts till they themselves +understand them? No man will ever be a poet, till his mind be +sufficiently powerful to sustain this labour.--_The Monthly Review_. + + +_An Evening Walk_. An Epistle; in Verse. Addressed to a Young Lady, from +the Lakes of the North of England. By W. Wordsworth, B.A. of St. John's, +Cambridge. 4to. pp. 27. 2s. Johnson. 1793. + +In this Epistle, the subject and the manner of treating it vary but +little from the former poem. We will quote four lines from a passage +which the author very sorrowfully apologizes for having omitted: + + 'Return delights! with whom my road beg_un_, + When _Life-rear'd_ laughing _up her_ morning _sun_; + When Transport kiss'd away my April tear, + "Rocking as in a dream the tedious year." + +Life _rearing_ up the sun! Transport kissing away an _April_ tear and +_rocking_ the year as in a dream! Would the cradle had been specified! +Seriously, these are figures which no poetical license can justify. If +they can possibly give pleasure, it must be to readers whose habits of +thinking are totally different from ours. Mr. Wordsworth is a scholar, +and, no doubt, when reading the works of others, a critic. There are +passages in his poems which display imagination, and which afford hope +for the future: but, if he can divest himself of all partiality, and +will critically question every line that he has written, he will find +many which, he must allow, call loudly for amendment.--_The Monthly +Review_. + + +_Lyrical Ballads, with a few other Poems_. _Small 8vo. 5s. Boards._ +Arch. 1798. + +The majority of these poems, we are informed in the advertisement, are +to be considered as experiments. + +'They were written chiefly with a view to ascertain how far the language +of conversation in the middle and lower classes of society is adapted to +the purposes of poetic pleasure.' P. i. + +Of these experimental poems, the most important is the Idiot Boy, the +story of which is simply this. Betty Foy's neighbour Susan Gale is +indisposed; and no one can conveniently be sent for the doctor but +Betty's idiot boy. She therefore puts him upon her poney, at eight +o'clock in the evening, gives him proper directions, and returns to take +care of her sick neighbour. Johnny is expected with the doctor by +eleven; but the clock strikes eleven, and twelve, and one, without the +appearance either of Johnny or the doctor. Betty's restless fears become +insupportable; and she now leaves her friend to look for her idiot son. +She goes to the doctor's house, but hears nothing of Johnny. About five +o'clock, however, she finds him sitting quietly upon his feeding poney. +As they go home they meet old Susan, whose apprehensions have cured her, +and brought her out to seek them; and they all return merrily together. + +Upon this subject the author has written nearly five hundred lines. With +what spirit the story is told, our extract will evince. + +[Quotes lines (322-401) of _The Idiot Boy_.] + +No tale less deserved the labour that appears to have been bestowed upon +this. It resembles a Flemish picture in the worthlessness of its design +and the excellence of its execution. From Flemish artists we are +satisfied with such pieces: who would not have lamented, if Corregio or +Rafaelle had wasted their talents in painting Dutch boors or the humours +of a Flemish wake? + +The other ballads of this kind are as bald in story, and are not so +highly embellished in narration. With that which is entitled the Thorn, +we were altogether displeased. The advertisement says, it is not told in +the person of the author, but in that of some loquacious narrator. The +author should have recollected that he who personates tiresome +loquacity, becomes tiresome himself. The story of a man who suffers the +perpetual pain of cold, because an old woman prayed that he might never +be warm, is perhaps a good story for a ballad, because it is a +well-known tale: but is the author certain that it is '_well +authenticated?_' and does not such an assertion promote the popular +superstition of witchcraft? + +In a very different style of poetry, is the Rime of the Ancyent +Marinere; a ballad (says the advertisement) 'professedly written in +imitation of the _style_, as well as of the spirit of the elder poets.' +We are tolerably conversant with the early English poets; and can +discover no resemblance whatever, except in antiquated spelling and a +few obsolete words. This piece appears to us perfectly original in style +as well as in story. Many of the stanzas are laboriously beautiful; but +in connection they are absurd or unintelligible. Our readers may +exercise their ingenuity in attempting to unriddle what follows. + + 'The roaring wind! it roar'd far off, + It did not come anear; + But with its sound it shook the sails + That were so thin and sere. + + The upper air bursts into life, + And a hundred fire-flags sheen + To and fro they are hurried about; + And to and fro, and in and out + The stars dance on between. + + The coming wind doth roar more loud; + The sails do sigh, like sedge: + The rain pours down from one black cloud, + And the moon is at its edge. + + Hark! hark! the thick black cloud is cleft, + And the moon is at its side: + Like waters shot from some high crag, + The lightning falls with never a jag + A river steep and wide. + + The strong wind reach'd the ship: it roar'd + And dropp'd down, like a stone! + Beneath the lightning and the moon + The dead men gave a groan.' P. 27. + +We do not sufficiently understand the story to analyse it. It is a Dutch +attempt at German sublimity. Genius has here been employed in producing +a poem of little merit. + +With pleasure we turn to the serious pieces, the better part of the +volume. The Foster-Mother's Tale is in the best style of dramatic +narrative. The Dungeon, and the Lines upon the Yew-tree Seat, are +beautiful. The Tale of the Female Vagrant is written in the stanza, not +the style, of Spenser. We extract a part of this poem. + +[Quotes lines (91-180) of _The Female Vagrant_.] + +Admirable as this poem is, the author seems to discover still superior +powers in the Lines written near Tintern Abbey. On reading this +production, it is impossible not to lament that he should ever have +condescended to write such pieces as the Last of the Flock, the Convict, +and most of the ballads. In the whole range of English poetry, we +scarcely recollect anything superior to a part of the following passage. + +[Quotes lines (66-112) of _Lines Written a few Miles above Tintern +Abbey_.] + +The 'experiment,' we think, has failed, not because the language of +conversation is little adapted to 'the purposes of poetic pleasure' but +because it has been tried upon uninteresting subjects. Yet every piece +discovers genius; and, ill as the author has frequently employed his +talents, they certainly rank him with the best of living poets.--_The +Critical Review_. + + +_Poems, in Two Volumes_. _By_ WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, _Author of the Lyrical +Ballads._ 8vo. pp. 320. London, 1807. + +This author is known to belong to a certain brotherhood of poets, who +have haunted for some years about the Lakes of Cumberland; and is +generally looked upon, we believe, as the purest model of the +excellences and peculiarities of the school which they have been +labouring to establish. Of the general merits of that school, we have +had occasion to express our opinion pretty freely, in more places than +one, and even to make some allusion to the former publications of the +writer now before us. We are glad, however, to have found an opportunity +of attending somewhat more particularly to his pretensions. + +The Lyrical Ballads were unquestionably popular; and, we have no +hesitation in saying, deservedly popular; for in spite of their +occasional vulgarity, affectation, and silliness, they were undoubtedly +characterised by a strong spirit of originality, of pathos, and natural +feeling; and recommended to all good minds by the clear impression which +they bore of the amiable dispositions and virtuous principles of the +author. By the help of these qualities, they were enabled, not only to +recommend themselves to the indulgence of many judicious readers, but +even to beget among a pretty numerous class of persons, a sort of +admiration of the very defects by which they were attended. It was upon +this account chiefly, that we thought it necessary to set ourselves +against this alarming innovation. Childishness, conceit, and +affectation, are not of themselves very popular or attractive; and +though mere novelty has sometimes been found sufficient to give them a +temporary currency, we should have had no fear of their prevailing to +any dangerous extent, if they had been graced with no more seductive +accompaniments. It was precisely because the perverseness and bad taste +of this new school was combined with a great deal of genius and of +laudable feeling, that we were afraid of their spreading and gaining +ground among us, and that we entered into the discussion with a degree +of zeal and animosity which some might think unreasonable toward +authors, to whom so much merit had been conceded. There were times and +moods indeed, in which we were led to suspect ourselves of unjustifiable +severity, and to doubt, whether a sense of public duty had not carried +us rather too far in reprobation of errors, that seemed to be atoned +for, by excellences of no vulgar description. At other times, the +magnitude of these errors--the disgusting absurdities into which they +led their feebler admirers, and the derision and contempt which they +drew from the more fastidious, even upon the merits with which they were +associated, made us wonder more than ever at the perversity by which +they were retained, and regret that we had not declared ourselves +against them with still more formidable and decided hostility. + +In this temper of mind, we read the _annonce_ of Mr Wordsworth's +publication with a good deal of interest and expectation, and opened his +volumes with greater anxiety, than he or his admirers will probably give +us credit for. We have been greatly disappointed certainly as to the +quality of the poetry; but we doubt whether the publication has afforded +so much satisfaction to any other of his readers:--it has freed us from +all doubt or hesitation as to the justice of our former censures, and +has brought the matter to a test, which we cannot help hoping may be +convincing to the author himself. + +Mr Wordsworth, we think, has now brought the question, as to the merit +of his new school of poetry, to a very fair and decisive issue. The +volumes before us are much more strongly marked by all its peculiarities +than any former publication of the fraternity. In our apprehension, they +are, on this very account, infinitely less interesting or meritorious; +but it belongs to the public, and not to us, to decide upon their merit, +and we will confess, that so strong is our conviction of their obvious +inferiority, and the grounds of it, that we are willing for once to +wa[i]ve our right of appealing to posterity, and to take the judgment of +the present generation of readers, and even of Mr Wordsworth's former +admirers, as conclusive on this occasion. If these volumes, which have +all the benefit of the author's former popularity, turn out to be nearly +as popular as the lyrical ballads--if they sell nearly to the same +extent--or are quoted and imitated among half as many individuals, we +shall admit that Mr Wordsworth has come much nearer the truth in his +judgment of what constitutes the charm of poetry, than we had previously +imagined--and shall institute a more serious and respectful inquiry into +his principles of composition than we have yet thought necessary. On the +other hand,--if this little work, selected from the compositions of five +maturer years, and written avowedly for the purpose of exalting a +system, which has already excited a good deal of attention, should be +generally rejected by those whose prepossessions were in its favour, +there is room to hope, not only that the system itself will meet with no +more encouragement, but even that the author will be persuaded to +abandon a plan of writing, which defrauds his industry and talents of +their natural reward. + +Putting ourselves thus upon our country, we certainly look for a verdict +against this publication; and have little doubt indeed of the result, +upon a fair consideration of the evidence contained in these +volumes.--To accelerate that result, and to give a general view of the +evidence, to those into whose hands the record may not have already +fallen, we must now make a few observations and extracts. + +We shall not resume any of the particular discussions by which we +formerly attempted to ascertain the value of the improvements which this +new school had effected in poetry;[H] but shall lay the grounds of our +opposition, for this time, a little more broadly. The end of poetry, we +take it, is to please--and the name, we think, is strictly applicable to +every metrical composition from which we receive pleasure, without any +laborious exercise of the understanding. This pleasure, may, in general, +be analyzed into three parts--that which we receive from the excitement +of Passion or emotion--that which is derived from the play of +Imagination, or the easy exercise of Reason--and that which depends on +the character and qualities of the Diction. The two first are the vital +and primary springs of poetical delight, and can scarcely require +explanation to any one. The last has been alternately overrated and +undervalued by the professors of the poetical art, and is in such low +estimation with the author now before us and his associates, that it is +necessary to say a few words in explanation of it. + +One great beauty of diction exists only for those who have some degree +of scholarship or critical skill. This is what depends on the exquisite +_propriety_ of the words employed, and the delicacy with which they are +adapted to the meaning which is to be expressed. Many of the finest +passages in Virgil and Pope derive their principal charm from the fine +propriety of their diction. Another source of beauty, which extends +only to the more instructed class of readers, is that which consists in +the judicious or happy application of expressions which have been +sanctified by the use of famous writers, or which bear the stamp of a +simple or venerable antiquity. There are other beauties of diction, +however, which are perceptible by all--the beauties of sweet sound and +pleasant associations. The melody of words and verses is indifferent to +no reader of poetry; but the chief recommendation of poetical language +is certainly derived from those general associations, which give it a +character of dignity or elegance, sublimity or tenderness. Every one +knows that there are low and mean expressions, as well as lofty and +grave ones; and that some words bear the impression of coarseness and +vulgarity, as clearly as others do of refinement and affection. We do +not mean, of course, to say anything in defence of the hackneyed +common-places of ordinary versemen. Whatever might have been the +original character of these unlucky phrases, they are now associated +with nothing but ideas of schoolboy imbecility and vulgar affectation. +But what we do maintain is, that much of the most popular poetry in the +world owes its celebrity chiefly to the beauty of its diction; and that +no poetry can be long or generally acceptable, the language of which is +coarse, inelegant, or infantine. + +From this great source of pleasure, we think the readers of Mr +Wordsworth are in a great measure cut off. His diction has no where any +pretensions to elegance or dignity; and he has scarcely ever +condescended to give the grace of correctness or melody to his +versification. If it were merely slovenly and neglected, however, all +this might be endured. Strong sense and powerful feeling will ennoble +any expressions; or, at least, no one who is capable of estimating those +higher merits, will be disposed to mark these little defects. But, in +good truth, no man, now-a-days, composes verses for publication with a +slovenly neglect of their language. It is a fine and laborious +manufacture, which can scarcely ever be made in a hurry; and the faults +which it has, may, for the most part, be set down to bad taste or +incapacity, rather than to carelessness or oversight. With Mr Wordsworth +and his friends, it is plain that their peculiarities of diction are +things of choice, and not of accident. They write as they do, upon +principle and system; and it evidently costs them much pains to keep +_down_ to the standard which they have proposed to themselves. They are, +to the full, as much mannerists, too, as the poetasters who ring changes +on the common-places of magazine versification; and all the difference +between them is, that they borrow their phrases from a different and a +scantier _gradus ad Parnassum_. If they were, indeed, to discard all +imitation and set phraseology, and to bring in no words merely for show +or for metre,--as much, perhaps, might be gained in freedom and +originality, as would infallibly be lost in allusion and authority; but, +in point of fact, the new poets are just as great borrowers as the old; +only that, instead of borrowing from the more popular passages of their +illustrious predecessors, they have preferred furnishing themselves from +vulgar ballads and plebeian nurseries. + +Their peculiarities of diction alone, are enough, perhaps, to render +them ridiculous; but the author before us really seems anxious to court +this literary martyrdom by a device still more infallible,--we mean, +that of connecting his most lofty, tender, or impassioned conceptions, +with objects and incidents, which the greater part of his readers will +probably persist in thinking low, silly, or uninteresting. Whether this +is done from affectation and conceit alone, or whether it may not +arise, in some measure, from the self-illusion of a mind of +extraordinary sensibility, habituated to solitary meditation, we cannot +undertake to determine. It is possible enough, we allow, that the sight +of a friend's garden-spade, or a sparrow's nest, or a man gathering +leeches, might really have suggested to such a mind a train of powerful +impressions and interesting reflections; but it is certain, that, to +most minds, such associations will always appear forced, strained, and +unnatural; and that the composition in which it is attempted to exhibit +them, will always have the air of parody, or ludicrous and affected +singularity. All the world laughs at Elegiac stanzas to a sucking-pig--a +Hymn on Washing-day--Sonnets to one's grandmother--or Pindarics on +gooseberry-pye; and yet, we are afraid, it will not be quite easy to +convince Mr Wordsworth, that the same ridicule must infallibly attach to +most of the pathetic pieces in these volumes. To satisfy our readers, +however, as to the justice of this and our other anticipations, we shall +proceed, without further preface, to lay before them a short view of +their contents. + +The first is a kind of ode 'to the Daisy,'--very flat, feeble, and +affected; and in a diction as artificial, and as much encumbered with +heavy expletives, as the theme of an unpractised schoolboy. The two +following stanzas will serve as a specimen. + + 'When soothed a while by milder airs, + Thee Winter in the garland wears + That thinly shades his few grey hairs; + _Spring cannot shun thee_; + Whole summer fields are thine by right; + And Autumn, melancholy Wight! + Doth in thy crimson head delight + When rains are on thee. + In shoals and bands, a morrice train, + Thou greet'st the Traveller in the lane; + If welcome once thou count'st it gain; + _Thou art not daunted_, + Nor car'st if thou be set at naught; + And oft alone in nooks remote + We meet thee, like a pleasant thought, + _When such are wanted_.' I. p. 2. + +The scope of the piece is to say, that the flower is found everywhere; +and that it has suggested many pleasant thoughts to the author--some +chime of fancy '_wrong or right_'--some feeling of devotion 'more or +less'--and other elegancies of the same stamp. It ends with this +unmeaning prophecy. + + 'Thou long the poet's praise shalt gain; + Thou wilt be more beloved by men + In times to come; thou not in vain + Art Nature's favourite.' I. 6. + +The next is called 'Louisa,' and begins in this dashing and affected +manner. + + 'I met Louisa in the shade; + And, having seen that lovely maid, + _Why should I fear to say_ + That she is ruddy, fleet, and _strong_; + _And down the rocks can leap_ along, + Like rivulets in May?' I. 7. + +Does Mr Wordsworth really imagine that this is at all more natural or +engaging than the ditties of our common song writers? + +A little farther on we have another original piece, entitled, 'The +Redbreast and the Butterfly,' of which our readers will probably be +contented with the first stanza. + + 'Art thou the bird whom man loves best, + The pious bird with the scarlet breast, + Our little English Robin; + The bird that comes about our doors + When autumn winds are sobbing? + Art thou the Peter of Norway Boors? + Their Thomas in Finland, + And Russia far inland? + The bird, whom _by some name or other_ + All men who know thee call their brother, + The darling of children and men? + Could Father Adam open his eyes, + And see this sight beneath the skies, + He'd wish to close them again.' I. 16. + +This, it must be confessed, is 'Silly Sooth' in good earnest. The three +last [_sic_] lines seem to be downright raving. + +By and by, we have a piece of namby-pamby 'to the Small Celandine,' +which we should almost have taken for a professed imitation of one of Mr +Philip's prettyisms. Here is a page of it. + + 'Comfort have thou of thy merit, + Kindly, unassuming spirit! + Careless of thy neighbourhood, + Thou dost show thy pleasant face + On the moor, and in the wood, + In the lane;--there's not a place, + Howsoever mean it be, + But 'tis good enough for thee. + Ill befal the yellow flowers, + Children of the flaring hours! + Buttercups, that will be seen, + Whether we will see or no; + Others, too, of lofty mien; + They have done as worldlings do, + Taken praise that should be thine, + Little, humble, Celandine!' I. 25. + +After talking of its 'bright coronet,' the ditty is wound up with this +piece of babyish absurdity. + + 'Thou art not beyond the moon, + But a thing "beneath our shoon;" + Let, as old Magellan did, + Others roam about the sea; + Build who will a pyramid; + Praise it is enough for me, + If there be but three or four + Who will love my little flower.' I. 30. + +After this come some more manly lines on 'The Character of the Happy +Warrior,' and a chivalrous legend on 'The Horn of Egremont Castle,' +which, without being very good, is very tolerable, and free from most of +the author's habitual defects. Then follow some pretty, but professedly +childish verses, on a kitten playing with the falling leaves. There is +rather too much of Mr Ambrose Philips here and there in this piece also; +but it is amiable and lively. + +Further on, we find an 'Ode to Duty,' in which the lofty vein is very +unsuccessfully attempted. This is the concluding stanza. + + 'Stern lawgiver! yet thou dost wear + The Godhead's most benignant grace; + Nor know we anything so fair + As is the smile upon thy face; + Flowers laugh before thee on their beds; + And fragrance in thy footing treads; + Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong; + And the most ancient heavens through thee are fresh and strong.' I. 73. + +The two last [_sic_] lines seem to be utterly without meaning; at least +we have no sort of conception in what sense _Duty_ can be said to keep +the old skies _fresh_, and the stars from wrong. + +The next piece, entitled 'The Beggars,' may be taken, we fancy, as a +touchstone of Mr Wordsworth's merit. There is something about it that +convinces us it is a favourite of the author's; though to us, we will +confess, it appears to be a very paragon of silliness and affectation. +Our readers shall have the greater part of it. It begins thus. + + 'She had a tall man's height, or more; + No bonnet screen'd her from the heat; + A long drab-coloured cloak she wore, + A mantle reaching to her feet: + What other dress she had I could not know; + Only she wore a cap that was as white as snow. + + 'Before me begging did she stand, + Pouring out sorrows like a sea; + Grief after grief:--on English land + Such woes I knew could never be; + And yet a boon I gave her; for the creature + Was beautiful to see; a weed of glorious feature!' I. 77, 78. + +The poet, leaving this interesting person, falls in with two ragged boys +at play, and 'like that woman's face as gold is like to gold.' Here is +the conclusion of this memorable adventure. + + 'They bolted on me thus, and lo! + Each ready with a plaintive whine; + Said I, "Not half an hour ago + Your mother has had alms of mine." + "That cannot be," one answered, "She is dead." + "Nay but I gave her pence, and she will buy you bread." + + "She has been dead, Sir, many a day." + "Sweet boys, you're telling me a lie"; + "It was your mother, as I say--" + And in the twinkling of an eye, + "Come, come!" cried one; and, without more ado, + Off to some other play they both together flew.' I. 79. + +'Alice Fell' is a performance of the same order. The poet, driving into +Durham in a postchaise, hears a sort of scream; and, calling to the +post-boy to stop, finds a little girl crying on the back of the vehicle. + + "My cloak!" the word was last and first, + And loud and bitterly she wept, + As if her very heart would burst; + And down from off the chaise she leapt. + + "What ails you, child?" she sobb'd, "Look here!" + I saw it in the wheel entangled, + A weather beaten rag as e'er + From any garden scarecrow dangled.' I. 85, 86. + +They then extricate the torn garment, and the good-natured bard takes +the child into the carriage along with him. The narrative proceeds-- + + "My child, in Durham do you dwell?" + She check'd herself in her distress, + And said, "My name is Alice Fell; + I'm fatherless and motherless. + + And I to Durham, Sir, belong." + And then, as if the thought would choke + Her very heart, her grief grew strong; + And all was for her tatter'd cloak. + + The chaise drove on; our journey's end + Was nigh; and, sitting by my side, + As if she'd lost her only friend + She wept, nor would be pacified. + + Up to the tavern-door we post; + Of Alice and her grief I told; + And I gave money to the host, + To buy a new cloak for the old. + + "And let it be of duffil grey, + As warm a cloak as man can sell!" + Proud creature was she the next day, + The little orphan, Alice Fell!' I. p. 87, 88. + +If the printing of such trash as this be not felt as an insult on the +public taste, we are afraid it cannot be insulted. + +After this follows the longest and most elaborate poem in the volume, +under the title of 'Resolution and Independence.' The poet, roving about +on a common one fine morning, falls into pensive musings on the fate of +the sons of song, which he sums up in this fine distich. + + 'We poets in our youth begin in gladness; + But thereof comes in the end despondency and madness.' I. p. 92. + +In the midst of his meditations-- + + 'I saw a man before me unawares; + The oldest man he seemed that ever wore grey hairs. + + ---------- + + Motionless as a cloud the old man stood; + That heareth not the loud winds when they call; + And moveth altogether, if it move at all. + At length, himself unsettling, he the pond + Stirred with his staff, and fixedly did look + Upon the muddy water, which he conn'd, + As if he had been reading in a book: + And now such fre[e]dom as I could I took; + And, drawing to his side, to him did say, + "This morning gives us promise of a glorious day." + + ---------- + + "What kind of work is that which you pursue? + This is a lonesome place for one like you." + He answer'd me _with pleasure and surprise_; + And there was, while he spake, a fire about his eyes. + He told me _that he to this pond had come + To gather leeches_, being old and poor: + Employment hazardous and wearisome! + And he had many hardships to endure: + From pond to pond he roam'd, from moor to moor, + Housing, with God's good help, by choice or chance: + And in this way he gain'd an honest maintenance.' I. p. 92-95. + +Notwithstanding the distinctness of this answer, the poet, it seems, was +so wrapped up in his own moody fancies, that he could not attend to it. + + 'And now, not knowing what the old man had said, + My question eagerly did I renew, + "How is it that you live, and what is it you do?" + He with a smile did then his words repeat; + And said, that, _gathering leeches_, far and wide + He travelled; stirring thus _about his feet_ + The waters of the ponds where they abide. + "_Once I could meet with them on every side_; + But they have dwindled long by slow decay; + Yet still I persevere, and find them where I may." I. p. 96, 97. + +This very interesting account, which he is lucky enough at last to +comprehend, fills the poet with comfort and admiration; and, quite glad +to find the old man so cheerful, he resolves to take a lesson of +contentedness from him; and the poem ends with this pious ejaculation-- + + "God," said I, "be my help and stay secure; + I'll think of the leech-gatherer on the lonely moor." I. p. 97. + +We defy the bitterest enemy of Mr Wordsworth to produce anything at all +parallel to this from any collection of English poetry, or even from the +specimens of his friend Mr Southey. The volume ends with some sonnets, +in a very different measure, of which we shall say something by and by. + +The first poems in the second volume were written during a tour in +Scotland. The first is a very dull one about Rob Roy; but the title that +attracted us most was 'an Address to the Sons of _Burns_, after visiting +their Father's Grave.' Never was anything, however, more miserable. This +is one of the four stanzas. + + 'Strong bodied if ye be to bear + Intemperance with less harm, beware! + But if your father's wit ye share, + Then, then indeed, + Ye sons of Burns! for watchful care + There will be need.' II. p. 29. + +The next is a very tedious, affected performance, called 'the Yarrow +Unvisited.' The drift of it is, that the poet refused to visit this +celebrated stream, because he had 'a vision of his own' about it, which +the reality might perhaps undo; and, for this no less fantastical +reason-- + + "Should life be dull, and spirits low, + 'Twill soothe us in our sorrow, + That earth has something yet to show, + The bonny holms of Yarrow!" II. p. 35. + +After this we come to some ineffable compositions which the poet has +simply entitled, 'Moods of my own Mind.' One begins-- + + 'O Nightingale! thou surely art + A creature of a fiery heart-- + Thou sing'st as if the god of wine + Had help'd thee to a valentine.' II. p. 42. + +This is the whole of another-- + + 'My heart leaps up when I behold + A rainbow in the sky: + So was it when my life began; + So is it now I am a man; + So be it when I shall grow old, + Or let me die! + The child is father of the man; + And I could wish my days to be + Bound each to each by natural piety.' II. p. 44. + +A third, 'on a Sparrow's Nest,' runs thus-- + + 'Look, five blue eggs are gleaming there! + _Few visions have I seen more fair,_ + _Nor many prospects of delight_ + More pleasing than that simple sight.' II. p. 53. + +The charm of this fine prospect, however, was, that it reminded him of +another nest which his sister Emmeline and he had visited in their +childhood. + + 'She look'd at it as if she fear'd it; + Still wishing, dreading to be near it: + Such heart was in her, being then + A little prattler among men,' &c., &c. II. p. 54. + +We have then a rapturous mystical ode to the Cuckoo; in which the +author, striving after force and originality, produces nothing but +absurdity. + + 'O cuckoo! shall I call thee bird, + Or but a wandering voice?' II. p. 57. + +And then he says, that the said voice seemed to pass from hill to hill, +'about and all about!'--Afterwards he assures us, it tells him 'in the +vale of visionary hours,' and calls it a darling; but still insists, +that it is + + 'No bird; but an invisible thing, + A voice,--a mystery.' II. p. 58. + +It is afterwards 'a hope;' and 'a love;' and, finally, + + 'O blessed _bird_! the earth we pace + Again appears to be + An unsubstantial, faery place, + That is fit home for thee!' II. p. 59. + +After this there is an address to a butterfly, whom he invites to visit +him, in these simple strains-- + + 'This plot of orchard-ground is ours; + My trees they are, my sister's flowers; + Stop here whenever you are weary.' II. p. 61. + +We come next to a long story of a 'Blind Highland Boy,' who lived near +an arm of the sea, and had taken a most unnatural desire to venture on +that perilous element. His mother did all she could to prevent him; but +one morning, when the good woman was out of the way, he got into a +vessel of his own, and pushed out from the shore. + + 'In such a vessel ne'er before + Did human creature leave the shore.' II. p. 72. + +And then we are told, that if the sea should get rough, 'a bee-hive +would be ship as safe.' 'But say, what is it?' a poetical interlocutor +is made to exclaim most naturally; and here followeth the answer, upon +which all the pathos and interest of the story depend. + + 'A HOUSEHOLD TUB, like one of those + Which women use to wash their clothes!!' II. p. 72. + +This, it will be admitted, is carrying the matter as far as it will well +go; nor is there anything,--down to the wiping of shoes, or the +evisceration of chickens,--which may not be introduced in poetry, if +this is tolerated. A boat is sent out and brings the boy ashore, who +being tolerably frightened we suppose, promises to go to sea no more; +and so the story ends. + +Then we have a poem, called 'the Green Linnet,' which opens with the +poet's telling us; + + 'A whispering leaf is now my joy, + And then a bird will be the _toy_ + That doth my fancy _tether_.' II. p. 79. + +and closes thus-- + + 'While thus before my eyes he gleams, + A brother of the leaves he seems; + When in a moment forth _he teems_ + His little song in gushes: + As if it pleas'd him to disdain + And mock the form which he did feign, + While he was dancing with the train + Of leaves among the bushes.' II. p. 81. + +The next is called 'Star Gazers.' A set of people peeping through a +telescope, all seem to come away disappointed with the sight; whereupon +thus sweetly moralizeth our poet. + + 'Yet, showman, where can lie the cause? Shall thy implement have blame, + A boaster, that when he is tried, fails, and is put to shame? + Or is it good as others are, and be their eyes in fault? + Their eyes, or minds? or, finally, is this resplendent vault? + + Or, is it rather, that conceit rapacious is and strong, + And bounty never yields so much but it seems to do her wrong? + Or is it, that when human souls a journey long have had, + And are returned into themselves, they cannot but be sad?' II. p. 88. + +There are then some really sweet and amiable verses on a French lady, +separated from her own children, fondling the baby of a neighbouring +cottager;--after which we have this quintessence of unmeaningness, +entitled, 'Foresight.' + + 'That is work which I am rueing-- + Do as Charles and I are doing! + Strawberry-blossoms, one and all, + We must spare them--here are many: + Look at it--the flower is small, + Small and low, though fair as any: + Do not touch it! Summers two + I am older, Anne, than you. + Pull the primrose, sister Anne! + Pull as many as you can. + + Primroses, the spring may love them-- + Summer knows but little of them: + Violets, do what they will, + Wither'd on the ground must lie: + Daisies will be daisies still; + Daisies they must live and die: + Fill your lap, and fill your bosom, + Only spare the strawberry-blossom!' II. p. 115, 116. + +Afterwards come some stanzas about an echo repeating a cuckoo's voice; +here is one for a sample-- + + 'Whence the voice? from air or earth? + _This the cuckoo cannot tell_; + But a startling sound had birth, + _As the bird must know full well_.' II. p. 123. + +Then we have Elegiac stanzas 'to the Spade of a friend,' beginning-- + + 'Spade! with which Wilkinson hath till'd his lands,' + +--but too dull to be quoted any further. + +After this there is a Minstrel's Song, on the Restoration of Lord +Clifford the Shepherd, which is in a very different strain of poetry; +and then the volume is wound up with an 'Ode,' with no other title but +the motto, _Paulo majora canamus_. This is, beyond all doubt, the most +illegible and unintelligible part of the publication. We can pretend to +give no analysis or explanation of it;--our readers must make what they +can of the following extracts. + + '----But there's a tree, of many one, + A single field which I have look'd upon, + Both of them speak of something that is gone: + The pansy at my feet + Doth the same tale repeat: + Whither is fled the visionary gleam? + Where is it now, the glory and the dream?' II. 150. + + ---------- + + O joy! that in our embers + Is something that doth live, + That nature yet remembers + What was so fugitive! + The thought of our past years in me doth breed + Perpetual benedictions: not indeed + For that which is most worthy to be blest: + Delight and liberty, the simple creed + Of childhood, whether fluttering or at rest, + With new-born hope forever in his breast:-- + Not for these I raise + The song of thanks and praise; + But for those obstinate questionings + Of sense and outward things, + Fallings from us, vanishings; + Blank misgivings of a creature + Moving about in worlds not realiz'd, + High instincts, before which our mortal nature + Did tremble like a guilty thing surpriz'd: + But for those first affections, + Those shadowy recollections, + Which be they what they may, + Are yet the fountain light of all our day, + Are yet a master light of all our feeling + Uphold us, cherish us, and make + Our noisy years seem moments in the being + Of the eternal silence: truths that wake, + To perish never; + Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour, + Nor man nor boy, + Nor all that is at enmity with joy, + Can utterly abolish or destroy! + Hence, in a season of calm weather, + Though inland far we be, + Our souls have sight of that immortal sea + Which brought us hither, + Can in a moment travel thither, + And see the children sport upon the shore, + And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.' II. 154-6. + +We have thus gone through this publication, with a view to enable our +readers to determine, whether the author of the verses which have now +been exhibited, is entitled to claim the honours of an improver or +restorer of our poetry, and to found a new school to supersede or +new-model all our maxims on this subject. If we were to stop here, we do +not think that Mr Wordsworth, or his admirers, would have any reason to +complain; for what we have now quoted is undeniably the most peculiar +and characteristic part of his publication, and must be defended and +applauded if the merit or originality of his system is to be seriously +maintained. In our own opinion, however, the demerit of that system +cannot be fairly appreciated, until it be shown, that the author of the +bad verses which we have already extracted, can write good verses when +he pleases; and that, in point of fact, he does always write good +verses, when, by any accident, he is led to abandon his system, and to +transgress the laws of that school which he would fain establish on the +ruin of all existing authority. + +The length to which our extracts and observations have already extended, +necessarily restrains us within more narrow limits in this part of our +citations; but it will not require much labour to find a pretty decided +contrast to some of the passages we have already detailed. The song on +the restoration of Lord Clifford is put into the mouth of an ancient +minstrel of the family; and in composing it, the author was led, +therefore, almost irresistibly to adopt the manner and phraseology that +is understood to be connected with that sort of composition, and to +throw aside his own babyish incidents and fantastical sensibilities. How +he has succeeded, the reader will be able to judge from the few +following extracts. + +[Quotes fifty-six lines of _Lord Clifford_.] + +All English writers of sonnets have imitated Milton; and, in this way, +Mr Wordsworth, when he writes sonnets, escapes again from the trammels +of his own unfortunate system; and the consequence is, that his sonnets +are as much superior to the greater part of his other poems, as Milton's +sonnets are superior to his. + +[Quotes the sonnets _On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic_, +_London_, and _I griev'd for Buonaparte_.] + +When we look at these, and many still finer passages, in the writings of +this author, it is impossible not to feel a mixtures of indignation and +compassion, at that strange infatuation which has bound him up from the +fair exercise of his talents, and withheld from the public the many +excellent productions that would otherwise have taken the place of the +trash now before us. Even in the worst of these productions, there are, +no doubt, occasional little traits of delicate feeling and original +fancy; but these are quite lost and obscured in the mass of childishness +and insipidity with which they are incorporated; nor can any thing give +us a more melancholy view of the debasing effects of this miserable +theory, than that it has given ordinary men a right to wonder at the +folly and presumption of a man gifted like Mr Wordsworth, and made him +appear, in his second avowed publication, like a bad imitator of the +worst of his former productions. + +We venture to hope, that there is now an end of this folly; and that, +like other follies, it will be found to have cured itself by the +extravagances resulting from its unbridled indulgence. In this point of +view, the publication of the volumes before us may ultimately be of +service to the good cause of literature. Many a generous rebel, it is +said, has been reclaimed to his allegiance by the spectacle of lawless +outrage and excess presented in the conduct of the insurgents; and we +think there is every reason to hope, that the lamentable consequences +which have resulted from Mr Wordsworth's open violation of the +established laws of poetry, will operate as a wholesome warning to those +who might otherwise have been seduced by his example, and be the means +of restoring to that antient and venerable code its due honour and +authority.--_The Edinburgh Review_. + +[Footnote H: See Vol. I. p. 63, &c.--Vol. VII. p. 1, &c.] + + + + +SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE + + +_Christabel: Kubla Khan, a Vision. The Pains of Sleep_. By S.T. +COLERIDGE, ESQ. London, Murray, 1816. + +The advertisement by which this work was announced to the publick, +carried in its front a recommendation from Lord Byron,--who, it seems, +has somewhere praised Christabel, as 'a wild and singularly original and +beautiful poem.' Great as the noble bard's merits undoubtedly are in +poetry, some of his latest _publications_ dispose us to distrust his +authority, where the question is what ought to meet the public eye; and +the works before us afford an additional proof, that his judgment on +such matters is not absolutely to be relied on. Moreover, we are a +little inclined to doubt the value of the praise which one poet lends +another. It seems now-a-days to be the practice of that once irritable +race to laud each other without bounds; and one can hardly avoid +suspecting, that what is thus lavishly advanced may be laid out with a +view to being repaid with interest. Mr Coleridge, however, must be +judged by his own merits. + +It is remarked, by the writers upon the Bathos, that the true _profound_ +is surely known by one quality--its being wholly bottomless; insomuch, +that when you think you have attained its utmost depth in the work of +some of its great masters, another, or peradventure the same, astonishes +you, immediately after, by a plunge so much more vigorous, as to outdo +all his former outdoings. So it seems to be with the new school, or, as +they may be termed, the wild or lawless poets. After we had been +admiring their extravagance for many years, and marvelling at the ease +and rapidity with which one exceeded another in the unmeaning or +infantine, until not an idea was left in the rhyme--or in the insane, +until we had reached something that seemed the untamed effusion of an +author whose thoughts were rather more free than his actions--forth +steps Mr Coleridge, like a giant refreshed with sleep, and as if to +redeem his character after so long a silence, ('his poetic powers having +been, he says, from 1808 till very lately, in a state of suspended +animation,' p. v.) and breaks out in these precise words-- + + ''Tis the middle of night by the castle clock, + And the owls have awaken'd the crowing cock; + Tu ---- whit! ---- Tu ---- whoo! + And hark, again! the crowing cock, + How drowsily it crew.' + 'Sir Leoline, the Baron rich, + Hath a toothless mastiff bitch; + From her kennel beneath the rock + She makes answer to the clock, + Four for the quarters, and twelve for the hour: + Ever and aye, moonshine or shower, + Sixteen short howls, not over loud; + Some say she sees my lady's shroud.' + 'Is the night chilly and dark? + The night is chilly, but not dark.' p. 3, 4. + +It is probable that Lord Byron may have had this passage in his eye, +when he called the poem 'wild' and 'original;' but how he discovered it +to be 'beautiful,' is not quite so easy for us to imagine. + +Much of the art of the wild writers consists in sudden +transitions--opening eagerly upon some topic, and then flying from it +immediately. This indeed is known to the medical men, who not +unfrequently have the care of them, as an unerring symptom. Accordingly, +here we take leave of the Mastiff Bitch, and lose sight of her entirely, +upon the entrance of another personage of a higher degree, + + 'The lovely Lady Christabel, + Whom her father loves so well'-- + +And who, it seems, has been rambling about all night, having, the night +before, had dreams about her lover, which 'made her moan and _leap_.' +While kneeling, in the course of her rambles, at an old oak, she hears a +noise on the other side of the stump, and going round, finds, to her +great surprize, another fair damsel in white silk, but with her dress +and hair in some disorder; at the mention of whom, the poet takes +fright, not, as might be imagined, because of her disorder, but on +account of her beauty and her fair attire-- + + 'I guess, 'twas frightful there to see + A lady so richly clad as she-- + Beautiful exceedingly!' + +Christabel naturally asks who she is, and is answered, at some length, +that her name is Geraldine; that she was, on the morning before, seized +by five warriors, who tied her on a white horse, and drove her on, they +themselves following, also on white horses; and that they had rode all +night. Her narrative now gets to be a little contradictory, which gives +rise to unpleasant suspicions. She protests vehemently, and with oaths, +that she has no idea who the men were; only that one of them, the +tallest of the five, took her and placed her under the tree, and that +they all went away, she knew not whither; but how long she had remained +there she cannot tell-- + + 'Nor do I know how long it is, + For I have lain in fits, I _wis_;' + +--although she had previously kept a pretty exact account of the time. +The two ladies then go home together, after this satisfactory +explanation, which appears to have conveyed to the intelligent mind of +Lady C. every requisite information. They arrive at the castle, and pass +the night in the same bed-room; not to disturb Sir Leoline, who, it +seems, was poorly at the time, and, of course, must have been called up +to speak to the chambermaids, and have the sheets aired, if Lady G. had +had a room to herself. They do not get to their bed, however in the +poem, quite so easily as we have carried them. They first cross the +moat, and Lady C. 'took the key that fitted well,' and opened a little +door, 'all in the middle of the gate.' Lady G. then sinks down 'belike +through pain;' but it should seem more probably from laziness; for her +fair companion having lifted her up, and carried her a little way, she +then walks on 'as she were not in pain.' Then they cross the court--but +we must give this in the poet's words, for he seems so pleased with +them, that he inserts them twice over in the space of ten lines. + + 'So free from danger, free from fear, + They crossed the court--right glad they were.' + +Lady C. is desirous of a little conversation on the way, but Lady G. +will not indulge her Ladyship, saying she is too much tired to speak. We +now meet our old friend, the mastiff bitch, who is much too important a +person to be slightly passed by-- + + 'Outside her kennel, the mastiff old + Lay fast asleep, in moonshine cold. + The mastiff old did not awake, + Yet she an angry moan did make! + And what can ail the mastiff bitch? + Never till now she uttered yell + Beneath the eye of Christabel. + Perhaps it is the owlet's scritch: + For what can ail the mastiff bitch?' + +Whatever it may be that ails the bitch, the ladies pass forward, and +take off their shoes, and tread softly all the way upstairs, as +Christabel observes that her father is a bad sleeper. At last, however, +they do arrive at the bed-room, and comfort themselves with a dram of +some homemade liquor, which proves to be very old; for it was made by +Lady C.'s mother; and when her new friend asks if she thinks the old +lady will take her part, she answers, that this is out of the question, +in as much as she happened to die in childbed of her. The mention of the +old lady, however, gives occasion to the following pathetic +couplet.--Christabel says, + + 'O mother dear, that thou wert here! + I would, said Geraldine, she were!' + +A very mysterious conversation next takes place between Lady Geraldine +and the old gentlewoman's ghost, which proving extremely fatiguing to +her, she again has recourse to the bottle--and with excellent effect, as +appears by these lines. + + 'Again the wild-flower wine she drank; + Her fair large eyes 'gan glitter bright, + 'And from the floor whereon she sank, + The lofty Lady stood upright: + She was most beautiful to see, + Like a Lady of a far countree.' + +--From which, we may gather among other points, the exceeding great +beauty of all women who live in a distant place, no matter where. The +effects of the cordial speedily begin to appear; as no one, we imagine, +will doubt, that to its influence must be ascribed the following +speech-- + + 'And thus the lofty lady spake-- + All they, who live in the upper sky, + Do love you, holy Christabel! + And you love them--and for their sake + And for the good which me befel, + Even I in my degree will try, + Fair maiden, to requite you well.' + +Before going to bed, Lady G. kneels to pray, and desires her friend to +undress, and lie down; which she does 'in her loveliness;' but being +curious, she leans 'on her elbow,' and looks toward the fair +devotee,--where she sees something which the poet does not think fit to +tell us very explicitly. + + 'Her silken robe, and inner vest, + Dropt to her feet, and full in view, + Behold! her bosom and half her side-- + A sight to dream of, not to tell! + And she is to sleep by Christabel.' + +She soon rises, however, from her knees; and as it was not a +double-bedded room, she turns in to Lady Christabel, taking only 'two +paces and a stride.' She then clasps her tight in her arms, and mutters +a very dark spell, which we apprehend the poet manufactured by shaking +words together at random; for it is impossible to fancy that he can +annex any meaning whatever to it. This is the end of it. + + 'But vainly thou warrest, + For this is alone in + Thy power to declare, + That in the dim forest + Thou heard'st a low moaning, + And found'st a bright lady, surpassingly fair: + And didst bring her home with thee in love and in charity, + To shield her and shelter her from the damp air.' + +The consequence of this incantation is, that Lady Christabel has a +strange dream--and when she awakes, her first exclamation is, 'Sure I +have sinn'd'--'Now heaven be praised if all be well!' Being still +perplexed with the remembrance of her 'too lively' dream--she then +dresses herself, and modestly prays to be forgiven for 'her sins +unknown.' The two companions now go to the Baron's parlour, and +Geraldine tells her story to him. This, however, the poet judiciously +leaves out, and only signifies that the Baron recognized in her the +daughter of his old friend Sir Roland, with whom he had had a deadly +quarrel. Now, however, he despatches his tame poet, or laureate, called +Bard Bracy, to invite him and his family over, promising to forgive +every thing, and even make an apology for what had passed. To understand +what follows, we own, surpasses our comprehension. Mr Bracy, the poet, +recounts a strange dream he has just had, of a dove being almost +strangled by a snake; whereupon the Lady Geraldine falls a hissing, and +her eyes grow small, like a serpent's,--or at least so they seem to her +friend; who begs her father to 'send away that woman.' Upon this the +Baron falls into a passion, as if he had discovered that his daughter +had been seduced; at least, we can understand him in no other sense, +though no hint of such a kind is given; but on the contrary, she is +painted to the last moment as full of innocence and +purity.--Nevertheless, + + 'His heart was cleft with pain and rage, + His cheeks they quiver'd, his eyes were wild, + Dishonour'd thus in his old age; + Dishonour'd by his only child; + And all his hospitality + To th' insulted daughter of his friend + By more than woman's jealousy, + Brought thus to a disgraceful end.--' + +Nothing further is said to explain the mystery; but there follows +incontinently, what is termed '_The conclusion of Part the Second_.' And +as we are pretty confident that Mr Coleridge holds this passage in the +highest estimation; that he prizes it more than any other part of 'that +wild, and singularly original and beautiful poem Christabel,' excepting +always the two passages touching the 'toothless mastiff bitch;' we shall +extract it for the amazement of our readers--premising our own frank +avowal that we are wholly unable to divine the meaning of any portion of +it. + + 'A little child, a limber elf, + Singing, dancing to itself, + A fairy thing with red round cheeks, + That always finds and never seeks; + Makes such a vision to the sight + As fills a father's eyes with light; + And pleasures flow in so thick and fast + Upon his heart, that he at last + Must needs express his love's excess + With words of unmeant bitterness. + Perhaps 'tis pretty to force together + Thoughts so all unlike each other; + To mutter and mock a broken charm, + To dally with wrong that does no harm + Perhaps 'tis tender too, and pretty, + At each wild word to feel within + A sweet recoil of love and pity. + And what if in a world of sin + (O sorrow and shame should this be true!) + Such giddiness of heart and brain + Comes seldom save from rage and pain, + So talks as it's most used to do.' + +Hence endeth the Second Part, and, in truth, the 'singular' poem itself; +for the author has not yet written, or, as he phrases it, 'embodied in +verse,' the 'three parts yet to come;'--though he trusts he shall be +able to do so' in the course of the present year.' + +One word as to the metre of Christabel, or, as Mr Coleridge terms it, +'_the_ Christabel'--happily enough; for indeed we doubt if the peculiar +force of the definite article was ever more strongly exemplified. He +says, that though the reader may fancy there prevails a great +_irregularity_ in the metre, some lines being of four, others of twelve +syllables, yet in reality it is quite regular; only that it is 'founded +on a new principle, namely, that of counting in each line the accents, +not the syllables.' We say nothing of the monstrous assurance of any man +coming forward coolly at this time of day, and telling the readers of +English poetry, whose ear has been tuned to the lays of Spenser, Milton, +Dryden, and Pope, that he makes his metre 'on a new principle!' but we +utterly deny the truth of the assertion, and defy him to show us _any_ +principle upon which his lines can be conceived to tally. We give two or +three specimens to confound at once this miserable piece of coxcombry +and shuffling. Let our 'wild, and singularly original and beautiful' +author, show us how these lines agree either in number of accents or of +feet. + + 'Ah wel-a-day!' + 'For this is alone in--' + 'And didst bring her home with thee in love and in charity'-- + 'I pray you drink this cordial wine'-- + 'Sir Leoline'-- + 'And found a bright lady surpassingly fair'-- + 'Tu--whit!----Tu--whoo!' + +_Kubla Khan_ is given to the public, it seems, 'at the request of a poet +of great and deserved celebrity;'--but whether Lord Byron, the praiser +of 'the Christabel,' or the Laureate, the praiser of Princes, we are not +informed. As far as Mr Coleridge's 'own opinions are concerned,' it is +published, 'not upon the ground of any _poetic_ merits,' but 'as a +PSYCHOLOGICAL CURIOSITY!' In these opinions of the candid author, we +entirely concur; but for this reason we hardly think it was necessary to +give the minute detail which the Preface contains, of the circumstances +attending its composition. Had the question regarded '_Paradise Lost_,' +or '_Dryden's Ode_,' we could not have had a more particular account of +the circumstances in which it was composed. It was in the year 1797, and +in the summer season. Mr Coleridge was in bad health;--the particular +disease is not given; but the careful reader will form his own +conjectures. He had retired very prudently to a lonely farm-house; and +whoever would see the place which gave birth to the 'psychological +curiosity,' may find his way thither without a guide; for it is situated +on the confines of Somerset and Devonshire, and on the Exmoor part of +the boundary; and it is, moreover, between Porlock and Linton. In that +farm-house, he had a slight indisposition, and had taken an anodyne, +which threw him into a deep sleep in his chair (whether after dinner or +not he omits to state), 'at the moment that he was reading a sentence in +Purchas's Pilgrims,' relative to a palace of Kubla Khan. The effects of +the anodyne, and the sentence together, were prodigious: They produced +the 'curiosity' now before us; for, during his three-hours sleep, Mr +Coleridge 'has the most vivid confidence that he could not have composed +less than from two to three hundred lines.' On awaking, he 'instantly +and eagerly' wrote down the verses here published; when he was (he says, +'_unfortunately_') called out by a 'person on business from Porlock, and +detained by him above an hour;' and when he returned the vision was +gone. The lines here given smell strongly, it must be owned, of the +anodyne; and, but that an under dose of a sedative produces contrary +effects, we should inevitably have been lulled by them into +forgetfulness of all things. Perhaps a dozen more such lines as the +following would reduce the most irritable of critics to a state of +inaction. + + 'A damsel with a dulcimer + In a vision once I saw: + It was an Abyssinian maid + And on her dulcimer she play'd, + Singing of Mount Abora. + Could I revive within me + Her symphony and song, + To such a deep delight 'twould win me, + That with music loud and long, + I would build that dome in air, + That sunny dome! those caves of ice! + And all who heard should see them there, + And all should cry, Beware! Beware! + His flashing eyes, his floating hair! + Weave a circle round him thrice, + And close your eyes with holy dread: + For he on honey-dew hath fed,' &c. &c. + +There is a good deal more altogether as exquisite--and in particular a +fine description of a wood, 'ancient as the hills;' and 'folding sunny +spots of _greenery_!' But we suppose this specimen will be sufficient. + +Persons in this poet's unhappy condition, generally feel the want of +sleep as the worst of their evils; but there are instances, too, in the +history of the disease, of sleep being attended with new agony, as if +the waking thoughts, how wild and turbulent soever, had still been under +some slight restraint, which sleep instantly removed. Mr Coleridge +appears to have experienced this symptom, if we may judge from the title +of his third poem, '_The Pains of Sleep_;' and, in truth, from its +composition--which is mere raving, without any thing more affecting than +a number of incoherent words, expressive of extravagance and +incongruity.--We need give no specimen of it. + +Upon the whole, we look upon this publication as one of the most notable +pieces of impertinence of which the press has lately been guilty; and +one of the boldest experiments that has yet been made on the patience or +understanding of the public. It is impossible, however, to dismiss it, +without a remark or two. The other productions of the Lake School have +generally exhibited talents thrown away upon subjects so mean, that no +power of genius could ennoble them; or perverted and rendered useless by +a false theory of poetical composition. But even in the worst of them, +if we except the White Doe of Mr Wordsworth and some of the laureate +odes, there were always some gleams of feeling or of fancy. But the +thing now before us is utterly destitute of value. It exhibits from +beginning to end not a ray of genius; and we defy any man to point out a +passage of poetical merit in any of the three pieces which it contains, +except, perhaps, the following lines in p. 32, and even these are not +very brilliant; nor is the leading thought original-- + + 'Alas! they had been friends in youth; + But whispering tongues can poison truth; + And constancy lives in realms above; + And life is thorny; and youth is vain; + And to be wroth with one we love, + Doth work like madness in the brain.' + +With this one exception, there is literally not one couplet in the +publication before us which would be reckoned poetry, or even sense, +were it found in the corner of a newspaper or upon the window of an inn. +Must we then be doomed to hear such a mixture of raving and driv'ling, +extolled as the work of a '_wild and original_' genius, simply because +Mr Coleridge has now and then written fine verses, and a brother poet +chooses, in his milder mood, to laud him from courtesy or from interest? +And are such panegyrics to be echoed by the mean tools of a political +faction, because they relate to one whose daily prose is understood to +be dedicated to the support of all that courtiers think should be +supported? If it be true that the author has thus earned the patronage +of those liberal dispensers of bounty, we can have no objection that +they should give him proper proofs of their gratitude; but we cannot +help wishing, for his sake, as well as our own, that they would pay in +solid pudding instead of empty praise; and adhere, at least in this +instance, to the good old system of rewarding their champions with +places and pensions, instead of puffing their bad poetry, and +endeavouring to cram their nonsense down the throats of all the loyal +and well affected.--_The Edinburgh Review_. + + + + +ROBERT SOUTHEY + + +_Madoc_, by ROBERT SOUTHEY. 4to. pp. 560. 2l. 2s. Boards. Printed at +Edinburgh, for Longman and Co., London. 1805. + +It has fallen to the lot of this writer to puzzle our critical +discernment more than once. In the _Annual Anthology_ we had reason to +complain that it was difficult to distinguish his jocular from his +serious poetry; and sometimes indeed to know his poetry from his prose. +He has now contrived to manufacture a large quarto, which he has styled +a poem, but of what description it is no easy matter to decide. The +title of epic, which he indignantly disclaims, we might have been +inclined to refuse his production, had it been claimed; and we suppose +that Mr. Southey would not suffer it to be classed under the +mock-heroic. The poem of Madoc is not didactic, nor elegiac, nor +classical, in any respect. Neither is it _Macphersonic_, nor +_Klopstockian_, nor _Darwinian_,--we beg pardon, we mean _Brookian_. To +conclude, according to a phrase of the last century, which was applied +to ladies of ambiguous character, _it is what it is_.--As Mr. Southey +has set the rules of Aristotle at defiance in his preface, we hope that +he will feel a due degree of gratitude for this appropriate definition +of his work. It is an old saying, thoroughly descriptive of such an old +song as this before us. + +Mr. Southey, however, has not disdained all ancient precedents in his +poem, for he introduces it with this advertisement: + + 'Come, listen to a tale of times of old! + Come, for ye know me! I am he who sung + The maid of Arc; and I am he who framed + Of Thalaba the wild and wonderous song. + Come, listen to my lay, and ye shall hear + How Madoc from the shores of Britain spread + The adventurous sail, explored the ocean ways, + And quelled barbarian power, and overthrew + The bloody altars of idolatry, + And planted in its fanes triumphantly + The cross of Christ. Come, listen to my lay!' + +This _modest ostentation_ was certainly derived from the verses imputed +to Virgil; + + "Ille ego, qui quondam gracili modulatus avena + Carmen; et egressus sylvis, vicina coegi + Ut quamvis avido parerent arva colono, + Gratum opus agricolis: at nunc horrentia Martis, &c." + +In the very first part of the poem, also, we find Mr. Southey pursuing +the Horatian precept, "_prorumpere in medias res_;" for he commences +with the _return_ of Madoc to his native country. It is true that, like +the Messenger in Macklin's tragedy, he "goes but to return;" and the +critic is tempted to say, with Martial, _toto carere possum_.--Thus the +grand interest of the work, which ought to consist in exploring a new +world, is destroyed at once, by the reader at his outset encountering +the heroes returning "sound, wind and limb," to their native country. It +may be said that Camoens has thrown a great part of Da Gama's Voyage +into the form of a narrative: but he has also given much in description; +enough, at least, to have justified Mr. Southey in commencing rather +nearer the commencement of his tale. + +That he might withdraw himself entirely from the yoke of Aristotle, Mr. +Southey has divided his poem into two parts, instead of giving it a +beginning, a middle and an end. One of these parts is concisely +entitled, 'Madoc in Wales;' the other, 'Madoc in Aztlan.' A _middle_ +might, however, have been easily found, by adding, _Madoc on +Shipboard_.--The first of these Anti Peripatetic parts contains 18 +divisions; the second, 27 which include every incident, episode, &c. +introduced into the poem. This arrangement gives it very much the +appearance of a journal versified, and effectually precludes any +imputation of luxuriance of fancy in the plot. + +Respecting the manners, Mr. Southey appears to have been more successful +than in his choice of the story. He has adhered to history where he +could discover any facts adapted to his purpose; and when history failed +him, he has had recourse to probability. Yet we own that the +nomenclature of his heroes has shocked what Mr. S. would call our +prejudices. _Goervyl_ and _Ririd_ and _Rodri_ and _Llaian_ may have +charms for Cambrian ears, but who can feel an interest in _Tezozomoc_, +_Tlalala_, or _Ocelopan_? Or, should + + ----'Tyneio, Merini, + Boda and Brenda and Aelgyvarch, + Gwynon and Celynin and Gwynodyl,' (p. 129.) + "Those rugged names to our like mouths grow sleek, + That would have made Quintilian stare and gasp[I]," + +how could we swallow _Yuhidthiton_, _Coanocotzin_, and, above all, the +yawning jaw-dislocating _Ayayaca_?--These torturing words, particularly +the latter, remind us so strongly of the odious cacophony of the Nurse +and Child, that they really are not to be tolerated. Mr. Southey's +defence (for he has partially anticipated this objection) is that the +names are conformable to history or analogy, which we are not inclined +to dispute: but it is not requisite to tread so closely in the traces of +barbarity. Truth does not constitute the essence of poetry: but it is +indispensably necessary that the lines should be agreeable to the ear, +as well as to the sense. Sorry, indeed, we are to complain that Mr. +Southey, in attempting a new method of writing,--in professing to set +aside the old models, and to promote his own work to a distinguished +place in the library,--has failed to interest our feelings, or to excite +our admiration. The dull tenor of mediocrity, which characterizes his +pages, is totally unsuitable to heroic poetry, regular or irregular. +Instead of viewing him on a _fiery Pegasus_, and "snatching a grace +beyond the reach of art," we behold the author mounted on a strange +animal, something between a rough Welsh poney and a Peruvian sheep, +whose utmost capriole only tends to land him in the mud. We may indeed +safely compliment Mr. Southey, by assuring him that there is nothing in +Homer, Virgil, or Milton, in any degree resembling the beauties of +Madoc. + +Whether the expedition of Madoc, and the existence of a Welsh tribe in +America, be historically true, it is not our present business to +examine. It is obvious, however, that one great object of the poem, the +destruction of the altars of idolatry, had failed; for it is not +pretended that the supposed descendants of Madoc remained Christians. + +We shall now make some extracts from this poem, which will enable our +readers to judge whether we have spoken too severely of Mr. Southey's +labours. + +[Quotes 270 lines of _Madoc_ with interpolated comments.] + +If the perusal of these and the preceding verses should tempt any of our +readers to purchase Mr. Southey's volume, we can warrant equal +entertainment in all its other parts, and shall heartily wish the +gentleman all happiness with his poet.--To us, there appears a thorough +perversion of taste, in the conception and execution of the whole; and +we are disgusted with the tameness of the verse, the vulgarity of the +thoughts, and the barbarity of the manners. If this style of writing be +continued, we may expect not only the actions of Vindomarus or +Ariovistus to be celebrated, but we may perhaps see the history of the +Cherokees, Choctaws, and Catabaws, versified in quarto. The name of +Atakulla-kulla would not be inharmonious, compared with some of Mr. +Southey's heroes. Indeed, a very interesting poem might be founded on +the story of Pocahuntas, as it is detailed by Smith, in his History of +the Settlement of Virginia; and if Mr. Southey should meditate another +irruption into the territories of the Muse, we would recommend this +subject to his attention. + +It must be remarked that this is a very handsome and elegantly printed +book, with engraved title-pages, vignettes, &c. and had the poet +equalled the printer, his work might have stood on the same shelf with +those of our most admired writers.--_The Monthly Review_. + +[Footnote I: Milton.] + + + + +CHARLES LAMB + + +_Blank Verse_, by CHARLES LLOYD, and CHARLES LAMB. 12mo. 2s. 6d. Boards. +Arch. 1798. + +Dr. Johnson, speaking of blank verse, seemed to have adopted the opinion +of some great man,--we forget whom,--that it is only "_poetry to the +eye_." On perusing the works of several modern bards of our own country, +we have sometimes rather inclined to the same idea, but the recollection +of Milton and Thomson presently banished it. + +We have more than once delivered our sentiments respecting the poetry of +Mr. Charles Lloyd. To what we have formerly remarked, in general on this +head, we have little to add on the present occasion; except that we +begin to grow weary of his continued melancholy strains. Why is this +ingenious writer so uncomfortably constant to the _mournful_ Muse? If he +has any taste for variety, he has little to fear from _jealousy_ in the +sacred sisterhood.--Then why not sometimes make his bow to THALIA? + +Mr. Lamb, the joint author of this little volume, seems to be very +properly associated with his plaintive companion.--_The Monthly +Review_. + + +_Album Verses, with a few others_. By CHARLES LAMB. 12mo. pp. 150. +London, 1830. Moxon. + +If any thing could prevent our laughing at the present collection of +absurdities, it would be a lamentable conviction of the blinding and +engrossing nature of vanity. We could forgive the folly of the original +composition, but cannot but marvel at the egotism which has preserved, +and the conceit which has published. What exaggerated notion must that +man entertain of his talents, who believes their slightest efforts +worthy of remembrance; one who keeps a copy of the verses he writes in +young ladies' albums, the proverbial receptacles for trash! Here and +there a sweet and natural thought intervenes; but the chief part is best +characterized by that expressive though ungracious word "rubbish." And +what could induce our author to trench on the masculine and vigorous +Crabbe? did he think his powerful and dark outlines might with advantage +be turned to "prettiness and favour?" But let our readers judge from the +following specimens. The first is from the album of Mrs. Jane Towers. + + "Conjecturing, I wander in the dark, + I know thee only sister to Charles Clarke!" + +Directions for a picture-- + + "You wished a picture, cheap, but good; + The colouring? decent; clear, not muddy; + To suit a poet's quiet study." + +The subject is a child-- + + "Thrusting his fingers in his ears, + Like Obstinate, that perverse funny one, + In honest parable of Bunyan." + +We were not aware of "Obstinate's" fun before. + +An epitaph:-- + + "On her bones the turf lie lightly, + And her rise again be brightly! + No dark stain be found upon her-- + No, there will not, on mine honour-- + Answer that at least I can." + +Or what is the merit of the ensuing epicedium? + +[Quotes 48 lines beginning:-- + + There's rich Kitty Wheatley, + With footing it featly, etc.] + +Mr. Lamb, in his dedication, says his motive for publishing is to +benefit his publisher, by affording him an opportunity of shewing how he +means to bring out works. We could have dispensed with the specimen; +though it is but justice to remark on the neat manner in which the work +is produced: the title-page is especially pretty.--_The Literary +Gazette_. + + + + +WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR + + +_Gebir; a Poem, in Seven Books_. 12mo. 74 pp. Rivingtons. 1798. + +How this Poem, which appears to issue from the same publishers as our +own work, so long escaped our notice, we cannot say. Still less are we +able to guess at the author, or his meaning. In a copy lately lent to +us, as a matter we had overlooked, we observe the following very +apposite quotation, inscribed on the title-page, by some unknown hand: + + Some love the verse---- + Which read, and read, you raise your eyes in doubt, + And gravely wonder what it is about. + +Among persons of that turn of mind, the author must look for the _ten_ +admirers who, as he says, would satisfy his ambition; but whether they +could have the qualities of taste and genius, which he requires, is with +us a matter of doubt. Turgid obscurity is the general character of the +composition, with now and then a gleam of genuine poetry, irradiating +the dark profound. The effect of the perusal is to give a kind of whirl +to the brain, more like distraction than pleasure; and something +analogous to the sensation produced, when the end of the finger is +rubbed against the parchment of the tambourine.--_The British Critic_. + + +_Gebir_; a Poem, in Seven Books. 8vo. pp. 74. 2s. 6d. Rivingtons. 1798. + +An unpractised author has attempted, in this poem, the difficult task of +relating a romantic story in blank-verse. His performance betrays all +the incorrectness and abruptness of inexperience, but it manifests +occasionally some talent for description. He has fallen into the common +error of those who aspire to the composition of blank-verse, by +borrowing too many phrases and epithets from our incomparable Milton. We +give the following extract, as affording a fair specimen: + +[Quotes about 60 lines from the beginning of the fifth and sixth books +of _Gebir_.] + +We must observe that the story is told very obscurely, and should have +been assisted by an _Argument_ in prose. Young writers are often +astonished to find that passages, which seem very clear to their own +heated imaginations, appear very dark to their readers.--The author of +the poem before us may produce something worthy of more approbation, if +he will labour hard, and delay for a few years the publication of his +next performance.--_The Monthly Review_. + + + + +SIR WALTER SCOTT + + +_Marmion; a Tale of Flodden Field_. By WALTER SCOTT, Esq. 4to. pp. 500. +Edinburgh and London, 1808. + +There is a kind of right of primogeniture among books, as well as among +men; and it is difficult for an author, who has obtained great fame by a +first publication, not to appear to fall off in a second--especially if +his original success could be imputed, in any degree, to the novelty of +his plan of composition. The public is always indulgent to untried +talents; and is even apt to exaggerate a little the value of what it +receives without any previous expectation. But, for this advance of +kindness, it usually exacts a most usurious return in the end. When the +poor author comes back, he is no longer received as a benefactor, but a +debtor. In return for the credit it formerly gave him, the world now +conceives that it has a just claim on him for excellence, and becomes +impertinently scrupulous as to the quality of the coin in which it is to +be paid. + +The just amount of this claim plainly cannot be for more than the rate +of excellence which he had reached in his former production; but, in +estimating this rate, various errors are perpetually committed, which +increase the difficulties of the task which is thus imposed on him. In +the _first_ place, the comparative amount of his past and present merits +can only be ascertained by the uncertain standard of his reader's +feelings; and these must always be less lively with regard to a second +performance; which, with every other excellence of the first, must +necessarily want the powerful recommendations of novelty and surprise, +and consequently fall very far short of the effect produced by their +strong cooeperation. In the _second_ place, it may be observed, in +general, that wherever our impression of any work is favourable on the +whole, its excellence is constantly exaggerated, in those vague and +habitual recollections which form the basis of subsequent comparisons. +We readily drop from our memory the dull and bad passages, and carry +along with us the remembrance of those only which had afforded us +delight. Thus, when we take the merit of any favourite poem as a +standard of comparison for some later production of the same author, we +never take its true average merit, which is the only fair standard, but +the merit of its most striking and memorable passages, which naturally +stand forward in our recollection, and pass upon our hasty retrospect as +just and characteristic specimens of the whole work; and this high and +exaggerated standard we rigorously apply to the first, and perhaps the +least interesting parts of the second performance. Finally, it deserves +to be noticed, that where a first work, containing considerable +blemishes, has been favourably received, the public always expects this +indulgence to be repaid by an improvement that ought not to be always +expected. If a second performance appear, therefore, with the same +faults, they will no longer meet with the same toleration. Murmurs will +be heard about indolence, presumption, and abuse of good nature; while +the critics, and those who had gently hinted at the necessity of +correction, will be more out of humour than the rest at this apparent +neglect of their admonitions. + +For these, and for other reasons, we are inclined to suspect, that the +success of the work now before us will be less brilliant than that of +the author's former publication, though we are ourselves of opinion, +that its intrinsic merits are nearly, if not altogether, equal; and +that, if it had had the fortune to be the elder born, it would have +inherited as fair a portion of renown as has fallen to the lot of its +predecessor. It is a good deal longer, indeed, and somewhat more +ambitious; and it is rather clearer that it has greater faults, than +that it has greater beauties; though, for our own parts, we are inclined +to believe in both propositions. It has more tedious and flat passages, +and more ostentation of historical and antiquarian lore; but it has also +greater richness and variety, both of character and incident; and if it +has less sweetness and pathos in the softer passages, it has certainly +more vehemence and force of colouring in the loftier and busier +representations of action and emotion. The place of the prologuizing +minstrel is but ill supplied, indeed, by the epistolary dissertations +which are prefixed to each book of the present poem; and the ballad +pieces and mere episodes which it contains, have less finish and +poetical beauty; but there is more airiness and spirit in the lighter +delineations; and the story, if not more skilfully conducted, is at +least better complicated, and extended through a wider field of +adventure. The characteristics of both, however, are evidently the +same;--a broken narrative--a redundancy of minute description--bursts of +unequal and energetic poetry--and a general tone of spirit and +animation, unchecked by timidity or affectation, and unchastised by any +great delicacy of taste, or elegance of fancy. + +But though we think this last romance of Mr Scott's about as good as the +former, and allow that it affords great indications of poetical talent, +we must remind our readers, that we never entertained much partiality +for this sort of composition, and ventured on a former occasion to +express our regret, that an author endowed with such talents should +consume them in imitations of obsolete extravagance, and in the +representation of manners and sentiments in which none of his readers +can be supposed to take much interest, except the few who can judge of +their exactness. To write a modern romance of chivalry, seems to be +much such a fantasy as to build a modern abbey, or an English pagoda. +For once, however, it may be excused as a pretty caprice of genius; but +a second production of the same sort is entitled to less indulgence, and +imposes a sort of duty to drive the author from so idle a task, by a +fair exposition of the faults which are in a manner inseparable from its +execution. To enable our readers to judge fairly of the present +performance, we shall first present them with a brief abstract of the +story; and then endeavour to point out what seems to be exceptionable, +and what is praiseworthy, in the execution. + +[Here follows a detailed outline of the plot of _Marmion_.] + +Now, upon this narrative, we are led to observe, in the first place, +that it forms a very scanty and narrow foundation for a poem of such +length as is now before us. There is scarcely matter enough in the main +story for a ballad of ordinary dimensions; and the present work is not +so properly diversified with episodes and descriptions, as made up and +composed of them. No long poem, however, can maintain its interest +without a connected narrative. It should be a grand historical picture, +in which all the personages are concerned in one great transaction, and +not a mere gallery of detailed groups and portraits. When we accompany +the poet in his career of adventure, it is not enough that he points out +to us, as we go along, the beauties of the landscape, and the costumes +of the inhabitants. The people must do something after they are +described, and they must do it in concert, or in opposition to each +other; while the landscape, with its castles and woods and defiles, must +serve merely as the scene of their exploits, and the field of their +conspiracies and contentions. There is too little connected incident in +Marmion, and a great deal too much gratuitous description. + +In the second place, we object to the whole plan and conception of the +fable, as turning mainly upon incidents unsuitable for poetical +narrative, and brought out in the denouement in a very obscure, +laborious, and imperfect manner. The events of an epic narrative should +all be of a broad, clear, and palpable description; and the difficulties +and embarrassments of the characters, of a nature to be easily +comprehended and entered into by readers of all descriptions. Now, the +leading incidents in this poem are of a very narrow and peculiar +character, and are woven together into a petty intricacy and +entanglement which puzzles the reader instead of interesting him, and +fatigues instead of exciting his curiosity. The unaccountable conduct of +Constance, in first ruining De Wilton in order to forward Marmion's suit +with Clara, and then trying to poison Clara, because Marmion's suit +seemed likely to succeed with her--but, above all, the paltry device of +the forged letters, and the sealed packet given up by Constance at her +condemnation, and handed over by the abbess to De Wilton and Lord Angus, +are incidents not only unworthy of the dignity of poetry, but really +incapable of being made subservient to its legitimate purposes. They are +particularly unsuitable, too, to the age and character of the personages +to whom they relate; and, instead of forming the instruments of knightly +vengeance and redress, remind us of the machinery of a bad German novel, +or of the disclosures which might be expected on the trial of a +pettifogging attorney. The obscurity and intricacy which they +communicate to the whole story, must be very painfully felt by every +reader who tries to comprehend it; and is prodigiously increased by the +very clumsy and inartificial manner in which the denouement is +ultimately brought about by the author. Three several attempts are made +by three several persons to beat into the head of the reader the +evidence of De Wilton's innocence, and of Marmion's guilt; first, by +Constance in her dying speech and confession; secondly, by the abbess in +her conference with De Wilton; and, lastly, by this injured innocent +himself, on disclosing himself to Clara in the castle of Lord Angus. +After all, the precise nature of the plot and the detection is very +imperfectly explained, and we will venture to say, is not fully +understood by one half those who have fairly read through every word of +the quarto now before us. We would object, on the same grounds, to the +whole scenery of Constance's condemnation. The subterranean chamber, +with its low arches, massive walls, and silent monks with smoky +torches,--its old chandelier in an iron chain,--the stern abbots and +haughty prioresses, with their flowing black dresses, and book of +statutes laid on an iron table, are all images borrowed from the novels +of Mrs Ratcliffe [_sic_] and her imitators. The public, we believe, has +now supped full of this sort of horrors; or, if any effect is still to +be produced by their exhibition, it may certainly be produced at too +cheap a rate, to be worthy the ambition of a poet of original +imagination. + +In the third place, we object to the extreme and monstrous improbability +of almost all the incidents which go to the composition of this fable. +We know very well that poetry does not describe what is ordinary; but +the marvellous, in which it is privileged to indulge, is the marvellous +of performance, and not of accident. One extraordinary rencontre or +opportune coincidence may be permitted, perhaps, to bring the parties +together, and wind up matters for the catastrophe; but a writer who gets +through the whole business of his poem, by a series of lucky hits and +incalculable chances, certainly manages matters in a very economical way +for his judgment and invention, and will probably be found to have +consulted his own ease, rather than the delight of his readers. Now, +the whole story of Marmion seems to us to turn upon a tissue of such +incredible accidents. In the first place, it was totally beyond all +calculation, that Marmion and De Wilton should meet, by pure chance, at +Norham, on the only night which either of them could spend in that +fortress. In the next place, it is almost totally incredible that the +former should not recognize his antient rival and antagonist, merely +because he had assumed a palmer's habit, and lost a little flesh and +colour in his travels. He appears unhooded, and walks and speaks before +him; and, as near as we can guess, it could not be more than a year +since they had entered the lists against each other. Constance, at her +death, says she had lived but three years with Marmion; and, it was not +till he tired of her, that he aspired to Clara, or laid plots against De +Wilton. It is equally inconceivable that De Wilton should have taken +upon himself the friendly office of a guide to his arch enemy, and +discharged it quietly and faithfully, without seeking, or apparently +thinking of any opportunity of disclosure or revenge. So far from +meditating anything of the sort, he makes two several efforts to leave +him, when it appears that his services are no longer indispensable. If +his accidental meeting, and continued association with Marmion, be +altogether unnatural, it must appear still more extraordinary, that he +should afterwards meet with the Lady Clare, his adored mistress, and the +Abbess of Whitby, who had in her pocket the written proofs of his +innocence, in consequence of an occurrence equally accidental. These two +ladies, the only two persons in the universe whom it was of any +consequence to him to meet, are captured in their voyage from Holy Isle, +and brought to Edinburgh, by the luckiest accident in the world, the +very day that De Wilton and Marmion make their entry into it. Nay, the +king, without knowing that they are at all of his acquaintance, happens +to appoint them lodgings in the same stair-case, and to make them travel +under his escort! We pass the night combat at Gifford, in which Marmion +knows his opponent by moonlight, though he never could guess at him in +sunshine; and all the inconsistencies of his dilatory wooing of Lady +Clare. Those, and all the prodigies and miracles of the story, we can +excuse, as within the privilege of poetry; but, the lucky chances we +have already specified, are rather too much for our patience. A poet, we +think, should never let his heroes contract such great debts to fortune; +especially when a little exertion of his own might make them independent +of her bounty. De Wilton might have been made to seek and watch his +adversary, from some moody feeling of patient revenge; and it certainly +would not have been difficult to discover motives which might have +induced both Clara and the Abbess to follow and relieve him, without +dragging them into his presence by the clumsy hands of a cruizer from +Dunbar. + +In the _fourth_ place, we think we have reason to complain of Mr Scott +for having made his figuring characters so entirely worthless, as to +excite but little of our sympathy, and at the same time keeping his +virtuous personages so completely in the back ground, that we are +scarcely at all acquainted with them when the work is brought to a +conclusion. Marmion is not only a villain, but a mean and sordid +villain; and represented as such, without any visible motive, and at the +evident expense of characteristic truth and consistency. His elopement +with Constance, and his subsequent desertion of her, are knightly vices +enough, we suppose; but then he would surely have been more interesting +and natural, if he had deserted her for a brighter beauty, and not +merely for a richer bride. This was very well for Mr Thomas Inkle, the +young merchant of London; but for the valiant, haughty, and liberal Lord +Marmion of Fontenaye and Lutterward, we do think it was quite +unsuitable. Thus, too, it was very chivalrous and orderly perhaps, for +him to hate De Wilton, and to seek to supplant him in his lady's love; +but, to slip a bundle of forged letters into his bureau, was cowardly as +well as malignant. Now, Marmion is not represented as a coward, nor as +at all afraid of De Wilton; on the contrary, and it is certainly the +most absurd part of the story, he fights him fairly and valiantly after +all, and overcomes him by mere force of arms, as he might have done at +the beginning, without having recourse to devices so unsuitable to his +general character and habits of acting. By the way, we have great doubts +whether a _convicted_ traitor, like De Wilton, whose guilt was +established by written evidence under his own hand, was ever allowed to +enter the lists, as a knight, against his accuser. At all events, we are +positive, that an accuser, who was as ready and willing to fight as +Marmion, could never have condescended to forge in support of his +accusation; and that the author has greatly diminished our interest in +the story, as well as needlessly violated the truth of character, by +loading his hero with the guilt of this most revolting and improbable +proceeding. The crimes of Constance are multiplied in like manner to +such a degree, as both to destroy our interest in her fate, and to +violate all probability. Her elopement was enough to bring on her doom; +and we should have felt more for it, if it had appeared a little more +unmerited. She is utterly debased, when she becomes the instrument of +Marmion's murderous perfidy, and the assassin of her unwilling rival. + +De Wilton, again, is too much depressed throughout the poem. It is +rather dangerous for a poet to chuse a hero who has been beaten in fair +battle. The readers of romance do not like an unsuccessful warrior; but +to be beaten in a judicial combat, and to have his arms reversed and +tied on the gallows, is an adventure which can only be expiated by +signal prowess and exemplary revenge, achieved against great odds, in +full view of the reader. The unfortunate De Wilton, however, carries the +stain upon him from one end of the poem to the other. He wanders up and +down, a dishonoured fugitive, in the disguise of a palmer, through the +five first books; and though he is knighted and mounted again in the +last, yet we see nothing of his performances; nor is the author merciful +enough to afford him one opportunity of redeeming his credit by an +exploit of gallantry or skill. For the poor Lady Clare, she is a +personage of still greater insipidity and insignificance. The author +seems to have formed her upon the principle of Mr Pope's maxim, that +women have no characters at all. We find her every where, where she has +no business to be; neither saying nor doing any thing of the least +consequence, but whimpering and sobbing over the Matrimony in her prayer +book, like a great miss from a boarding school; and all this is the more +inexcusable, as she is altogether a supernumerary person in the play, +who should atone for her intrusion by some brilliancy or novelty of +deportment. Matters would have gone on just as well, although she had +been left behind at Whitby till after the battle of Flodden; and she is +daggled about in the train, first of the Abbess and then of Lord +Marmion, for no purpose, that we can see, but to afford the author an +opportunity for two or three pages of indifferent description. + +Finally, we must object, both on critical and on national grounds, to +the discrepancy between the title and the substance of the poem, and the +neglect of Scotish feelings and Scotish character that is manifested +throughout. Marmion is no more a tale of Flodden Field, than of Bosworth +Field, or any other field in history. The story is quite independent of +the national feuds of the sister kingdoms; and the battle of Flodden has +no other connexion with it, than from being the conflict in which the +hero loses his life. Flodden, however, is mentioned; and the +preparations for Flodden, and the consequences of it, are repeatedly +alluded to in the course of the composition. Yet we nowhere find any +adequate expressions of those melancholy and patriotic sentiments which +are still all over Scotland the accompaniment of those allusions and +recollections. No picture is drawn of the national feelings before or +after that fatal encounter; and the day that broke for ever the pride +and the splendour of his country, is only commemorated by a Scotish poet +as the period when an English warrior was beaten to the ground. There is +scarcely one trait of true Scotish nationality or patriotism introduced +into the whole poem; and Mr Scott's only expression of admiration or +love for the beautiful country to which he belongs, is put, if we +rightly remember, into the mouth of one of his Southern favourites. +Independently of this, we think that too little pains is taken to +distinguish the Scotish character and manners from the English, or to +give expression to the general feeling of rivalry and mutual jealousy +which at that time existed between the two countries. + +If there be any truth in what we have now said, it is evident that the +merit of this poem cannot consist in the story. And yet it has very +great merit, and various kinds of merit,--both in the picturesque +representation of visible objects, in the delineation of manners and +characters, and in the description of great and striking events. After +having detained the reader so long with our own dull remarks, it will +be refreshing to him to peruse a few specimens of Mr Scott's more +enlivening strains. + +[Quotes over six hundred lines of _Marmion_ with brief comment.] + +The powerful poetry of these passages can receive no illustration from +any praises or observations of ours. It is superior, in our +apprehension, to all that this author has hitherto produced; and, with a +few faults of diction, equal to any thing that has _ever_ been written +upon similar subjects. Though we have extended our extracts to a very +unusual length, in order to do justice to these fine conceptions, we +have been obliged to leave out a great deal, which serves in the +original to give beauty and effect to what we have actually cited. From +the moment the author gets in sight of Flodden Field, indeed, to the end +of the poem, there is no tame writing, and no intervention of ordinary +passages. He does not once flag or grow tedious; and neither stops to +describe dresses and ceremonies, nor to commemorate the harsh names of +feudal barons from the Border. There is a flight of five or six hundred +lines, in short, in which he never stoops his wing, nor wavers in his +course; but carries the reader forward with a more rapid, sustained, and +lofty movement, than any Epic bard that we can at present remember. + +From the contemplation of such distinguished excellence, it is painful +to be obliged to turn to the defects and deformities which occur in the +same composition. But this, though a less pleasing, is a still more +indispensable part of our duty; and one, from the resolute discharge of +which, much more beneficial consequences may be expected. In the work +which contains the fine passages we have just quoted, and many of nearly +equal beauty, there is such a proportion of tedious, hasty, and +injudicious composition, as makes it questionable with us, whether it +is entitled to go down to posterity as a work of classical merit, or +whether the author will retain, with another generation, that high +reputation which his genius certainly might make coeval with the +language. These are the authors, after all, whose faults it is of most +consequence to point out; and criticism performs her best and boldest +office,--not when she tramples down the weed, or tears up the +bramble,--but when she strips the strangling ivy from the oak, or cuts +out the canker from the rose. The faults of the fable we have already +noticed at sufficient length. Those of the execution we shall now +endeavour to enumerate with greater brevity. + +And, in the _first_ place, we must beg leave to protest, in the name of +a very numerous class of readers, against the insufferable number, and +length and minuteness of those descriptions of antient dresses and +manners, and buildings; and ceremonies, and local superstitions; with +which the whole poem is overrun,--which render so many notes necessary, +and are, after all, but imperfectly understood by those to whom +chivalrous antiquity has not hitherto been an object of peculiar +attention. We object to these, and to all such details, because they +are, for the most part, without dignity or interest in themselves; +because, in a modern author, they are evidently unnatural; and because +they must always be strange, and, in a good degree, obscure and +unintelligible to ordinary readers. + +When a great personage is to be introduced, it is right, perhaps, to +give the reader some notion of his external appearance; and when a +memorable event is to be narrated, it is natural to help the imagination +by some picturesque representation of the scenes with which it is +connected. Yet, even upon such occasions, it can seldom be advisable to +present the reader with a full inventory of the hero's dress, from his +shoebuckle to the plume in his cap, or to enumerate all the drawbridges, +portcullisses, and diamond cut stones in the castle. Mr Scott, however, +not only draws out almost all his pictures in these full dimensions, but +frequently introduces those pieces of Flemish or Chinese painting to +represent persons who are of no consequence, or places and events which +are of no importance to the story. It would be endless to go through the +poem for examples of this excess of minute description; we shall merely +glance at the First Canto as a specimen. We pass the long description of +Lord Marmion himself, with his mail of Milan steel; the blue ribbons on +his horse's mane; and his blue velvet housings. We pass also the two +gallant squires who ride behind him. But our patience is really +exhausted, when we are forced to attend to the black stockings and blue +jerkins of the inferior persons in the train, and to the whole process +of turning out the guard with advanced arms on entering the castle. + + 'Four men-at-arms came _at their backs_, + With halberd, bill, and battle-axe: + They bore Lord Marmion's lance so strong, + And led his sumpter mules along, + And ambling palfrey, _when at need_ + Him listed ease his battle-steed. + The last, and trustiest of the four, + On high his forky pennon bore; + Like swallow's tail, in shape and hue, + Flutter'd the streamer glossy blue, + Where, blazoned sable, as before, + The towering falcon seemed to soar. + Last, twenty yeomen, two and two, + In hosen black, and jerkins blue, + With falcons broider'd on each breast, + Attended on their lord's behest. + 'Tis meet that I should tell you now, + How fairly armed, and ordered how, + The soldiers of the guard, + With musquet, pike, and morion, + To welcome noble Marmion, + Stood in the Castle-yard; + Minstrels and trumpeters were there, + The gunner held his _linstock yare_, + For welcome-shot prepared-- + + The guards their morrice pikes advanced, + The trumpets flourished brave, + The cannon from the ramparts glanced, + And thundering welcome gave. + + Two pursuivants, whom tabards deck, + With silver scutcheon round their neck, + Stood on the steps of stone, + By which you reach the Donjon gate, + And there, with herald pomp and state, + They hailed Lord Marmion. + And he, their courtesy to requite, + Gave them a chain of twelve marks weight, + All as he lighted down.' p. 29-32. + +Sir Hugh the Heron then orders supper-- + + 'Now broach ye a pipe of Malvoisie, + Bring pasties of the doe.' + +--And after the repast is concluded, they have some mulled wine, and +drink good night very ceremoniously. + + 'Lord Marmion drank a fair good rest, + The Captain pledged his noble guest, + The cup went round among the rest.' + +In the morning, again, we are informed that they had prayers, and that +knight and squire + + ----'broke their fast + On rich substantial repast.' + 'Then came the stirrup-cup in course,' &c., &c. + +And thus a whole Canto is filled up with the account of a visit and a +supper, which lead to no consequences whatever, and are not attended +with any circumstances which must not have occurred at every visit and +supper among persons of the same rank at that period. Now, we are really +at a loss to know, why the mere circumstance of a moderate antiquity +should be supposed so far to ennoble those details, as to entitle them +to a place in poetry, which certainly never could be claimed for a +description of more modern adventures. Nobody, we believe, would be bold +enough to introduce into a serious poem a description of the hussar +boots and gold epaulets of a commander in chief, and much less to +particularize the liveries and canes of his servants, or the order and +array of a grand dinner, given even to the cabinet ministers. Yet these +things are, in their own nature, fully as picturesque, and as +interesting, as the ribbons at the mane of Lord Marmion's horse, or his +supper and breakfast at the castle of Norham. We are glad, indeed, to +find these little details in _old_ books, whether in prose or verse, +because they are there authentic and valuable documents of the usages +and modes of life of our ancestors; and we are thankful when we light +upon this sort of information in an antient romance, which commonly +contains matter much more tedious. Even there, however, we smile at the +simplicity which could mistake such naked enumerations for poetical +description; and reckon them as nearly on a level, in point of taste, +with the theological disputations that are sometimes introduced in the +same meritorious compositions. In a _modern_ romance, however, these +details being no longer authentic, are of no value in point of +information; and as the author has no claim to indulgence on the ground +of simplicity, the smile which his predecessors excited is in some +danger of being turned into a yawn. If he wishes sincerely to follow +their example, he should describe the manners of his own time, and not +of theirs. They painted from observation, and not from study; and the +familiarity and _naivete_ of their delineations, transcribed with a +slovenly and hasty hand from what they saw daily before them, is as +remote as possible from the elaborate pictures extracted by a modern +imitator from black-letter books, and coloured, not from the life, but +from learned theories, or at best from mouldy monkish illuminations, and +mutilated fragments of painted glass. + +But the times of chivalry, it may be said, were more picturesque than +the present times. They are better adapted to poetry; and everything +that is associated with them has a certain hold on the imagination, and +partakes of the interest of the period. We do not mean utterly to deny +this; nor can we stop, at present, to assign exact limits to our assent: +but this we will venture to observe, in general, that if it be true that +the interest which we take in the contemplation of the chivalrous era, +arises from the dangers and virtues by which it was distinguished,--from +the constant hazards in which its warriors passed their days, and the +mild and generous valour with which they met those hazards,--joined to +the singular contrast which it presented between the ceremonious polish +and gallantry of the nobles, and the brutish ignorance of the body of +the people:--if these are, as we conceive they are, the sources of the +charm which still operates in behalf of the days of knightly adventure, +then it should follow, that nothing should interest us, by association +with that age, but what serves naturally to bring before us those +hazards and that valour, and gallantry, and aristocratical superiority. +Any description, or any imitation of the exploits in which those +qualities were signalized, will do this most effectually. +Battles,--tournaments,--penances,--deliverance of damsels,--instalments +of knights, &c.--and, intermixed with these, we must admit some +description of arms, armorial bearings, castles, battlements, and +chapels: but the least and lowest of the whole certainly is the +description of servants' liveries, and of the peaceful operations of +eating, drinking, and ordinary salutation. These have no sensible +connexion with the qualities or peculiarities which have conferred +certain poetical privileges on the manners of chivalry. They do not +enter either necessarily or naturally into our conception of what is +interesting in those manners; and, though protected, by their +strangeness, from the ridicule which would infallibly attach to their +modern equivalents, are substantially as unpoetic, and as little +entitled to indulgence from impartial criticism. + +We would extend this censure to a larger proportion of the work before +us than we now choose to mention--certainly to all the stupid monkish +legends about St Hilda and St Cuthbert--to the ludicrous description of +Lord Gifford's habiliments of divination--and to all the various scraps +and fragments of antiquarian history and baronial biography, which are +scattered profusely through the whole narrative. These we conceive to be +put in purely for the sake of displaying the erudition of the author; +and poetry, which has no other recommendation, but that the substance of +it has been gleaned from rare or obscure books, has, in our estimation, +the least of all possible recommendations. Mr Scott's great talents, and +the novelty of the style in which his romances are written, have made +even these defects acceptable to a considerable part of his readers. His +genius, seconded by the omnipotence of fashion, has brought chivalry +again into temporary favour; but he ought to know, that this is a taste +too evidently unnatural to be long prevalent in the modern world. Fine +ladies and gentlemen now talk, indeed, of donjons, keeps, tabards, +scutcheons, tressures, caps of maintenance, portcullisses, wimples, and +we know not what besides; just as they did, in the days of Dr Darwin's +popularity, of gnomes, sylphs, oxygen, gossamer, polygynia, and +polyandria. That fashion, however, passed rapidly away; and if it be now +evident to all the world, that Dr Darwin obstructed the extension of his +fame, and hastened the extinction of his brilliant reputation, by the +pedantry and ostentatious learning of his poems, Mr Scott should take +care that a different sort of pedantry does not produce the same +effects. The world will never be long pleased with what it does not +readily understand; and the poetry which is destined for immortality, +should treat only of feelings and events which can be conceived and +entered into by readers of all descriptions. + +What we have now mentioned is the cardinal fault of the work before us; +but it has other faults, of too great magnitude to be passed altogether +without notice. There is a debasing lowness and vulgarity in some +passages, which we think must be offensive to every reader of delicacy, +and which are not, for the most part, redeemed by any vigour or +picturesque effect. The venison pasties, we think, are of this +description; and this commemoration of Sir Hugh Heron's troopers, who + + 'Have drunk the monks of St Bothan's ale, + And driven the beeves of Lauderdale; + Harried the wives of Greenlaw's goods, + And given them light to set their hoods.' p. 41. + +The long account of Friar John, though not without merit, offends in the +same sort; nor can we easily conceive, how any one could venture, in a +serious poem, to speak of + + ----'the wind that blows, + And _warms itself against his nose_.' + +The speeches of squire Blount, too, are a great deal too unpolished for +a noble youth aspiring to knighthood. On two occasions, to specify no +more, he addresses his brother squire in these cacophonous lines-- + + '_St Anton' fire thee!_ wilt thou stand + All day with bonnet in thy hand?' + +And, + + '_Stint in thy prate_,' quoth Blount, '_thou'dst best_, + And listen to our Lord's behest.' + +Neither can we be brought to admire the simple dignity of Sir Hugh the +Heron, who thus encourageth his nephew, + + ----'_By my fay_, + Well hast thou spoke--say forth thy say.' + +There are other passages in which the flatness and tediousness of the +narrative is relieved by no sort of beauty, nor elegance of diction, and +which form an extraordinary contrast with the more animated and finished +portions of the poem. We shall not afflict our readers with more than +one specimen of this falling off. We select it from the Abbess's +explanation to De Wilton. + + 'De Wilton and Lord Marmion wooed + Clara de Clare, of Gloster's blood; + (Idle it were of Whitby's dame, + To say of that same blood I came;) + And once, when jealous rage was high, + Lord Marmion said despiteously, + Wilton was traitor in his heart, + And had made league with Martin Swart, + When he came here on Simnel's part; + And only cowardice did restrain + His rebel aid on Stokefield's plain,-- + And down he threw his glove:--the thing + Was tried, as wont, before the king; + Where frankly did De Wilton own, + That Swart in Guelders he had known; + And that between them then there went + Some scroll of courteous compliment. + For this he to his castle sent; + But when his messenger returned, + Judge how De Wilton's fury burned! + For in his packet there were laid + Letters that claimed disloyal aid, + And proved King Henry's cause betrayed.' p. 272-274. + +In some other places, Mr Scott's love of variety has betrayed him into +strange imitations. This is evidently formed on the school of Sternhold +and Hopkins. + + 'Of all the palaces so fair, + Built for the royal dwelling, + In Scotland, far beyond compare, + Linlithgow is excelling.' + +The following is a sort of mongrel between the same school, and the +later one of Mr Wordsworth. + + 'And Bishop Gawin, as he rose, + Said--Wilton, grieve not for thy woes, + Disgrace, and trouble; + For He, who honour best bestows, + May give thee double.' + +There are many other blemishes, both of taste and of diction, which we +had marked for reprehension, but now think it unnecessary to specify; +and which, with some of those we have mentioned, we are willing to +ascribe to the haste in which much of the poem seems evidently to have +been composed. Mr Scott knows too well what is due to the public, to +make any boast of the rapidity with which his works are written; but the +dates and the extent of his successive publications show sufficiently +how short a time could be devoted to each; and explain, though they do +not apologize for, the many imperfections with which they have been +suffered to appear. He who writes for immortality should not be sparing +of time; and if it be true, that in every thing which has a principle of +life, the period of gestation and growth bears some proportion to that +of the whole future existence, the author now before us should tremble +when he looks back on the miracles of his own facility. + +We have dwelt longer on the beauties and defects of this poem, than we +are afraid will be agreeable either to the partial or the indifferent; +not only because we look upon it as a misapplication, in some degree, of +very extraordinary talents, but because we cannot help considering it as +the foundation of a new school, which may hereafter occasion no little +annoyance both to us and to the public. Mr Scott has hitherto filled the +whole stage himself; and the very splendour of his success has probably +operated, as yet, rather to deter, than to encourage, the herd of rivals +and imitators: but if, by the help of the good parts of his poem, he +succeeds in suborning the verdict of the public in favour of the bad +parts also, and establishes an indiscriminate taste for chivalrous +legends and romances in irregular rhime, he may depend upon having as +many copyists as Mrs Radcliffe or Schiller, and upon becoming the +founder of a new schism in the catholic poetical church, for which, in +spite of all our exertions, there will probably be no cure, but in the +extravagance of the last and lowest of its followers. It is for this +reason that we conceive it to be our duty to make one strong effort to +bring back the great apostle of the heresy to the wholesome creed of +his instructors, and to stop the insurrection before it becomes +desperate and senseless, by persuading the leader to return to his duty +and allegiance. We admire Mr Scott's genius as much as any of those who +may be misled by its perversion; and, like the curate and the barber in +Don Quixote, lament the day when a gentleman of such endowments was +corrupted by the wicked tales of knight-errantry and enchantment. + +We have left ourselves no room to say any thing of the epistolary +effusions which are prefixed to each of the cantos. They certainly are +not among the happiest productions of Mr Scott's muse. They want +interest in the subjects, and finish in the execution. There is too much +of them about the personal and private feelings and affairs of the +author; and too much of the remainder about the most trite commonplaces +of politics and poetry. There is a good deal of spirit, however, and a +good deal of nature intermingled. There is a fine description of St +Mary's loch, in that prefixed to the second canto; and a very pleasing +representation of the author's early tastes and prejudices, in that +prefixed to the third. The last, which is about Christmas, is the worst; +though the first, containing a threnody on Nelson, Pitt, and Fox, +exhibits a more remarkable failure. We are unwilling to quarrel with a +poet on the score of politics; but the manner in which he has chosen to +praise the last of these great men, is more likely, we conceive, to give +offence to his admirers, than the most direct censure. The only deed for +which he is praised, is for having broken off the negotiation for peace; +and for this act of firmness, it is added, Heaven rewarded him with a +share in the honoured grave of Pitt! It is then said, that his errors +should be forgotten, and that he _died_ a Briton--a pretty plain +insinuation, that, in the author's opinion, he did not live one; and +just such an encomium as he himself pronounces over the grave of his +villain hero Marmion. There was no need, surely, to pay compliments to +ministers or princesses, either in the introduction or in the body of a +romance of the 16th century. Yet we have a laboured lamentation over the +Duke of Brunswick, in one of the epistles; and in the heart of the poem, +a triumphant allusion to the siege of Copenhagen--the last exploit, +certainly, of British valour, on which we should have expected a +chivalrous poet to found his patriotic gratulations. We have no +business, however, on this occasion, with the political creed of the +author; and we notice these allusions to objects of temporary interest, +chiefly as instances of bad taste, and additional proofs that the author +does not always recollect, that a poet should address himself to more +than one generation.--_The Edinburgh Review_. + + + + +GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON + + +_Hours of Idleness: A Series of Poems, Original and Translated_. By +GEORGE GORDON, Lord Byron, a Minor. 8vo. pp. 200. Newark. 1807. + +The poesy of this young lord belongs to the class which neither gods nor +men are said to permit. Indeed, we do not recollect to have seen a +quantity of verse with so few deviations in either direction from that +exact standard. His effusions are spread over a dead flat, and can no +more get above or below the level, than if they were so much stagnant +water. As an extenuation of this offence, the noble author is peculiarly +forward in pleading minority. We have it in the title-page, and on the +very back of the volume; it follows his name like a favourite part of +his _style_. Much stress is laid upon it in the preface, and the poems +are connected with this general statement of his case, by particular +dates, substantiating the age at which each was written. Now, the law +upon the point of minority, we hold to be perfectly clear. It is a plea +available only to the defendant; no plaintiff can offer it as a +supplementary ground of action. Thus, if any suit could be brought +against Lord Byron, for the purpose of compelling him to put into court +a certain quantity of poetry; and if judgment were given against him; it +is highly probable that an exception would be taken, were he to deliver +_for poetry_, the contents of this volume. To this he might plead +_minority_; but as he now makes voluntary tender of the article, he hath +no right to sue, on that ground, for the price in good current praise, +should the goods be unmarketable. This is our view of the law on the +point, and, we dare to say, so will it be ruled. Perhaps, however, in +reality, all that he tells us about his youth, is rather with a view to +increase our wonder, than to soften our censures. He possibly means to +say, 'See how a minor can write! This poem was actually composed by a +young man of eighteen, and this by one of only sixteen!'--But, alas, we +all remember the poetry of Cowley at ten, and Pope at twelve; and so far +from hearing, with any degree of surprise, that very poor verses were +written by a youth from his leaving school to his leaving college, +inclusive, we really believe this to be the most common of all +occurrences; that it happens in the life of nine men in ten who are +educated in England; and that the tenth man writes better verse than +Lord Byron. + +His other plea of privilege, our author rather brings forward in order +to wa[i]ve it. He certainly, however, does allude frequently to his +family and ancestors--sometimes in poetry, sometimes in notes; and while +giving up his claim on the score of rank, he takes care to remember us +of Dr Johnson's saying, that when a nobleman appears as an author, his +merit should be handsomely acknowledged. In truth, it is this +consideration only, that induces us to give Lord Byron's poems a place +in our review, beside our desire to counsel him, that he do forthwith +abandon poetry, and turn his talents, which are considerable, and his +opportunities, which are great, to better account. + +With this view, we must beg leave seriously to assure him, that the mere +rhyming of the final syllable, even when accompanied by the presence of +a certain number of feet,--nay, although (which does not always happen) +those feet should scan regularly, and have been all counted accurately +upon the fingers,--is not the whole art of poetry. We would entreat him +to believe, that a certain portion of liveliness, somewhat of fancy, is +necessary to constitute a poem; and that a poem in the present day, to +be read, must contain at least one thought, either in a little degree +different from the ideas of former writers, or differently expressed. We +put it to his candour, whether there is any thing so deserving the name +of poetry in verses like the following, written in 1806, and whether, if +a youth of eighteen could say any thing so uninteresting to his +ancestors, a youth of nineteen should publish it. + + 'Shades of heroes, farewell! your descendant, departing + From the seat of his ancestors, bids you, adieu! + Abroad, or at home, your remembrance imparting + New courage, he'll think upon glory, and you. + + Though a tear dim his eye, at this sad separation, + 'Tis nature, not fear, that excites his regret: + Far distant he goes, with the same emulation; + The fame of his fathers he ne'er can forget. + + That fame, and that memory, still will he cherish, + He vows, that he ne'er will disgrace your renown; + Like you will he live, or like you will he perish; + When decay'd, may he mingle his dust with your own.' p. 3. + +Now we positively do assert, that there is nothing better than these +stanzas in the whole compass of the noble minor's volume. + +Lord Byron should also have a care of attempting what the greatest poets +have done before him, for comparisons (as he must have had occasion to +see at his writing-master's) are odious.--Gray's Ode on Eton College, +should really have kept out the ten hobbling stanzas 'on a distant view +of the village and school of Harrow.' + + 'Where fancy, yet, joys to retrace the resemblance, + Of comrades, in friendship and mischief allied; + How welcome to me, your ne'er fading remembrance, + Which rests in the bosom, though hope is deny'd.' p. 4. + +In like manner the exquisite lines of Mr Rogers, '_On a Tear_,' might +have warned the noble author off those premises, and spared us a whole +dozen such stanzas as the following. + + 'Mild Charity's glow, + To us mortals below, + Shows the soul from barbarity clear; + Compassion will melt, + Where this virtue is felt, + And its dew is diffus'd in a Tear. + + The man doom'd to sail, + With the blast of the gale, + Through billows Atlantic to steer, + As he bends o'er the wave, + Which may soon be his grave, + The green sparkles bright with a Tear.' p. 11. + +And so of instances in which former poets had failed. Thus, we do not +think Lord Byron was made for translating, during his non-age, Adrian's +Address to his Soul, when Pope succeeded so indifferently in the +attempt. If our readers, however, are of another opinion, they may look +at it. + + 'Ah! gentle, fleeting, wav'ring sprite, + Friend and associate of this clay! + To what unknown region borne, + Wilt thou now wing thy distant flight? + No more, with wonted humour gay, + But pallid, cheerless, and forlorn.' p. 72. + +However, be this as it may, we fear his translations and imitations are +great favourites with Lord Byron. We have them of all kinds, from +Anacreon to Ossian; and, viewing them as school exercises, they may +pass. Only, why print them after they have had their day and served +their turn? And why call the thing in p. 79 a translation, where _two_ +words ([Greek: thelo legein]) of the original are expanded into four +lines, and the other thing in p. 81, where [Greek: mesonychtiois poth' +ho rais], is rendered by means of six hobbling verses?--As to his +Ossianic poesy, we are not very good judges, being, in truth, so +moderately skilled in that species of composition, that we should, in +all probability be criticizing some bit of the genuine Macpherson +itself, were we to express our opinion of Lord Byron's rhapsodies. _If_, +then, the following beginning of a 'Song of bards,' is by his Lordship, +we venture to object to it, as far as we can comprehend it. 'What form +rises on the roar of clouds, whose dark ghost gleams on the red stream +of tempests? His voice rolls on the thunder; 'tis Orla, the brown chief +of Otihoma. He was,' &c. After detaining this 'brown chief' some time, +the bards conclude by giving him their advice to 'raise his fair locks;' +then to 'spread them on the arch of the rainbow;' and 'to smile through +the tears of the storm.' Of this kind of thing there are no less than +_nine_ pages; and we can so far venture an opinion in their favour, that +they look very like Macpherson; and we are positive they are pretty +nearly as stupid and tiresome. + +It is a sort of privilege of poets to be egotists; but they should 'use +it as not abusing it;' and particularly one who piques himself (though +indeed at the ripe age of nineteen), of being 'an infant bard,'--('The +artless Helicon I boast is youth;')--should either not know, or should +seem not to know, so much about his own ancestry. Besides a poem above +cited on the family seat of the Byrons, we have another of eleven pages, +on the self-same subject, introduced with an apology, 'he certainly had +no intention of inserting it;' but really, 'the particular request of +some friends,' &c., &c. It concludes with five stanzas on himself, 'the +last and youngest of a noble line.' There is a good deal also about his +maternal ancestors, in a poem on Lachin-y-gair, a mountain where he +spent part of his youth, and might have learned that _pibroch_ is not a +bagpipe, any more than duet means a fiddle. + +As the author has dedicated so large a part of his volume to immortalize +his employments at school and college, we cannot possibly dismiss it +without presenting the reader with a specimen of these ingenious +effusions. In an ode with a Greek motto, called Granta, we have the +following magnificent stanzas. + + 'There, in apartments small and damp, + The candidate for college prizes, + Sits poring by the midnight lamp, + Goes late to bed, yet early rises. + + Who reads false quantities in Sele, + Or puzzles o'er the deep triangle; + Depriv'd of many a wholesome meal, + In barbarous Latin doom'd to wrangle. + + Renouncing every pleasing page, + From authors of historic use; + Preferring to the lettered sage, + The square of the hypothenuse. + + Still harmless are these occupations, + That hurt none but the hapless student, + Compar'd with other recreations + Which bring together the imprudent.' p. 123, 124, 125. + +We are sorry to hear so bad an account of the college psalmody as is +contained in the following Attic stanzas. + + 'Our choir would scarcely be excus'd. + Even as a band of new beginners; + All mercy, now, must be refus'd + To such a set of croaking sinners. + + If David, when his toils were ended, + Had heard these blockheads sing before him + To us, his psalms had ne'er descended, + In furious mood, he would have tore 'em.' p. 126, 127. + +But whatever judgment may be passed on the poems of this noble minor, it +seems we must take them as we find them, and be content; for they are +the last we shall ever have from him. He is at best, he says, but an +intruder into the groves of Parnassus; he never lived in a garret, like +thorough-bred poets; and 'though he once roved a careless mountaineer in +the Highlands of Scotland,' he has not of late enjoyed this advantage. +Moreover, he expects no profit from his publication; and whether it +succeeds or not 'it is highly improbable, from his situation and +pursuits hereafter,' that he should again condescend to become an +author. Therefore, let us take what we get and be thankful. What right +have we poor devils to be nice? We are well off to have got so much from +a man of this Lord's station, who does not live in a garret, but 'has +the sway' of Newstead Abbey. Again we say, let us be thankful; and, with +honest Sancho, bid God bless the giver, nor look the gift horse in the +mouth.--_The Edinburgh Review_. + + +_Childe Harolde's Pilgrimage. A Romaunt_. _By_ LORD BYRON. The Second +Edition. London: Murray, Fleet Street. 1812. 8vo. pp. 300. Price 12s. + +If the object of poetry is to instruct by pleasing, then every poetical +effort has a double claim upon the attention of the Christian observer. +For we are anxious that the world should be instructed at all rates, and +that they should be pleased where they innocently may. We are, +therefore, by no means among those spectators who view the occasional +ascent of a poetic luminary upon the horizon of literature, as a +meteoric flash which has no relation to ourselves; but we feel instantly +an eager desire to find its altitude, to take its bearings, to trace its +course, and to calculate its influence upon surrounding bodies. When +especially it is no more an "oaten reed" that is blown; or a "simple +shepherd" who blows it; but when the song involves many high and solemn +feelings, and a man of rank and notoriety strikes his golden harp, we +feel, at once, that the increased influence of the song demands the more +rigid scrutiny of the critic. + +Lord Byron is the author, beside the book before us, of a small volume +of poems, which gave little promise, we think, of the present work; and +of a satyrical poem, which, as far as temper is concerned, did give some +promise of it. It had pleased more than one critic to treat his +Lordship's first work in no very courtier-like manner; and especially +the Lion of the north had let him feel the lashing of his angry tail. +Not of a temperament to bear calmly even a "look that threatened him +with insult," his Lordship seized the tomahawk of satire, mounted the +fiery wings of his muse, and, like Bonaparte, spared neither rank, nor +sex, nor age, but converted the republic of letters into one universal +field of carnage. The volume called English Bards and Scotch Reviewers +is, in short, to be considered, among other works, as one of those +playful vessels which are said to have accompanied the Spanish armada, +manned by executioners, and loaded with nothing but instruments of +torture. + +This second work was of too sanguinary a complexion to beget a very +pleasant impression upon the public mind; and all men, who wished well +to peace, politeness and literature, joined in the paean sung by the +immediate victims of his Lordship's wrath, when he embarked to soften +his manners, and, as it were, oil his tempers, amidst the gentler +spirits of more southern climes. Travelling, indeed, through any climes, +may be expected to exert this mitigating influence upon the mind. Nature +is so truly gentle, or, to speak more justly, the God of nature displays +so expansive a benevolence in all his works; so prodigally sheds his +blessings "upon the evil and the good;" builds up so many exquisite +fabrics to delight the eyes of his creatures; tinges the flowers with +such colours, and fills the grove with such music; that anyone who +becomes familiar with nature, can scarcely remain angry with man. With +what mitigating touches the scenery of Europe has visited our author, +remains to be seen. That he did not disarm it of its force by regarding +it with a cold or contemptuous eye, he himself teaches us-- + + "Dear Nature is the kindest mother still, + Though always changing in her aspect mild; + From her bare bosom let me take my fill, + Her never-weaned, though not her favoured child. + O she is fairest in her features wild, + Where nothing polished dares pollute her path; + To me by day or night she ever smiled, + Though I have marked her when none other hath, + And sought her more and more, and loved her most in wrath." p. 79. + +Our author having re-landed upon his native shores, his first deed is to +present to his country the work before us, as the fruits of his travels. +It is a kind of poetical journal of journeys and voyages through Spain +and Portugal, along the shores of the Mediterranean and Archipelago, and +through the states of ancient Greece. When we speak of journal, we mean +rather to designate the topics of the work than the manner of its +execution; for it is highly poetical. Most contrary to the spirit of +those less fanciful records, his Lordship sublimely discards all facts +and histories; all incidents; A.M. and P.M.; and bad inns and worse +winds; and battles and feasts. Seizing merely upon the picturesque +features in every object and event before him, he paints and records +them with such reflections, moral or immoral, as arise in his ardent +mind. + +The "Childe Harolde" is the traveller; and as he is a mighty surly +fellow, neither loves nor is loved by any one; "through sin's long +labyrinth had run, nor made atonement when he did amiss;" as, moreover, +he is licentious and sceptical; Lord Byron very naturally, and +creditably to himself, sets out in his Preface with disclaiming any +connection with this imaginary personage. It is somewhat singular, +however, that most of the offensive reflections in the poem are made, +not by the "Childe," but the poet. + +[Here follows a summary of the two cantos, with extensive quotations.] + +Having by these extracts endeavoured to put our readers in possession of +some of the finest parts of this poem, and also of those passages which +determine its moral complexion, we shall proceed to offer a few remarks +upon its character and pretensions in both points of view. + +The poem is in the stanza of Spenser--a stanza of which we think it +difficult to say whether the excellencies or defects are the greatest. +The paramount advantage is the variety of tone and pause of which it +admits. The great disadvantages are, the constraint of such complicated +rhymes, and the long suspension of the sense, especially in the latter +half of the stanza. The noblest conception and most brilliant diction +must be sacrificed, if four words in one place, and three in another +cannot be found rhyming to each other. And as to the suspension of the +sense, we are persuaded that no man reads a single stanza without +feeling a sort of strain upon the intellect and lungs--a kind of +suffocation of mind and body, before he can either discover the +lingering meaning, or pronounce the nine lines. To us, we confess that +the rhyming couplets of Mr. Scott, sometimes deviating into alternate +rhymes, are, on both accounts, infinitely preferable. One of the ends of +poetry is to relax, and the artificial and elaborate stanza of Spenser +costs us too much trouble, even in the reading, to accomplish this end. +To effect this, the sense should come to us, instead of our going far +and wide in quest of the sense. In our conception also, the heroic line +of ten syllables, though favourable to the most dignified order of +poetry, appears to limp when forced into the service of sonneteers: and +poems in the metre before us, are, after all, little better than a +string of sonnets; of which it is the constituent principle to be rather +pretty than grand--rather tender than martial--rather conceited than +wise--to keep the sense suspended for eight lines, and to discharge it +with a point in the ninth. These observations are by no means designed +to apply especially to the author--the extreme gravity of whose general +manner and matter, in a measure covet the dignity of the heroic line. +But it is this discordancy of measure and subject, together with the +obviously laboured rhymes and the halting of the sense, which in +general, we think, have shut out the Spenserian school from popular +reading, and have caused a distinguished critic[J] to say, that the +"Faiery Queen will not often be read through;" and that, although it +maintains its place upon the shelf, it is seldom found on the table of +the modern library. + +Whilst, however, Lord Byron participates in this defect of his great +original, he is to be congratulated, as a poet, but alas! in his +poetical character alone, on much happy deviation from him. In the first +place, he has altogether washed his hands of allegory; a species of +fiction open to a thousand objections. In the next place, he is +infinitely more brief than his prototype. And in the third place, he +philosophizes and moralizes (though not indeed in a very sound strain), +as well as paints--provides food for the mind as well as the +eye--kindles the feeling as well as gratifies the sense. Thus far, then, +we are among the admirers of his Lordship. But it is to be lamented, +that what was well conceived is, from the temperament of his mind, ill +executed; that his philosophy is, strictly speaking, "only philosophy so +called;" that the moral emotions he feels, and is likely to communicate, +are of a character rather to offend and pollute the mind, than to sooth +or to improve it. This defect, however, we fear, is to be charged, not +upon the poet, but upon the man, at least upon his principles. But, +whatever be the cause, the consequences are dreadful. Indeed, we do not +hesitate to say, that the temperament of his mind is the ruin of his +poem. We shall take the liberty, as we have intimated, of touching upon +these defects as moral delinquincies, under another head; but for the +present we wish to notice them merely as poetical errors. + +The legitimate object, then, of poetry, as we have said, is to +_instruct_ by _pleasing_; and, caeteris paribus, that poem is the best +which conveys the noblest lessons in the most attractive form. If, in +reply to this, it is urged that the heathen poets, and especially Homer, +taught no lesson to his readers; we answer, that he taught all the +lessons which, in his own days, were deemed of highest importance to his +country. The first object of philosophers and other teachers, in those +days, was to make good soldiers, and therefore to condemn the vices +which interfered with successful warfare. Now be it remembered, that the +grand topic of the Iliad is the fatal influence of the wrath of kings on +the success of armies. Its first words are [Greek: MENIN aeide]. Besides +this, the Iliad upholds the national mythology, or the only accredited +religion; and by a bold fiction, bordering upon truth, displays in an +Elysium and Tartarus, the eternal mansions of the good and bad, the +strongest incentive to virtue and penalty to vice. Indeed, that both +this and the Odyssey had a moral object, and that this object was +recognized by the ancients, may be inferred from Horace, who says of +Homer, in reference to the first poem: + + "Qui, quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non, + Plenius ac melius Chrysippo aut Crantore dicit." + +And as to the second: + + "Rursum--quid virtus, et quid sapientia possit, + Utile proposuit nobis exemplar Ulyssem." Epist. I. 2. + +Many of the Odes of Horace had a patriotic subject--his Epistles and +Satires, with those of Juvenal and Persius, were the sermons of the +day. Virgil chiefly proposed to himself to exalt in his hero the +character of a patriot, and, in his fictitious history, the dignity of +his country. If the lessons they taught were of small importance or +doubtful value, or if they often forget to "teach" in their ambition to +"please," this is to be charged rather on the age than on the poet. They +taught the best lessons they knew; and were satisfied to please only +when they had nothing better to do. In modern times, it will not be +questioned that the greatest poets have ever endeavoured to enshrine +some moral or intellectual object in their verse. Milton calls Spenser +"our sage serious Spenser, whom I dare be known to think a better +teacher than Scotus or Aquinas." In like manner, the Absalom and +Achitophel, the Hind and Panther of Dryden, the philosophic strain of +Pope, the immortal page of Milton, and the half-inspired numbers of the +Task, are all, in their various ways, attempts of poets to improve or +reform the world. Every species of poetry, indeed, has received fresh +lustre, and even taken a new place in Parnassian dignity, by a larger +infusion of moral sentiment into its numbers. The ancient ballad has +arisen to new dignity through the moral touches, we wish they had been +less rare, of a Scott; and the stanza of Spenser has acquired new +interest in the hands of Lord Byron, from the philosophical air which it +wears. Numbers without morals are the man without "the glory." We +sincerely wish that the moral tone of his Lordship's poem had been less +liable to exception. + +His Lordship, we believe, is acquainted with ancient authors. Let him +turn to Quinctilian, and he will find a whole chapter to prove that a +great writer must be a good man. Let him go to Longinus, and he will +read that a man who would write sublimely, "must spare no labour to +educate his soul to grandeur, and impregnate it with great and generous +ideas"--that "the faculties of the soul will then grow stupid, their +spirit will be lost, and good sense and genius lie in ruins, when the +care and study of man is engaged about the mortal, the worthless part of +himself, and he has ceased to cultivate virtue, and polish his nobler +part, his soul." Or, if poetical authority alone will satisfy a poet, +let him learn from one of the finest of our modern poems: + + "But of our souls the high-born loftier part, + Th' ethereal energies that touch the heart, + Conceptions ardent, laboring thought intense, + Creative fancy's wild magnificence, + And all the dread sublimities of song: + These, Virtue, these to thee alone belong: + Chill'd, by the breath of vice, their radiance dies, + And brightest burns when lighted at the skies: + Like vestal flames to purest bosoms given, + And kindled only by a ray from heaven."[K] + +That the object of poetry, however, is not simply to instruct, but to +"instruct by _pleasing_," is too obvious to need a proof. However the +original object of measure and rhythm may have been to graft truth on +the memory, and associate it with music; they are perpetuated by the +universal conviction that they delight the ear. Like the armour which +adorns the modern hall, they were contrived for use, but are continued +for ornament. + +Assuming this, then, to be a just definition of poetry, we repeat our +assertion, that, in the work before us, the temperament of mind in the +poet creates the grand defect of the poetry. If poetry should instruct, +then he is a defective poet whose lessons rather revolt than improve the +mind. If poetry should please, then he is a bad poet who offends the +eye by calling up the most hideous images--who shews the world through a +discoloured medium--who warms the heart by no generous feelings--who +uniformly turns to us the worst side of men and things--who goes on his +way grumbling, and labours hard to make his readers as peevish and +wretched as himself. The tendency of the strain of Homer is to transform +us for the moment into heroes; of Cowper, into saints; of Milton, into +angels: but Lord Byron would almost degrade us into a Thersites or a +Caliban; or lodge us, as fellow-grumblers, in the style of Diogenes, or +any of his two or four-footed snarling or moody posterity. Now his +Lordship, we trust, is accessible upon much higher grounds; but he will +perceive that mere regard for his poetical reputation ought to induce +him to change his manner. If, as Longinus instructs us, a man must feel +sublimely to write sublimely, a poet must find pleasure in the objects +of nature before him, if he hope to give pleasure to others. Let him +remember, that not merely his conceptions, but his mind and character +are to be imparted to us in his verse. He will, in a measure, "stamp an +image of himself!" The fire with which we are to glow must issue from +him. Till this change take place in him, then, he can be no great poet. +It is Heraclitus who mourns in his pages, or Zeno who scolds, or Zoilus +who lashes; but we look in vain for the poet, for the living fountain of +our innocent pleasures, for the artificer of our literary delight, for +the hand which, as by enchantment, snatches us from the little cares of +life, whirls us into the boundless regions of imagination, "exhausting" +one "world," and imagining others, to supply pictures which may refresh +and charm the mind.[L] Lord Byron shews us man and nature, like the +phantasmagoria, _in shade_; whereas, in poetry at least, we desire to +see them illuminated by all the friendly rays which a benevolent +imagination can impart. + +We have hitherto confined ourselves to an examination of the influence +of the principles and temper of this work upon its literary pretensions; +but his Lordship will forgive us if we now put off the mere critic for a +moment, and address him in that graver character which we assume to +ourselves in the title of our work. In truth, we are deeply affected by +the spectacle his poem presents to us. As the minor poems at the +conclusion of the work breathe the same spirit, suggest the same doubts, +and employ the same language with the "Childe Harold" we are compelled +to recognise the author in the hero whom he has painted. In fact, the +disclaimer, already noticed in the Preface, seems merely like one of +those veils worn to draw attention to the face rather than to baffle it: +and in the work before us we are forced to recognise a character, which, +since Rousseau gave his Confessions to the public, has scarcely ever, we +think, darkened the horizon of letters. The reader of the "Confessions" +is dismayed to find a man frankly avowing the most disgraceful vices; +abandoning them, not upon principle, but merely because they have ceased +to gratify; prepared to return to them if they promise to reward him +better; without natural affection, neither loving, nor beloved by any; +without peace, without hope, "without God in the world." When we search +into the mysterious cause of this autobiographical phenomenon, we at +once discover that Rousseau's immeasurable vanity betrayed him into a +belief, that even his vices would vanish in the blaze of his +excellencies; and that the world would worship him, as idolaters do +their mishapen gods, in spite of their ugliness. The confessions of +Lord Byron, we regret to say, bear something of an analogy to those of +the philosopher of Geneva. Are they, then, to be traced to the _same +source_? He plainly is far from indifferent to the opinion of +by-standers: can he, then, conceive that this peep into the window of +his breast must not revolt every virtuous eye? Can he boldly proclaim +his violations of decency and of sobriety; his common contempt for all +modifications of religion; his monstrous belief in the universal rest or +annihilation of man in a future state; and forget that he is one of +those who + + "Play such tricks before high heaven, + As make the angels weep;" + +as offend against all moral taste; as attempt to shake the very pillars +of domestic happiness and of public security? + +It is, however, a matter of congratulation, that his Lordship, in common +with the republican Confessor, has not revealed his creed without very +honestly displaying the influence of this creed upon his own mind. We +should not, indeed, have credited a man of his sentiments, had he +assured us he was happy: happiness takes no root in such soils. But it +is still better to have his own testimony to the unmixed misery of +licentiousness and unbelief. It is almost comforting to be told, if we +dared to draw comfort out of the well of another man's miseries, that + + "Though gay companions o'er the bowl + Dispel awhile the sense of ill; + Though pleasure fires the maddening soul, + The heart--the heart is lonely still." + +It is consolatory also to contrast the peace and triumph of the dying +Christian, with the awful uncertainty, or rather the sullen despair, +which breathe in these verses. + + "'Aye--but to die and go'--alas, + Where all have gone, and all must go; + To be the nothing that I was, + Ere born to life and living woe. + + "Count o'er the joys thine hours have seen, + Count o'er thy days from anguish free; + And know, whatever thou hast been, + 'Tis something better not to be." + +Nor can religion be more powerfully recommended than by the following +avowal of an apostle of the opposite system. + + "No, for myself, so dark my fate + Through every turn of life has been, + Man and the world I so much hate, + I care not when I quit the scene." + +But whilst, for the benefit of others, we thus avail ourselves of the +antidote supplied by his Lordship to his own poison, we would wish also +that he might feel the efficacy of it himself. Could we hope that so +humble a work as this would reach the lofty sphere in which he moves, we +would solemnly say to him: "You are wretched, but will nothing make you +happy? You hate all men; will nothing warm you with new feelings? You +are (as you say) hated by all; will nothing make you an object of +affection? Suppose yourself the victim of some disease, which resisted +many ordinary applications; but that all who used one medicine uniformly +pronounced themselves cured:--would it be worthy of a philosopher not +merely to neglect the remedy, but to traduce it? Such, however, my Lord, +is the fatuity of your own conduct as to the religion of Christ. +Thousands, as wretched as yourself, have found 'a Comforter' in Him; +thousands, having stepped into these waters, have been healed of their +disease; thousands, touching the hem of His garment, have found 'virtue +go out of it.' Beggared then of every other resource, try this. +'Acquaint yourself with God, and be at peace.'" His Lordship may +designate this language by that expressive monosyllable, cant; and may +possibly, before long, hunt us down, as a sort of mad March hare, with +the blood-hounds of his angry muse. But we hope better things of him. We +assure him, that, whatever may be true of others, we do not "hate him." +As Christians, even he who professes to be unchristian is dear to us. We +regard the waste of his fine talents, and the laboured suppression and +apparent extinction of his better feelings, with the deepest +commiseration and sorrow. We long to see him escape from the black cloud +which, by what may fairly be called his "black art," he has conjured up +around himself. We hope to know him as a future buttress of his shaken +country, and as a friend of his yet "unknown God." Should this change, +by the mercy of God, take place, what pangs would many passages of his +present work cost him! Happy should we be, could we persuade him, in the +bare anticipation of such a change, even now to contrive for his future +happiness, by expunging sentiments that would then so much embitter it. +Should he never change; yet, such an act would prove, that, at least, he +meditated no cruel invasion upon the joys of others. Even Rousseau +taught his child religion, as a delusion essential to happiness. The +philosophic Tully also, if a belief in futurity were an error, deemed it +one with which it was impossible to part. Let the author then, at all +events, leave us in unmolested possession of our supposed privileges. +_He_ plainly knows no noble or "royal way" to happiness. _We_ find in +religion a bark that rides the waves in every storm; a sun that never +goes down; a living fountain of waters. Religion is suffered to change +its aspect and influence according to the eye and faith of the +examiner. Like one side of the pillar of the wilderness, it may merely +darken and perplex his Lordship's path: to millions it is like the +opposite side of that pillar to the Israelites, the symbol of Deity; the +pillar of hallowed flame, which lights and guides, and cheers them as +they toil onward through the pilgrimage of life. Could we hear any voice +proclaim of him, as of one reclaimed from as inveterate, though more +honest, prejudices, "behold, he prayeth;" we should hope that here also +the scales would drop from the eyes, and his Lordship become an eloquent +defender and promulgator of the religion which he now scorns.--_The +Christian Observer_. + +[Footnote J: Hume.] + +[Footnote K: Grant's Restoration of Learning in the East.] + +[Footnote L: We cannot resist the temptation of saying, that in this +highest department of the poet's art, we know of no living poet who will +bear a comparison with Mr. Southey.] + + + + +PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY + + +_Alastor_; or, The Spirit of Solitude; and other Poems. By Percy Bysshe +Shelley. Crown 8vo. pp. 101. Baldwin, and Co. 1816. + +We must candidly own that these poems are beyond our comprehension; and +we did not obtain a clue to their sublime obscurity, till an address to +Mr. Wordsworth explained in what school the author had formed his taste. +We perceive, through the "darkness visible" in which Mr. Shelley veils +his subject, some beautiful imagery and poetical expressions: but he +appears to be a poet "whose eye, in a fine phrenzy rolling," seeks only +such objects as are "above this visible diurnal sphere;" and therefore +we entreat him, for the sake of his reviewers as well as of his other +readers, (if he has any,) to subjoin to his next publication an _ordo_, +a glossary, and copious notes, illustrative of his allusions and +explanatory of his meaning.--_The Monthly Review_. + + +_The Cenci. A Tragedy, in Five Acts_. By PERCY BYSSHE SHELL[E]Y. Italy. +1819. pp. 104. + +There has lately arisen a new-fangled style of poetry, facetiously +yclept the Cockney School, that it would really be worth any one's while +to enter as a candidate. The qualifications are so easy, that he need +never doubt the chance of his success, for he has only to knock, and it +shall be opened unto him. The principal requisites for admission, in a +literary point of view, are as follows. First, an inordinate share of +affectation and conceit, with a few occasional good things sprinkled, +like green spots of verdure in a wilderness, with a "parca quod satis +est manu." Secondly, a prodigious quantity of assurance, that neither +God nor man can daunt, founded on the honest principle of "who is like +unto me?" and lastly, a contempt for all institutions, moral and divine, +with secret yearnings for aught that is degrading to human nature, or +revolting to decency. These qualifications ensured, a regular initiation +into the Cockney mysteries follows as a matter of course, and the novice +enlists himself under their banners, proud of his newly-acquired honors, +and starched up to the very throat in all the prim stiffness of his +intellect. A few symptoms of this literary malady appeared as early as +the year 1795, but it then assumed the guise of simplicity and pathos. +It was a poetical Lord Fanny. It wept its pretty self to death by +murmuring brooks, and rippling cascades, it heaved delicious sighs over +sentimental lambs, and love-lorn sheep, apostrophized donkies in the +innocence of primaeval nature; sung tender songs to tender nightingales; +went to bed without a candle, that it might gaze on the chubby faces of +the stars; discoursed sweet nothings to all who would listen to its +nonsense; and displayed (_horrendum dictu_) the acute profundity of its +grief in ponderous folios and spiral duodecimos. The literary world, +little suspecting the dangerous consequences of this distressing malady, +suffered it to germinate in silence; and not until they became +thoroughly convinced that the disorder was of an epidemical nature, did +they start from their long continued lethargy. But it was then too late! +The evil was incurable; it branched out into the most vigorous +ramifications, and following the scriptural admonition, "Increase and +multiply," disseminated its poetry and its prose throughout a great part +of England. As a dog, when once completely mad, is never satisfied until +he has bitten half a dozen more, so the Cockney professors, in laudable +zeal for the propagation of their creed, were never at rest until they +had spread their own doctrines around them. They stood on the house tops +and preached, 'till of a verity they were black in the face with the +heating quality of their arguments; they stationed themselves by the bye +roads and hedges, to discuss the beauties of the country; they looked +out from their garrett [_sic_] windows in Grub-street, and exclaimed, +"_O! rus, quando ego te aspiciam_;" and gave such afflicting tokens of +insanity, that the different reviewers and satirists of the day kindly +laced them in the strait jackets of their criticism. "But all this +availeth _us_ nothing," exclaimed the critics, "so long as _we_ see +Mordecai the Jew sitting at the gate of the Temple; that is to say, as +long as there is one Cockney pericranium left unscalped by the tomahawks +of our satire." But notwithstanding the strenuous exertions of all those +whose brains have not been cast in the mould of this new species of +intellectual dandyism, the evil has been daily and even hourly +increasing; and so prodigious is the progressive ratio of its march, +that the _worthy_ Society for the Suppression of Vice should be called +upon to eradicate it. It now no longer masks its real intentions under +affected purity of sentiment; its countenance has recently acquired a +considerable addition of brass, the glitter of which has often been +mistaken for sterling coin, and incest, adultery, murder, blasphemy, are +among other favorite topics of its discussion. It seems to delight in an +utter perversion of all moral, intellectual, and religious qualities. It +gluts over the monstrous deformities of nature; finds gratification in +proportion to the magnitude of the crime it extolls; and sees no virtue +but in vice; no sin, but in true feeling. Like poor Tom, in Lear, whom +the foul fiend has possessed for many a day, it will run through +ditches, through quagmires, and through bogs, to see a man stand on his +head for the exact space of half an hour. Ask the reason of this raging +appetite for eccentricity, the answer is, such a thing is out of the +beaten track of manhood, _ergo_, it is praiseworthy. + +Among the professors of the Cockney school, Mr. Percy Bysshe Shell[e]y +is one of the most conspicuous. With more fervid imagination and +splendid talents than nine-tenths of the community, he yet prostitutes +those talents by the utter degradation to which he unequivocally +consigns them. His Rosalind and Helen, his Revolt of Islam, and his +Alastor, or the Spirit of Solitude, while they possess beauties of a +superior order, are lamentably deficient in morality and religion. The +doctrines they inculcate are of the most evil tendency; the characters +they depict are of the most horrible description; but in the midst of +these disgraceful passages, there are beauties of such exquisite, such +redeeming qualities, that we adore while we pity--we admire while we +execrate--and are tempted to exclaim with the last of the Romans, "Oh! +what a fall is _here_, my countrymen." In the modern Eclogue of Rosalind +and Helen in particular, there is a pensive sadness, a delicious +melancholy, nurst in the purest, the deepest recesses of the heart, and +springing up like a fountain in the desert, that pervades the poem, and +forms its principal attraction. The rich yet delicate imagery that is +every where scattered over it, is like the glowing splendor of the +setting sun, when he retires to rest, amid the blessings of exulting +nature. It is the balmy breath of the summer breeze, the twilight's last +and holiest sigh. In the dramatic poem before us, the interest is of a +different nature; it is dark--wild, and unearthly. The characters that +appear in it are of no mortal stamp; they are daemons in human guise, +inscrutable in their actions, subtle in their revenge. Each has his +smile of awful meaning--his purport of hellish tendency. The tempest +that rages in his bosom is irrepressible but by death. The phrenzied +groan that diseased imagination extorts from his perverted soul, is as +the thunder-clap that reverberates amid the cloud-capt summits of the +Alps. It is the storm that convulses all nature--that lays bare the face +of heaven, and gives transient glimpses of destruction yet to be. Then +in the midst of all these accumulated horrors comes the gentle Beatrice, + + "Who in the gentleness of thy sweet youth + Hast never trodden on a worm, or bruised + A living flower, but thou hast pitied it + With needless tears." Page 50. + +She walks in the light of innocence; in the unclouded sunshine of +loveliness and modesty; but her felicity is transient as the calm that +precedes the tempest; and in the very whispers of her virtue, you hear +the indistinct muttering of the distant thunder. She is conceived in +the true master spirit of genius; and in the very instant of her +parricide, comes home to our imagination fresh in the spring time of +innocence--hallowed in the deepest recesses of melancholy. But +notwithstanding all these transcendant qualities, there are numerous +passages that warrant our introductory observations respecting the +Cockney school, and plunge "full fathom five," into the profoundest +depths of the Bathos. While, therefore, we do justice to the abilities +of the author, we shall bestow a passing smile or two on his unfortunate +Cockney propensities. + +The following are the principal incidents of the play. Count Cenci, the +_daemon_ of the piece, delighted with the intelligence of the death of +two of his sons, recounts at a large assembly, specially invited for the +purpose, the circumstances of the dreadful transaction. Lucretia, his +wife, Beatrice, his daughter, and the other guests, are of course +startled at his transports; but when they hear his awful imprecations, + + "Oh, thou bright wine whose purple splendor leaps + And bubbles gaily in this golden bowl + Under the lamp light, as my spirits do, + To hear the death of my accursed sons! + Could I believe thou wert their mingled blood, + Then would I taste thee like a sacrament, + And pledge with thee the mighty Devil in Hell, + Who, if a father's curses, as men say, + Climb with swift wings after their children's souls, + And drag them from the very throne of Heaven, + Now triumphs in my triumph!--But thou art + Superfluous; I have drunken deep of joy + And I will taste no other wine tonight--" + +their horror induces them to leave the room. Beatrice, in the meantime, +who has been rating her parent for his cruelty, is subjected to every +species of insult; and he sends her to her own apartment, with the +hellish intention of prostituting her innocence, and contaminating, as +he pithily expresses it, "both body and soul." The second act introduces +us to a tete-a-tete between Bernardo (another of Cenci's sons) and +Lucretia; when their conference is suddenly broken off, by the abrupt +entrance of Beatrice, who has escaped from the pursuit of the Count. She +recapitulates the injuries she has received from her father, the most +atrocious of which appear to be, that he has given them all "ditch +water" to drink, and "buffalos" to eat. But before we proceed further, +we have a word or two respecting this same ditch water, and buffalo's +flesh, which we shall mention, as a piece of advice to the author. It is +well known, we believe, in a case of lunacy, that the first thing +considered is, whether the patient has done any thing sufficiently +foolish, to induce his relatives to apply for a statute against him: now +any malicious, evil-minded person, were he so disposed, might make +successful application to the court against the luckless author of the +_Cenci, a tragedy in five acts_. Upon which the judge with all the +solemnity suitable to so melancholy a circumstance as the decay of the +mental faculties, would ask for proofs of the defendant's lunacy; upon +which the plaintiff would produce the affecting episode of the ditch +water and buffalo flesh; upon which the judge would shake his head, and +acknowledge the insanity; upon which the defendant would be incarcerated +in Bedlam. + +To return from this digression, we are next introduced to Giacomo, +another of Cenci's hopeful progeny, who, like the rest, has a dreadful +tale to unfold of his father's cruelty towards him. Orsino, the favored +lover of Beatrice, enters at the moment of his irritation; and by the +most artful pleading ultimately incites him to the murder of his +father, in which he is to be joined by the rest of the family. The plot, +after one unlucky attempt, succeeds; and at the moment of its +accomplishment, is discovered by a messenger, who is despatched to the +lonely castle of Petrella (one of the Count's family residences), with a +summons of attendance from the Pope. We need hardly say that the +criminals are condemned; and not even the lovely Beatrice is able to +escape the punishment of the law. The agitation she experiences after +the commission of the incest, is powerfully descriptive. + + "How comes this hair undone? + Its wandering strings must be what blind me so, + And yet I tied it fast.--O, horrible! + The pavement sinks under my feet! The walls + Spin round! I see a woman weeping there, + And standing calm and motionless, whilst I + Slide giddily as the world reels--My God! + The beautiful blue heaven is flecked with blood! + The sunshine on the floor is black! The air + Is changed to vapours such as the dead breathe + In charnel pits! Pah! I am choaked! There creeps + A clinging, black, contaminating mist + About me--'tis substantial, heavy, thick, + I cannot pluck it from me, for it glues + My fingers and my limbs to one another, + And eats into my sinews, and dissolves + My flesh to a pollution, poisoning + The subtle, pure, and inmost spirit of life!" + +At first she concludes that she is mad; but then pathetically checks +herself by saying, "No, I am dead." Lucretia naturally enough inquires +into the cause of her disquietude, and but too soon discovers, by the +broken hints of the victim, the source of her mental agitation. +Terrified at their defenceless state, they then mutually conspire with +Orsino against the Count; and Beatrice proposes to way-lay him (a plot, +however, which fails) in a _deep and dark ravine_, as he journeys to +Petrella. + + "But I remember + Two miles on this side of the fort, the road + Crosses a deep ravine; 'tis rough and narrow, + And winds with short turns down the precipice; + And in its depth there is a mighty rock, + Which has, from unimaginable years, + Sustained itself with terror and with toil + Over a gulph, and with the agony + With which it clings seems slowly coming down; + Even as a wretched soul hour after hour, + Clings to the mass of life; yet clinging, leans; + And leaning, makes more dark the dread abyss + In which it fears to fall: beneath this crag + Huge as despair, as if in weariness, + The melancholy mountain yawns--below, + You hear but see not an impetuous torrent + Raging among the caverns, and a bridge + Crosses the chasm; and high above there grow, + With intersecting trunks, from crag to crag, + Cedars, and yews, and pines; whose tangled hair + Is matted in one solid roof of shade + By the dark ivy's twine. At noon day here + 'Tis twilight, and at sunset blackest night." + +Giacomo, meanwhile, who was privy to the transaction, awaits the arrival +of Orsino, with intelligence of the murder, in a state of the most +fearful torture and suspence. + + "Tis midnight, and Orsino comes not yet. + (_Thunder, and the sound of a storm._) + What! can the everlasting elements + Feel with a worm like man? If so, the shaft + Of mercy-winged lightning would not fall + On stones and trees. My wife and children sleep: + They are now living in unmeaning dreams: + But I must wake, still doubting if that deed + Be just which was most necessary. O, + Thou unreplenished lamp! whose narrow fire + Is shaken by the wind, and on whose edge + Devouring darkness hovers! Thou small flame, + Which, as a dying pulse rises and falls, + Still flickerest up and down, how very soon, + Did I not feed thee, thou wouldst fail and be + As thou hadst never been! So wastes and sinks + Even now, perhaps, the life that kindled mine: + But that no power can fill with vital oil + That broken lamp of flesh. Ha! 'tis the blood + Which fed these veins that ebbs till all is cold: + It is the form that moulded mine that sinks + Into the white and yellow spasms of death: + It is the soul by which mine was arrayed + In God's immortal likeness which now stands + Naked before Heaven's judgment seat! + (_a bell strikes_) + One! Two! + The hours crawl on; and when my hairs are white + My son will then perhaps be waiting thus. + Tortured between just hate and vain remorse; + Chiding the tardy messenger of news + Like those which I expect. I almost wish + He be not dead, although my wrongs are great; + Yet--'tis Orsino's step." + +We envy not the feelings of any one who can read the curses that Cenci +invokes on his daughter, when she refuses to repeat her guilt, without +the strongest disgust, notwithstanding the intense vigor of the +imprecations + + "_Cen._ (_Kneeling_) God! + Hear me! If this most specious mass of flesh, + Which thou hast made my daughter; this my blood, + This particle of my divided being; + Or rather, this my bane and my disease, + Whose sight infects and poisons me; this devil + Which sprung from me as from a hell, was meant + To aught good use; if her bright loveliness + Was kindled to illumine this dark world; + If nursed by thy selectest dew of love + Such virtues blossom in her as should make + The peace of life, I pray thee for my sake + As thou the common God and Father art + Of her, and me, and all; reverse that doom! + Earth, in the name of God, let her food be + Poison, until she be encrusted round + With leprous stains! Heaven, rain upon her head + The blistering drops of the Maremma's dew, + Till she be speckled like a toad; parch up + Those love-enkindled lips, warp those fine limbs + To loathed lameness! All beholding sun, + Strike in thine envy those life darting eyes + With thine own blinding beams! + _Lucr._ Peace! Peace! + For thine own sake unsay those dreadful words. + When high God grants he punishes such prayers. + _Cen._ (_Leaping up, and throwing his right hand toward Heaven_) + He does his will, I mine! This in addition, + That if she have a child-- + _Lucr._ Horrible thought! + _Cen._ That if she ever have a child; and thou, + Quick Nature! I adjure thee by thy God, + That thou be fruitful in her, and encrease + And multiply, fulfilling his command, + And my deep imprecation! May it be + A hideous likeness of herself, that as + From a distorting mirror, she may see + Her image mixed with what she most abhors, + Smiling upon her from her nursing breast. + And that the child may from its infancy + Grow, day by day, more wicked and deformed, + Turning her mother's love to misery: + And that both she and it may live until + It shall repay her care and pain with hate, + Or what may else be more unnatural. + So he may hunt her thro' the clamorous scoffs + Of the loud world to a dishonoured grave. + Shall I revoke this curse? Go, bid her come, + Before my words are chronicled in Heaven. + (_Exit_ LUCRETIA.) + I do not feel as if I were a man, + But like a fiend appointed to chastise + The offences of some unremembered world. + My blood is running up and down my veins; + A fearful pleasure makes it prick and tingle: + I feel a giddy sickness of strange awe; + My heart is beating with an expectation + Of horrid joy." + +_Ohe! jam satis est!!_--The _minutiae_ of this _affectionate_ parent's +curses forcibly remind us of the equally minute excommunication so +admirably recorded in Tristram Shandy. But Sterne has the start of him; +for though Percy Bysshe Shell[e]y, Esquire, has contrived to include in +the imprecations of Cenci, the eyes, head, lips, and limbs of his +daughter, the other has anticipated his measures, in formally and +specifically anathematizing the lights, lungs, liver, and _all odd +joints_, without excepting even the great toe of his victim.--To proceed +in our review; the dying expostulations of poor Beatrice, are beautiful +and affecting, though occasionally tinged with the Cockney style of +burlesque; for instance, Bernado asks, when they tear him from the +embraces of his sister, + + "Would ye divide body from soul?" + +On which the judge sturdily replies--"That is the headsman's business." +The idea of approaching execution paralyses the soul of Beatrice, and +she thus frantically expresses her horror. + + "_Beatr._ (_Wildly_) Oh, + My God! Can it be possible I have + To die so suddenly? So young to go + Under the obscure, cold, rotting, wormy ground! + To be nailed down into a narrow place; + To see no more sweet sunshine; hear no more + Blithe voice of living thing; muse not again + Upon familiar thoughts, sad, yet thus lost. + How fearful! to be nothing! Or to be-- + What? O, where am I? Let me not go mad! + Sweet Heaven, forgive weak thoughts! If there should be + No God, no Heaven, no Earth in the void world; + The wide, grey, lampless, deep, unpeopled world! + If all things then should be--my father's spirit + His eye, his voice, his touch surrounding me; + The atmosphere and breath of my dead life! + If sometimes, as a shape more like himself, + Even the form which tortured me on earth, + Masked in grey hairs and wrinkles, he should come + And wind me in his hellish arms, and fix + His eyes on mine, and drag me down, down, down!" + +The author, in his preface, observes that he has committed only one +plagiarism in his play. But with all the triumph of vanity, we here +stoutly convict him of having wilfully, maliciously and despitefully +stolen, the pleasing idea of the repetition of "down, down, down," from +the equally pathetic and instructive ditty of "up, up, up," in Tom +Thumb; the exordium or prolegomena to which floweth _sweetly_ and +_poetically_ thus:-- + + "Here we go up, up, up, + And here we go _down, down, down_!" + +In taking leave of Mr. Shelley, we have a few observations to whisper in +his ear. That he has the seedlings of poetry in his composition no one +can deny, after the perusal of many of our extracts; that he employs +them worthily, is more than can be advanced. His style, though disgraced +by occasional puerilities, and simpering affectations, is in general +bold, vigorous, and manly; but the disgraceful fault to which we object +in his writings, is the scorn he every where evinces for all that is +moral or religious. If he must be skeptical--if he must be lax in his +human codes of excellence, let him be so; but in God's name let him not +publish his principles, and cram them down the throats of others. +Existence in its present state is heavy enough; and if we take away the +idea of eternal happiness, however visionary it may appear to some, who +or what is to recompence us for the loss we have sustained? Will +scepticism lighten the bed of death?--Will vice soothe the pillow of +declining age? If so! let us all be sceptics, let us all be vicious; but +until their admirable efficacy is proved, let us jog on the beaten +course of life, neither influenced by the scoff of infidelity, nor +fascinated by the dazzling but flimsy garb of licentiousness and +immorality.--_The London Magazine_. + + +ADONAIS. _An Elegy, on the Death of Mr. John Keats_. By P.B. Shelley. + +We have already given some of our columns to this writer's merits, and +we will not now repeat our convictions of his incurable absurdity. On +the last occasion of our alluding to him, we were compelled to notice +his horrid licentiousness and profaneness, his fearful offences to all +the maxims that honorable minds are in the habit of respecting, and his +plain defiance of Christianity. On the present occasion we are not met +by so continued and regular a determination of insult, though there are +atrocities to be found in the poem quite enough to make us caution our +readers against its pages. Adonais is an elegy after _the manner of +Moschus_, on a foolish young man, who, after writing some volumes of +very weak, and, in the greater part, of very indecent poetry, died some +time since of a consumption: the breaking down of an infirm constitution +having, in all probability, been accelerated by the discarding his neck +cloth, a practice of the cockney poets, who look upon it as essential to +genius, inasmuch as neither Michael Angelo, Raphael or Tasso are +supposed to have worn those antispiritual incumbrances. In short, as the +vigour of Sampson lay in his hair, the secret of talent with these +persons lies in the neck; and what aspirations can be expected from a +mind enveloped in muslin. Keats caught cold in training for a genius, +and, after a lingering illness, died, to the great loss of the +Independents of South America, whom he had intended to visit with an +English epic poem, for the purpose of exciting them to liberty. But +death, even the death of the radically presumptuous profligate, is a +serious thing; and as we believe that Keats was made presumptuous +chiefly by the treacherous puffing of his cockney fellow gossips, and +profligate in his poems merely to make them saleable, we regret that he +did not live long enough to acquire common sense, and abjure the +pestilent and perfidious gang who betrayed his weakness to the grave, +and are now panegyrising his memory into contempt. For what is the +praise of cockneys but disgrace, or what honourable inscription can be +placed over the dead by the hands of notorious libellers, exiled +adulterers, and avowed atheists. + +Adonais, an Elegy, is the form in which Mr. Shelley puts forth his woes. +We give a verse at random, premising that there is no story in the +elegy, and that it consists of fifty-five stanzas, which are, to our +seeming, altogether unconnected, interjectional, and nonsensical. We +give one that we think among the more comprehensible. An address to +Urania:-- + + "Most musical of mourners, weep anew! + Not all to that bright station dared to climb; + And _happier they their happiness who knew_, + Whose _tapers yet burn thro' that night of time + In which suns perish'd_; Others more sublime, + Struck by the _envious_ wroth of man or GOD!! + _Have sunk extinct in their refulgent prime_; + And some yet live," &c.---- + +Now what is the meaning of this, or of any sentence of it, except indeed +that horrid blasphemy which attributes crime to the Great Author of all +virtue! The rest is mere empty absurdity. If it were worth our while to +dilate on the folly of the production, we might find examples of every +species of the ridiculous within those few pages. + +Mr. Shelley summons all kinds of visions round the grave of this young +man, who, if he has now any feeling of the earth, must shrink with +shame and disgust from the touch of the hand that could have written +that impious sentence. These he classifies under names, the greater +number as new we believe to poetry as strange to common sense. Those +are-- + + ----"Desires and _Adorations_ + Winged _Persuasions_ and veiled Destinies, + _Splendours_, and _Glooms_, and glimmering _Incarnations_ + Of hopes and fears and twilight Phantasies, + And Sorrow with her family of _Sighs_, + And Pleasure, _blind with tears_! led by the _gleam_ + Of her own _dying_ SMILE instead of eyes!!" + +Let our readers try to imagine these weepers, and close with "_blind_ +Pleasure led," by what? "by the _light_ of _her own dying +smile_--instead of _eyes_!!!" + +We give some specimens of Mr. S.'s + + _Nonsense--pastoral._ + "_Lost Echo_ sits amid the _voiceless mountains_,[M] + And feeds her grief with his remember'd lay, + _And will no more reply_ to winds and fountains." + _Nonsense--physical._ + --"for whose disdain she (Echo) pin'd away + Into a _shadow_ of all _sounds_!" + _Nonsense--vermicular._ + "Flowers springing from the corpse + ----------------------illumine death + And _mock_ the _merry_ worm that wakes beneath." + _Nonsense--pathetic._ + "Alas! that all we lov'd of him should be + But for our grief, as if it had not been, + And _grief itself be mortal_! WOE IS ME!" + _Nonsense--nondescript._ + "In the death chamber for a moment Death, + _Blush'd to annihilation_!" + _Nonsense--personal._ + "A pardlike spirit, beautiful and swift-- + A love in _desolation mask'd_;--a Power + Girt _round with weakness_;--it can scarce _uplift_ + The _weight_ of the _superincumbent hour_!" + +We have some idea that this fragment of character is intended for Mr. +Shelley himself. It closes with a passage of memorable and ferocious +blasphemy:-- + + ---------------"He with a sudden hand + Made bare his branded and ensanguin'd brow, + Which was like Cain's or CHRIST'S!!!" + +What can be said to the wretched person capable of this daring +profanation. The name of the first murderer--the accurst of God--brought +into the same aspect image with that of the Saviour of the World! We are +scarcely satisfied that even to quote such passages may not be criminal. +The subject is too repulsive for us to proceed even in expressing our +disgust for the general folly that makes the Poem as miserable in point +of authorship, as in point of principle. We know that among a certain +class this outrage and this inanity meet with some attempt at +palliation, under the idea that frenzy holds the pen. That any man who +insults the common order of society, and denies the being of God, is +essentially mad we never doubted. But for the madness, that retains +enough of rationality to be wilfully mischievous, we can have no more +lenity than for the appetites of a wild beast. The poetry of the work is +_contemptible_--a mere collection of bloated words heaped on each other +without order, harmony, or meaning; the refuse of a schoolboy's +common-place book, full of the vulgarisms of pastoral poetry, yellow +gems and blue stars, bright Phoebus and rosy-fingered Aurora; and of +this stuff is Keats's wretched Elegy compiled. + +We might add instances of like incomprehensible folly from every stanza. +A heart _keeping_, a mute _sleep_, and death _feeding_ on a mute +_voice_, occur in one verse (page 8); Spring in despair "throws down her +_kindling_ buds as if she Autumn were," a thing we never knew Autumn do +with buds of any sort, the kindling kind being unknown to our botany; a +_green lizard_ is like an _unimprisoned flame_, _waking_ out of its +_trance_ (page 13). In the same page the _leprous corpse_ touched by the +tender spirit of Spring, so as to exhale itself in flowers, is compared +to "_incarnations of the stars, when splendour is changed to +fragrance_!!!" Urania (page 15) _wounds_ the "invisible palms" of her +tender feet by treading on human hearts as she journeys to see the +corpse. Page 22, somebody is asked to "clasp with panting soul the +pendulous earth," an image which, we take it, exceeds that of +Shakespeare, to "put a girdle about it in forty minutes." + +It is so far a fortunate thing that this piece of impious and utter +absurdity can have little circulation in Britain. The copy in our hands +is one of some score sent to the Author's intimates from Pisa, where it +has been printed in a quarto form "with the types of Didot," and two +learned Epigraphs from Plato and Moschus. Solemn as the subject is, (for +in truth we must grieve for the early death of any youth of literary +ambition,) it is hardly possible to help laughing at the mock solemnity +with which Shelley charges the Quarterly Review for having murdered his +friend with--a critique![N] If criticism killed the disciples of that +school, Shelley would not have been alive to write an Elegy on +another:--but the whole is most farcical from a pen which on other +occasions, has treated of the soul, the body, life and death agreeably +to the opinions, the principles, and the practice of Percy Bysshe +Shelley.--_The Literary Gazette_. + +[Footnote M: Though there is _no Echo_ and the mountains are +_voiceless_, the woodmen, nevertheless, in the last line of this verse +hear "a drear murmur between their Songs!!"] + +[Footnote N: This would have done excellently for a coroner's inquest +like that on _Honey_, which lasted _thirty_ days, and was facetiously +called the "Honey-moon."] + + + + +JOHN KEATS + + +_Endymion: A Poetic Romance_. By John Keats. London. 1818. pp. 207. + +Reviewers have been sometimes accused of not reading the works which +they affected to criticise. On the present occasion we shall anticipate +the author's complaint, and honestly confess that we have not read his +work. Not that we have been wanting in our duty--far from it--indeed, we +have made efforts almost as superhuman as the story itself appears to +be, to get through it; but with the fullest stretch of our perseverance, +we are forced to confess that we have not been able to struggle beyond +the first of the four books of which this Poetic Romance consists. We +should extremely lament this want of energy, or whatever it may be, on +our parts, were it not for one consolation--namely, that we are no +better acquainted with the meaning of the book through which we have so +painfully toiled, than we are with that of the three which we have not +looked into. + +It is not that Mr. Keats, (if that be his real name, for we almost doubt +that any man in his senses would put his real name to such a rhapsody,) +it is not, we say, that the author has not powers of language, rays of +fancy, and gleams of genius--he has all these; but he is unhappily a +disciple of the new school of what has been somewhere called Cockney +poetry; which may be defined to consist of the most incongruous ideas in +the most uncouth language. + +Of this school, Mr. Leigh Hunt, as we observed in a former Number, +aspires to be the hierophant. Our readers will recollect the pleasant +recipes for harmonious and sublime poetry which he gave us in his +preface to 'Rimini,' and the still more facetious instances of his +harmony and sublimity in the verses themselves; and they will recollect +above all the contempt of Pope, Johnson, and such like poetasters and +pseudo-critics, which so forcibly contrasted itself with Mr. Leigh +Hunt's self-complacent approbation of + + --'all the things itself had wrote, + Of special merit though of little note.' + +This author is a copyist of Mr. Hunt; but he is more unintelligible, +almost as rugged, twice as diffuse, and ten times more tiresome and +absurd than his prototype, who, though he impudently presumed to seat +himself in the chair of criticism, and to measure his own poetry by his +own standard, yet generally had a meaning. But Mr. Keats has advanced no +dogmas which he was bound to support by examples; his nonsense therefore +is quite gratuitous; he writes it for its own sake, and, being bitten by +Mr. Leigh Hunt's insane criticism, more than rivals the insanity of his +poetry. + +Mr. Keats's preface hints that his poem was produced under peculiar +circumstances. + + 'Knowing within myself (he says) the manner in which this Poem has + been produced, it is not without a feeling of regret that I make it + public.--What manner I mean, will be _quite clear_ to the reader, + who must soon perceive great inexperience, immaturity, and every + error denoting a feverish attempt, rather than a deed + accomplished.'--_Preface_, p. vii. + +We humbly beg his pardon, but this does not appear to us to be _quite so +clear_--we really do not know what he means--but the next passage is +more intelligible. + + 'The two first books, and indeed the two last, I feel sensible are + not of such completion as to warrant their passing the + press.'--_Preface_, p. vii. + +Thus 'the two first books' are, even in his own judgment, unfit to +appear, and 'the two last' are, it seems, in the same condition--and as +two and two make four, and as that is the whole number of books, we have +a clear and, we believe, a very just estimate of the entire work. + +Mr. Keats, however, deprecates criticism on this 'immature and feverish +work' in terms which are themselves sufficiently feverish; and we +confess that we should have abstained from inflicting upon him any of +the tortures of the '_fierce hell_' of criticism, which terrify his +imagination, if he had not begged to be spared in order that he might +write more; if we had not observed in him a certain degree of talent +which deserves to be put in the right way, or which, at least, ought to +be warned of the wrong; and if, finally, he had not told us that he is +of an age and temper which imperiously require mental discipline. + +Of the story we have been able to make out but little; it seems to be +mythological, and probably relates to the loves of Diana and Endymion; +but of this, as the scope of the work has altogether escaped us, we +cannot speak with any degree of certainty; and must therefore content +ourselves with giving some instances of its diction and +versification:--and here again we are perplexed and puzzled.--At first +it appeared to us, that Mr. Keats had been amusing himself and wearying +his readers with an immeasurable game at _bouts-rimes_; but, if we +recollect rightly, it is an indispensable condition at this play, that +the rhymes when filled up shall have a meaning; and our author, as we +have already hinted, has no meaning. He seems to us to write a line at +random, and then he follows not the thought excited by this line, but +that suggested by the _rhyme_ with which it concludes. There is hardly +a complete couplet enclosing a complete idea in the whole book. He +wanders from one subject to another, from the association, not of the +ideas but of sounds, and the work is composed of hemistichs which, it is +quite evident, have forced themselves upon the author by the mere force +of the catchwords on which they turn. + +We shall select, not as the most striking instance, but as that least +liable to suspicion, a passage from the opening of the poem. + + ----'Such the sun, the moon, + Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon + For simple sheep; and such are daffodils + With the green world they live in; and clear rills + That for themselves a cooling covert make + 'Gainst the hot season; the mid forest brake, + Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms: + And such too is the grandeur of the dooms + We have imagined for the mighty dead; &c. &c.'--pp. 3, 4. + +Here it is clear that the word, and not the idea, _moon_ produces the +simple sheep and their shady _boon_, and that 'the _dooms_ of the mighty +dead' would never have intruded themselves but for the '_fair musk-rose +blooms_.' + +Again. + + 'For 'twas the morn: Apollo's upward fire + Made every eastern cloud a silvery pyre + Of brightness so unsullied, that therein + A melancholy spirit well might win + Oblivion, and melt out his essence fine + Into the winds: rain-scented eglantine + Gave temperate sweets to that well-wooing sun; + The lark was lost in him; cold springs had run + To warm their chilliest bubbles in the grass; + Man's voice was on the mountains; and the mass + Of nature's lives and wonders puls'd tenfold, + To feel this sun-rise and its glories old.'--p. 8. + +Here Apollo's _fire_ produces a _pyre_, a silvery pyre of clouds, +_wherein_ a spirit may _win_ oblivion and melt his essence _fine_, and +scented _eglantine_ gives sweets to the _sun_, and cold springs had +_run_ into the _grass_, and then the pulse of the _mass_ pulsed +_tenfold_ to feel the glories _old_ of the new-born day, &c. + +One example more. + + 'Be still the unimaginable lodge + For solitary thinkings; such as dodge + Conception to the very bourne of heaven, + Then leave the naked brain: be still the leaven, + That spreading in this dull and clodded earth + Gives it a touch ethereal--a new birth.'--p. 17. + +_Lodge, dodge_--_heaven, leaven_--_earth, birth_; such, in six words, is +the sum and substance of six lines. + +We come now to the author's taste in versification. He cannot indeed +write a sentence, but perhaps he may be able to spin a line. Let us see. +The following are specimens of his prosodial notions of our English +heroic metre. + + 'Dear as the temple's self, so does the moon, + The passion poesy, glories infinite.'--p. 4. + + 'So plenteously all weed-hidden roots.'--p. 6. + + 'Of some strange history, potent to send.'--p. 18. + + 'Before the deep intoxication.'--p. 27. + + 'Her scarf into a fluttering pavilion.'--p. 33. + + 'The stubborn canvass for my voyage prepared--.'--p. 39. + + '"Endymion! the cave is secreter + Than the isle of Delos. Echo hence shall stir + No sighs but sigh-warm kisses, or light noise + Of thy combing hand, the while it travelling cloys + And trembles through my labyrinthine hair."'--p. 48. + +By this time our readers must be pretty well satisfied as to the meaning +of his sentences and the structure of his lines: we now present them +with some of the new words with which, in imitation of Mr. Leigh Hunt, +he adorns our language. + +We are told that 'turtles _passion_ their voices,' (p. 15); that 'an +arbour was _nested_,' (p. 23); and a lady's locks '_gordian'd_ up,' (p. +32); and to supply the place of the nouns thus verbalized Mr. Keats, +with great fecundity, spawns new ones; such as 'men-slugs and human +_serpentry_,' (p. 41); the '_honey-feel_ of bliss,' (p. 45); 'wives +prepare _needments_,' (p. 13)--and so forth. + +Then he has formed new verbs by the process of cutting off their natural +tails, the adverbs, and affixing them to their foreheads; thus, 'the +wine out-sparkled,' (p. 10); the 'multitude up-followed,' (p. 11); and +'night up-took,' (p. 29). 'The wind up-blows,' (p. 32); and the 'hours +are down-sunken,' (p. 36.) + +But if he sinks some adverbs in the verbs, he compensates the language +with adverbs and adjectives which he separates from the parent stock. +Thus, a lady 'whispers _pantingly_ and close,' makes '_hushing_ signs,' +and steers her skiff into a '_ripply_ cove,' (p. 23); a shower falls +'_refreshfully_,' (45); and a vulture has a '_spreaded_ tail,' (p. 44.) + +But enough of Mr. Leigh Hunt and his simple neophyte.--If any one should +be bold enough to purchase this 'Poetic Romance,' and so much more +patient, than ourselves, as to get beyond the first book, and so much +more fortunate as to find a meaning, we entreat him to make us +acquainted with his success; we shall then return to the task which we +now abandon in despair, and endeavour to make all due amends to Mr. +Keats and to our readers.--_The Quarterly Review_. + + +COCKNEY SCHOOL OF POETRY. + +No[.] IV. + + ------------------------------OF KEATS, + THE MUSES' SON OF PROMISE, AND WHAT FEATS + HE YET MAY DO, &C. + +CORNELIUS WEBB. + +Of all the manias of this mad age, the most incurable as well as the +most common, seems to be no other than the _Metromanie_. The just +celebrity of Robert Burns and Miss Baillie has had the melancholy effect +of turning the heads of we know not how many farm-servants and unmarried +ladies; our very footmen compose tragedies, and there is scarcely a +superannuated governess in the island that does not leave a roll of +lyrics behind her in her band-box. To witness the disease of any human +understanding, however feeble, is distressing; but the spectacle of an +able mind reduced to a state of insanity is of course ten times more +afflicting. It is with such sorrow as this that we have contemplated the +case of Mr John Keats. This young man appears to have received from +nature talents of an excellent, perhaps even of a superior +order--talents which, devoted to the purposes of any useful profession, +must have rendered him a respectable, if not an eminent citizen. His +friends, we understand, destined him to the career of medicine, and he +was bound apprentice some years ago to a worthy apothecary in town. But +all has been undone by a sudden attack of the malady to which we have +alluded. Whether Mr John had been sent home with a diuretic or composing +draught to some patient far gone in the poetical mania, we have not +heard. This much is certain, that he has caught the infection, and that +thoroughly. For some time we were in hopes, that he might get off with a +violent fit or two; but of late the symptoms are terrible. The phrenzy +of the "Poems" was bad enough in its way; but it did not alarm us half +so seriously as the calm, settled, imperturbable, drivelling idiocy of +"Endymion." We hope, however, that in so young a person, and with a +constitution originally so good, even now the disease is not utterly +incurable. Time, firm treatment, and rational restraint, do much for +many apparently hopeless invalids; and if Mr Keats should happen, at +some interval of reason, to cast his eye upon our pages, he may perhaps +be convinced of the existence of his malady, which, in such cases, is +often all that is necessary to put the patient in a fair way of being +cured. + +The readers of the Examiner newspaper were informed, some time ago, by a +solemn paragraph, in Mr Hunt's best style, of the appearance of two new +stars of glorious magnitude and splendour in the poetical horizon of the +land of Cockaigne. One of these turned out, by and by, to be no other +than Mr John Keats. This precocious adulation confirmed the wavering +apprentice in his desire to quit the gallipots, and at the same time +excited in his too susceptible mind a fatal admiration for the character +and talents of the most worthless and affected of all the versifiers of +our time. One of his first productions was the following sonnet, +"_written on the day when Mr Leigh Hunt left prison_." It will be +recollected, that the cause of Hunt's confinement was a series of libels +against his sovereign, and that its fruit was the odious and incestuous +"Story of Rimini." + + "What though, for shewing truth to flattered state, + _Kind Hunt_ was shut in prison, yet has he, + In his immortal spirit been as free + As the sky-searching lark and as elate. + Minion of grandeur! think you he did wait? + Think you he nought but prison walls did see, + Till, so unwilling, thou unturn'dst the key? + Ah, no! far happier, nobler was his fate! + _In Spenser's halls!_ he strayed, and bowers fair, + Culling enchanted flowers; and he flew + _With daring Milton!_ through the fields of air; + To regions of his own his genius true + Took happy flights. Who shall his fame impair + When thou art dead, and all thy wretched crew?" + +The absurdity of the thought in this sonnet is, however, if possible, +surpassed in another, "_addressed to Haydon_" the painter, that clever, +but most affected artist, who as little resembles Raphael in genius as +he does in person, notwithstanding the foppery of having his hair curled +over his shoulders in the old Italian fashion. In this exquisite piece +it will be observed, that Mr Keats classes together WORDSWORTH, HUNT, +and HAYDON, as the three greatest spirits of the age, and that he +alludes to himself, and some others of the rising brood of Cockneys, as +likely to attain hereafter an equally honourable elevation. Wordsworth +and Hunt! what a juxta-position! The purest, the loftiest, and, we do +not fear to say it, the most classical of living English poets, joined +together in the same compliment with the meanest, the filthiest, and the +most vulgar of Cockney poetasters. No wonder that he who could be guilty +of this should class Haydon with Raphael, and himself with Spencer +[_sic_]. + + "Great spirits now on earth are sojourning; + He of the cloud, the cataract, the lake, + Who on Helvellyn's summit, wide awake, + Catches his freshness from Archangel's wing: + _He of the rose, the violet, the spring, + The social smile, the chain for Freedom's sake_: + And lo!--whose steadfastness would never take + A meaner sound than Raphael's whispering. + And other spirits there are standing apart + Upon the forehead of the age to come; + These, these will give the world another heart, + And other pulses. _Hear ye not the hum + Of mighty workings?---- + Listen awhile ye nations, and be dumb._" + +The nations are to listen and be dumb! and why, good Johnny Keats? +because Leigh Hunt is editor of the Examiner, and Haydon has painted the +judgment of Solomon, and you and Cornelius Webb, and a few more city +sparks, are pleased to look upon yourselves as so many future +Shakespeares and Miltons! The world has really some reason to look to +its foundations! Here is a _tempestas in matula_ with a vengeance. At +the period when these sonnets were published Mr Keats had no hesitation +in saying that he looked on himself as "_not yet_ a glorious denizen of +the wide heaven of poetry," but he had many fine soothing visions of +coming greatness, and many rare plans of study to prepare him for it. +The following we think is very pretty raving. + + "Why so sad a moan? + Life is the rose's hope while yet unblown; + The reading of an ever-changing tale; + The light uplifting of a maiden's veil; + A pigeon tumbling in clear summer air; + A laughing school-boy, without grief or care, + Riding the springing branches of an elm. + + "O for ten years, that I may overwhelm + Myself in poesy; so I may do the deed + That my own soul has to itself decreed. + Then will I pass the countries that I see + In long perspective, and continually + Taste their pure fountains. First the realm I'll pass + Of Flora, and old Pan: sleep in the grass, + Feed on apples red, and strawberries, + And choose each pleasure that my fancy sees. + Catch the white-handed nymphs in shady places, + To woo sweet kisses from averted faces,-- + Play with their fingers, touch their shoulders white + Into a pretty shrinking with a bite + As hard as lips can make it: till agreed, + A lovely tale of human life we'll read. + And one will teach a tame dove how it best + May fan the cool air gently o'er my rest; + Another, bending o'er her nimble tread, + Will set a green robe floating round her head, + And still will dance with ever varied ease, + Smiling upon the flowers and the trees: + Another will entice me on, and on + Through almond blossoms and rich cinnamon; + Till in the bosom of a leafy world + We rest in silence, like two gems upcurl'd + In the recesses of a pearly shell." + +Having cooled a little from this "fine passion," our youthful poet +passes very naturally into a long strain of foaming abuse against a +certain class of English Poets, whom, with Pope at their head, it is +much the fashion with the ignorant unsettled pretenders of the present +time to undervalue. Begging these gentlemens' pardon, although Pope was +not a poet of the same high order with some who are now living, yet, to +deny his genius, is just about as absurd as to dispute that of +Wordsworth, or to believe in that of Hunt. Above all things, it is most +pitiably ridiculous to hear men, of whom their country will always have +reason to be proud, reviled by uneducated and flimsy striplings, who are +not capable of understanding either their merits, or those of any other +_men of power_--fanciful dreaming tea-drinkers, who, without logic +enough to analyze a single idea, or imagination enough to form one +original image, or learning enough to distinguish between the written +language of Englishmen and the spoken jargon of Cockneys, presume to +talk with contempt of some of the most exquisite spirits the world ever +produced, merely because they did not happen to exert their faculties in +laborious affected descriptions of flowers seen in window-pots, or +cascades heard at Vauxhall; in short, because they chose to be wits, +philosophers, patriots, and poets, rather than to found the Cockney +school of versification, morality and politics, a century before its +time. After blaspheming himself into a fury against Boileau, &c. Mr +Keats comforts himself and his readers with a view of the present more +promising aspect of affairs; above all, with the ripened glories of the +poet of Rimini. Addressing the manes of the departed chiefs of English +poetry, he informs them, in the following clear and touching manner, of +the existence of "him of the Rose," &c. + + "From a thick brake, + Nested and quiet in a valley mild, + Bubbles a pipe; fine sounds are floating wild + About the earth. Happy are ye and glad." + +From this he diverges into a view of "things in general." We smile when +we think to ourselves how little most of our readers will understand of +what follows. + + "Yet I rejoice: a myrtle fairer than + E'er grew in Paphos, from the bitter weeds + Lifts its sweet head into the air, and feeds + A silent space with ever sprouting green. + All tenderest birds there find a pleasant screen, + Creep through the shade with jaunty fluttering, + Nibble the little cupped flowers and sing. + Then let us clear away the choaking _thorns_ + From round its gentle stem; let the young _fawns_, + Yeaned in after times, when we are flown, + Find a fresh sward beneath it, overgrown + With simple flowers: let there nothing be + More boisterous than a lover's bended knee; + Nought more ungentle than the placid look + Of one who leans upon a closed book; + Nought more untranquil than the grassy slopes + Between two hills. All hail delightful hopes! + As she was wont, th' imagination + Into most lovely labyrinths will be gone, + And they shall be accounted poet kings + Who simply tell the most heart-easing things. + O may these joys be ripe before I die. + Will not some say that I presumptuously + Have spoken? that from hastening disgrace + 'Twere better far to hide my foolish face? + That whining boyhood should with reverence bow + Ere the dreadful thunderbolt could reach? How! + If I do hide myself, it sure shall be + In the very fane, the light of poesy." + +From some verses addressed to various amiable individuals of the other +sex, it appears, notwithstanding all this gossamer-work, that Johnny's +affections are not entirely confined to objects purely etherial. Take, +by way of specimen, the following prurient and vulgar lines, evidently +meant for some young lady east of Temple-bar. + + "Add too, the sweetness + Of thy honied voice; the neatness + Of thine ankle lightly turn'd: + With those beauties, scarce discern'd, + Kept with such sweet privacy, + That they seldom meet the eye + Of the little loves that fly + Round about with eager pry. + Saving when, with freshening lave, + Thou dipp'st them in the taintless wave; + Like twin water lilies, born + In the coolness of the morn + O, if thou hadst breathed then, + Now the Muses had been ten. + Couldst thou wish for lineage _higher_ + Than twin sister of _Thalia_? + At last for ever, evermore, + Will I call the Graces four." + +Who will dispute that our poet, to use his own phrase (and rhyme), + + "Can mingle music fit for the soft _ear_ + Of Lady _Cytherea_." + +So much for the opening bud; now for the expanded flower. It is time to +pass from the juvenile "Poems," to the mature and elaborate "Endymion, a +Poetic Romance." The old story of the moon falling in love with a +shepherd, so prettily told by a Roman Classic, and so exquisitely +enlarged and adorned by one of the most elegant of German poets, has +been seized upon by Mr John Keats, to be done with as might seem good +unto the sickly fancy of one who never read a single line either of Ovid +or of Wieland. If the quantity, not the quality, of the verses dedicated +to the story is to be taken into account, there can be no doubt that Mr +John Keats may now claim Endymion entirely to himself. To say the truth, +we do not suppose either the Latin or the German poet would be very +anxious to dispute about the property of the hero of the "Poetic +Romance." Mr Keats has thoroughly appropriated the character, if not the +name. His Endymion is not a Greek shepherd, loved by a Grecian goddess; +he is merely a young Cockney rhymester, dreaming a phantastic dream at +the full of the moon. Costume, were it worth while to notice such a +trifle, is violated in every page of this goodly octavo. From his +prototype Hunt, John Keats has acquired a sort of vague idea, that the +Greeks were a most tasteful people, and that no mythology can be so +finely adapted for the purposes of poetry as theirs. It is amusing to +see what a hand the two Cockneys make of this mythology; the one +confesses that he never read the Greek Tragedians, and the other knows +Homer only from Chapman; and both of them write about Apollo, Pan, +Nymphs, Muses, and Mysteries, as might be expected from persons of their +education. We shall not, however, enlarge at present upon this subject, +as we mean to dedicate an entire paper to the classical attainments and +attempts of the Cockney poets. As for Mr Keats' "Endymion," it has just +as much to do with Greece as it has with "old Tartary the fierce;" no +man, whose mind has ever been imbued with the smallest knowledge or +feeling of classical poetry or classical history, could have stooped to +profane and vulgarise every association in the manner which has been +adopted by this "son of promise." Before giving any extracts, we must +inform our readers, that this romance is meant to be written in English +heroic rhyme. To those who have read any of Hunt's poems, this hint +might indeed be needless. Mr Keats has adopted the loose, nerveless +versification, and the Cockney rhymes of the poet of Rimini; but in +fairness to that gentleman, we must add, that the defects of the system +are tenfold more conspicuous in his disciple's work than in his own. Mr +Hunt is a small poet, but he is a clever man. Mr Keats is a still +smaller poet, and he is only a boy of pretty abilities, which he has +done everything in his power to spoil. + +[Quotes almost two hundred lines of _Endymion_ with brief interpolated +comment.] + +And now, good-morrow to "the Muses' son of Promise;" as for "the feats +he yet may do," as we do not pretend to say, like himself, "Muse of my +native land am I inspired," we shall adhere to the safe old rule of +_pauca verba_. We venture to make one small prophecy, that his +bookseller will not a second time venture L50 upon any thing he can +write. It is a better and a wiser thing to be a starved apothecary than +a starved poet; so back to the shop Mr John, back to "plasters, pills, +and ointment boxes," &c. But, for Heaven's sake, young Sangrado, be a +little more sparing of extenuatives and soporifics in your practice than +you have been in your poetry. + +Z. + +--_Blackwood's Magazine_. + + + + +ALFRED LORD TENNYSON + + +_Timbuctoo: a Poem, which obtained the Chancellor's Medal at the +Cambridge Commencement_, _by A. Tennyson, of Trinity College, +Cambridge._ + +We have accustomed ourselves to think, perhaps without any good reason, +that poetry was likely to perish among us for a considerable period +after the great generation of poets which is now passing away. The age +seems determined to contradict us, and that in the most decided manner, +for it has put forth poetry by a young man, and that where we should +least expect it, namely, in a prize-poem. These productions have often +been ingenious and elegant, but we have never before seen one of them +which indicated really first-rate poetical genius, and which would have +done honour to any man that ever wrote. Such, we do not hesitate to +affirm, is the little work before us; and the examiners seem to have +felt about it like ourselves, for they have assigned the prize to its +author, though the measure in which he writes was never before (we +believe) thus selected for honour. We extract a few lines to justify our +admiration. + +[Quotes fifty lines beginning:-- + + "A curve of whitening, flashing, ebbing light! + A rustling of white wings! the bright descent," etc.] + +How many men have lived for a century who could equal this?--_The +Athenaeum_. + + +_Poems by Alfred Tennyson_. pp. 163. London. 12mo. 1833. + +This is, as some of his marginal notes intimate, Mr. Tennyson's second +appearance. By some strange chance we have never seen his first +publication, which, if it at all resembles its younge[r] brother, must +be by this time so popular that any notice of it on our part would seem +idle and presumptuous; but we gladly seize this opportunity of repairing +an unintentional neglect, and of introducing to the admiration of our +more sequestered readers a new prodigy of genius--another and a brighter +star of that galaxy or _milky way_ of poetry of which the lamented Keats +was the harbinger; and let us take this occasion to sing our palinode on +the subject of 'Endymion.' We certainly did not[O] discover in that poem +the same degree of merit that its more clear-sighted and prophetic +admirers did. We did not foresee the unbounded popularity which has +carried it through we know not how many editions; which has placed it on +every table; and, what is still more unequivocal, familiarized it in +every mouth. All this splendour of fame, however, though we had not the +sagacity to anticipate, we have the candour to acknowledge: and we +request that the publisher of the new and beautiful edition of Keats's +works now in the press, with graphic illustrations by Calcott and +Turner, will do us the favour and the justice to notice our conversion +in his prolegomena. + +Warned by our former mishap, wiser by experience, and improved, as we +hope, in taste, we have to offer Mr. Tennyson our tribute of unmingled +approbation, and it is very agreeable to us, as well as to our readers, +that our present task will be little more than the selection, for their +delight, of a few specimens of Mr. Tennyson's singular genius, and the +venturing to point out, now and then, the peculiar brilliancy of some of +the gems that irradiate his poetical crown. + +A prefatory sonnet opens to the reader the aspirations of the young +author, in which, after the manner of sundry poets, ancient and modern, +he expresses his own peculiar character, by wishing himself to be +something that he is not. The amorous Catullus aspired to be a sparrow; +the tuneful and convivial Anacreon (for we totally reject the +supposition that attributes the [Greek: Eithe lure chale genoimen] to +Alcaeus) wished to be a lyre and a great drinking cup; a crowd of more +modern sentimentalists have desired to approach their mistresses as +flowers, tunicks, sandals, birds, breezes, and butterflies;--all poor +conceits of narrow-minded poetasters! Mr. Tennyson (though he, too, +would, as far as his true love is concerned, not unwillingly 'be an +earring,' 'a girdle,' and 'a necklace,' p. 45) in the more serious and +solemn exordium of his works ambitions a bolder metamorphosis--he wishes +to be--_a river_! + +SONNET. + + 'Mine be the strength of spirit fierce and free, + Like some broad river rushing down _alone_'-- + +rivers that travel in company are too common for his taste-- + + 'With the self-same impulse wherewith he was thrown'-- + +a beautiful and harmonious line-- + + 'From his loud fount upon the echoing lea:-- + Which, with _increasing_ might, doth _forward flee_'-- + +Every word of this line is valuable--the natural progress of human +ambition is here strongly characterized--two lines ago he would have +been satisfied with the _self-same_ impulse--but now he must have +_increasing_ might; and indeed he would require all his might to +accomplish his object of _fleeing forward_, that is, going backwards and +forwards at the same time. Perhaps he uses the word _flee_ for _flow_; +which latter he could not well employ in _this_ place, it being, as we +shall see, essentially necessary to rhyme to _Mexico_ towards the end of +the sonnet--as an equivalent to _flow_ he has, therefore, with great +taste and ingenuity, hit on the combination of _forward flee_-- + + ------------'doth forward flee + By town, and tower, and hill, and cape, and isle, + And in the middle of the green _salt_ sea + Keeps his blue waters fresh for many a mile.' + +A noble wish, beautifully expressed, that he may not be confounded with +the deluge of ordinary poets, but, amidst their discoloured and briny +ocean, still preserve his own bright tints and sweet savor. He may be at +ease on this point--he never can be mistaken for any one else. We have +but too late become acquainted with him, yet we assure ourselves that if +a thousand anonymous specimens were presented to us, we should +unerringly distinguish his by the total absence of any particle of +_salt_. But again, his thoughts take another turn, and he reverts to the +insatiability of human ambition:--we have seen him just now content to +be a river, but as he _flees forward_, his desires expand into +sublimity, and he wishes to become the great Gulfstream of the Atlantic. + + 'Mine be the power which ever to its sway + Will win _the wise at once_-- + +We, for once, are wise, and he has won _us_-- + + 'Will win the wise at once; and by degrees + May into uncongenial spirits flow, + Even as the great gulphstream of Flori_da_ + Floats far away into the Northern seas + The lavish growths of southern Mexi_co_!'--p. 1. + +And so concludes the sonnet. + +The next piece is a kind of testamentary paper, addressed 'To ----,' a +friend, we presume, containing his wishes as to what his friend should +do for him when he (the poet) shall be dead--not, as we shall see, that +he quite thinks that such a poet can die outright. + + 'Shake hands, my friend, across the brink + Of that deep grave to which I go. + Shake hands once more; I cannot sink + So far--far down, but I shall know + Thy voice, and answer from below!' + +Horace said 'non omnis moriar,' meaning that his fame should +survive--Mr. Tennyson is still more vivacious, 'non _omnino_ +moriar,'--'I will not die at all; my body shall be as immortal as my +verse, and however _low I may go_, I warrant you I shall keep all my +wits about me,--therefore' + + 'When, in the darkness over me, + The four-handed mole shall scrape, + Plant thou no dusky cypress tree, + Nor wreath thy cap with doleful crape, + But pledge me in the flowing grape.' + +Observe how all ages become present to the mind of a great poet; and +admire how naturally he combines the funeral cypress of classical +antiquity with the crape hat-band of the modern undertaker. + +He proceeds:-- + + 'And when the sappy field and wood + Grow green beneath the _showery gray_, + And rugged barks begin to bud, + And through damp holts, newflushed with May, + Ring sudden _laughters_ of the jay!' + +Laughter, the philosophers tell us, is a peculiar attribute of man--but +as Shakespeare found 'tongues in trees and sermons in stones,' this true +poet endows all nature not merely with human sensibilities but with +human functions--the jay _laughs_, and we find, indeed, a little further +on, that the woodpecker _laughs_ also; but to mark the distinction +between their merriment and that of men, both jays and woodpeckers laugh +upon melancholy occasions. We are glad, moreover, to observe, that Mr. +Tennyson is prepared for, and therefore will not be disturbed by, human +laughter, if any silly reader should catch the infection from the +woodpeckers and the jays. + + 'Then let wise Nature work her will, + And on my clay her darnels grow, + Come only when the days are still, + And at my head-stone whisper low, + And tell me'-- + +Now, what would an ordinary bard wish to be told under such +circumstances?--why, perhaps, how his sweetheart was, or his child, or +his family, or how the Reform Bill worked, or whether the last edition +of his poems had been sold--_papae_! our genuine poet's first wish is + + 'And tell me--_if the woodbines blow_!' + +When, indeed, he shall have been thus satisfied as to the _woodbines_, +(of the blowing of which in their due season he may, we think, feel +pretty secure,) he turns a passing thought to his friend--and another to +his mother-- + + 'If _thou_ art blest, my _mother's_ smile + Undimmed'-- + +but such inquiries, short as they are, seem too common-place, and he +immediately glides back into his curiosity as to the state of the +weather and the forwardness of the spring-- + + 'If thou art blessed--my mother's smile + Undimmed--_if bees are on the wing_?' + +No, we believe the whole circle of poetry does not furnish such another +instance of enthusiasm for the sights and sounds of the vernal +season!--The sorrows of a bereaved mother rank _after_ the blossoms of +the _woodbine_, and just before the hummings of the _bee_; and this is +_all_ that he has any curiosity about; for he proceeds:-- + + 'Then cease, my friend, a little while + That I may'-- + +'send my love to my mother,' or 'give you some hints about bees, which I +have picked up from Aristaeus, in the Elysian Fields,' or 'tell you how I +am situated as to my own personal comforts in the world below'?--oh no-- + + 'That I may--hear the _throstle sing_ + His bridal song--the boast of spring. + + Sweet as the noise, in parched plains, + Of bubbling wells that fret the stones, + (_If any sense in me remains_) + Thy words will be--thy cheerful tones + As welcome to--my _crumbling bones_!'--p. 4. + +'_If any sense in me remains!_'--This doubt is inconsistent with the +opening stanza of the piece, and, in fact, too modest; we take upon +ourselves to re-assure Mr. Tennyson, that, even after he shall be dead +and buried, as much '_sense_' will still remain as he has now the good +fortune to possess. + +We have quoted these first two poems in _extenso_, to obviate any +suspicion of our having made a partial or delusive selection. We cannot +afford space--we wish we could--for an equally minute examination of the +rest of the volume, but we shall make a few extracts to show--what we +solemnly affirm--that every page teems with beauties hardly less +surprising. + +_The Lady of Shalott_ is a poem in four parts, the story of which we +decline to maim by such an analysis as we could give, but it opens +thus-- + + 'On either side the river lie + Long fields of barley and of rye, + That clothe the wold and _meet the sky_-- + And _through_ the field the road runs _by_.' + +The Lady of Shalott was, it seems, a spinster who had, under some +unnamed penalty, a certain web to weave. + + 'Underneath the bearded barley, + The reaper, reaping late and early, + Hears her ever chanting cheerly, + Like an angel singing clearly.... + + 'No time has she for sport or play, + A charmed web she weaves alway; + A curse is on her if she stay + Her weaving either night or day.... + + 'She knows not'-- + +Poor lady, nor we either-- + + 'She knows not what that curse may be, + Therefore she weaveth steadily; + Therefore no other care has she + The Lady of Shalott.' + +A knight, however, happens to ride past her window, coming + + ----'from Camelot;[P] + From the bank, and _from_ the _river_, + He flashed _into_ the crystal _mirror_-- + "Tirra lirra, tirra _lirra_," (_lirrar_?) + Sang Sir Launcelot.'--p. 15. + +The lady stepped to the window to look at the stranger, and forgot for +an instant her web:--the curse fell on her, and she died; why, how, and +wherefore, the following stanzas will clearly and pathetically +explain:-- + + 'A long drawn carol, mournful, holy, + She chanted loudly, chanted lowly, + Till her eyes were darkened _wholly_, + And her smooth face sharpened _slowly_, + Turned to towered Camelot. + For ere she reached upon the tide + The first house on the water side, + Singing in her song she died, + The Lady of Shalott! + Knight and burgher, lord and dame, + To the planked wharfage came; + Below _the stern_ they read her name, + The Lady of Shalott.'--p. 19. + +We pass by two--what shall we call them?--tales, or odes, or sketches, +entitled 'Mariana in the South' and 'Eleaenore,' of which we fear we +could make no intelligible extract, so curiously are they run together +into one dreamy tissue--to a little novel in rhyme, called 'The Miller's +Daughter.' Millers' daughters, poor things, have been so generally +betrayed by their sweethearts, that it is refreshing to find that Mr. +Tennyson has united himself to _his_ miller's daughter in lawful +wedlock, and the poem is a history of his courtship and wedding. He +begins with a sketch of his own birth, parentage, and personal +appearance-- + + 'My father's mansion, mounted high, + Looked down upon the village-spire; + I was a long and listless boy, + And son and heir unto the Squire.' + +But the son and heir of Squire Tennyson often descended from the +'mansion mounted high;' and + + 'I met in all the close green ways, + While walking with my line and rod,' + +A metonymy for 'rod and line'-- + + 'The wealthy miller's mealy face, + Like the _moon in an ivytod_. + + 'He looked so jolly and so good-- + While fishing in the mill-dam water, + I laughed to see him as he stood, + And dreamt not of the miller's daughter.'--p. 33. + +He, however, soon saw, and, need we add, loved the miller's daughter, +whose countenance, we presume, bore no great resemblance either to the +'mealy face' of the miller, or 'the moon in an ivy-tod;' and we think +our readers will be delighted at the way in which the impassioned +husband relates to his wife how his fancy mingled enthusiasm for rural +sights and sounds, with a prospect of the less romantic scene of her +father's occupation. + + 'How dear to me in youth, my love, + Was everything about the mill; + The black, the silent pool above, + The pool beneath that ne'er stood still; + + The meal-sacks on the whitened floor, + The dark round of the dripping wheel, + _The very air about the door, + Made misty with the floating meal!_'--p. 36. + +The accumulation of tender images in the following lines appears not +less wonderful:-- + + 'Remember you that pleasant day + When, after roving in the woods, + ('Twas April then) I came and lay + Beneath those _gummy_ chestnut-buds? + + 'A water-rat from off the bank + Plunged in the stream. With idle care, + Downlooking through the sedges rank, + I saw your troubled image there. + + 'If you remember, you had set, + Upon the narrow casement-edge, + A _long green box_ of mignonette + And you were leaning on the ledge.' + +The poet's truth to Nature in his 'gummy' chestnut-buds, and to Art in +the 'long green box' of mignonette--and that masterful touch of likening +the first intrusion of love into the virgin bosom of the Miller's +daughter to the plunging of a water-rat into the mill-dam--these are +beauties which, we do not fear to say, equal anything even in Keats. + +We pass by several songs, sonnets, and small pieces, all of singular +merit, to arrive at a class, we may call them, of three poems derived +from mythological sources--Oenone, the Hesperides, and the +Lotos-eaters. But though the subjects are derived from classical +antiquity, Mr. Tennyson treats them with so much originality that he +makes them exclusively his own. Oenone, deserted by + + 'Beautiful Paris, evilhearted Paris,' + +sings a kind of dying soliloquy addressed to Mount Ida, in a formula +which is _sixteen_ times repeated in this short poem. + + 'Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die.' + +She tells her 'dear mother Ida,' that when evilhearted Paris was about +to judge between the three goddesses, he hid her (Oenone) behind a +rock, whence she had a full view of the _naked_ beauties of the rivals, +which broke her heart. + + '_Dear mother Ida, hearken ere I die_:-- + It was the deep mid noon: one silvery cloud + Had _lost his way_ among the pined hills: + They came--_all three_--the Olympian goddesses. + Naked they came-- + + * * * * * * + + How beautiful they were! too beautiful + To look upon; but Paris was to me + _More lovelier_ than all the world beside. + _O mother Ida, hearken ere I die._'--p. 56. + +In the place where we have indicated a pause, follows a description, +long, rich, and luscious--Of the three naked goddesses? Fye for +shame--no--of the 'lily flower violet-eyed,' and the 'singing pine,' and +the 'overwandering ivy and vine,' and 'festoons,' and 'gnarled boughs,' +and 'tree tops,' and 'berries,' and 'flowers,' and all the _inanimate_ +beauties of the scene. It would be unjust to the _ingenuus pudor_ of the +author not to observe the art with which he has veiled this ticklish +interview behind such luxuriant trellis-work, and it is obvious that it +is for our special sakes he has entered into these local details, +because if there was one thing which 'mother Ida' knew better than +another, it must have been her own bushes and brakes. We then have in +detail the tempting speeches of, first-- + + 'The imperial Olympian, + With arched eyebrow smiling sovranly, + Full-eyed Here;' + +secondly of Pallas-- + + 'Her clear and bared limbs + O'er-thwarted with the brazen-headed spear,' + +and thirdly-- + + 'Idalian Aphrodite ocean-born, + Fresh as the foam, new-bathed in Paphian _wells_--' + +for one dip, or even three dips in one well, would not have been enough +on such an occasion--and her succinct and prevailing promise of-- + + 'The fairest and most loving _wife_ in Greece;'-- + +upon evil-hearted Paris's catching at which prize, the tender and chaste +Oenone exclaims her indignation, that she herself should not be +considered fair enough, since only yesterday her charms had struck awe +into-- + + 'A wild and wanton pard, + Eyed like the evening-star, with playful tail--' + +and proceeds in this anti-Martineau rapture-- + + '_Most_ loving is _she_?' + 'Ah me! my mountain shepherd, that my arms + Were wound about thee, and my hot lips prest + Close--close to thine in that quick-falling dew + Of _fruitful_ kisses ... + Dear mother Ida! hearken ere I die!--p. 62. + +After such reiterated assurances that she was about to die on the spot, +it appears that Oenone thought better of it, and the poem concludes +with her taking the wiser course of going to town to consult her swain's +sister, Cassandra--whose advice, we presume, prevailed upon her to live, +as we can, from other sources, assure our readers she did to a good old +age. + +In the 'Hesperides' our author, with great judgment, rejects the common +fable, which attributes to Hercules the slaying of the dragon and the +plunder of the golden fruit. Nay, he supposes them to have existed to a +comparatively recent period--namely, the voyage of Hanno, on the coarse +canvas of whose log-book Mr. Tennyson has judiciously embroidered the +Hesperian romance. The poem opens with a geographical description of the +neighbourhood, which must be very clear and satisfactory to the English +reader; indeed, it leaves far behind in accuracy of topography and +melody of rhythm the heroics of Dionysius _Periegetes_. + + 'The north wind fall'n, in the new-starred night.' + +Here we must pause to observe a new species of _metabole_ with which Mr. +Tennyson has enriched our language. He suppresses the E in _fallen_, +where it is usually written and where it must be pronounced, and +transfers it to the word _new-starred_, where it would not be +pronounced if he did not take due care to superfix a _grave_ accent. +This use of the grave accent is, as our readers may have already +perceived, so habitual with Mr. Tennyson, and is so obvious an +improvement, that we really wonder how the language has hitherto done +without it. We are tempted to suggest, that if analogy to the accented +languages is to be thought of, it is rather the acute ([']) than the +grave ([`]) which should be employed on such occasions; but we speak +with profound diffidence; and as Mr. Tennyson is the inventor of the +system, we shall bow with respect to whatever his final determination +may be. + + 'The north wind fall'n, in the new-starred night + Zidonian Hanno, voyaging beyond + The hoary promontory of Soloe, + Past Thymiaterion in calmed bays.' + +We must here note specially the musical flow of this last line, which is +the more creditable to Mr. Tennyson, because it was before the tuneless +names of this very neighbourhood that the learned continuator of +Dionysius retreated in despair-- + + ----[Greek: eponymias nyn ellachen allas + Aithiopon gain, dysphonous oud' epierons + Mousais ouneka tasd' ego ouk agoreusom' apasas.] + +but Mr. Tennyson is bolder and happier-- + + 'Past Thymiaterion in calmed bays, + Between the southern and the western Horn, + Heard neither'-- + +We pause for a moment to consider what a sea-captain might have expected +to hear, by night, in the Atlantic ocean--he heard + + --'neither the warbling of the _nightingale_ + Nor melody o' the Libyan lotusflute,' + +but he did hear the three daughters of Hesper singing the following +song:-- + + 'The golden apple, the golden apple, the hallowed fruit, + Guard it well, guard it warily, + Singing airily, + Standing about the charmed root, + Round about all is mute'-- + +_mute_, though they sung so loud as to be heard some leagues out at +sea-- + + ----'all is mute + As the snow-field on mountain peaks, + As the sand-field at the mountain foot. + Crocodiles in briny creeks + Sleep, and stir not: all is mute.' + +How admirably do these lines describe the peculiarities of this charmed +neighbourhood--fields of snow, so talkative when they happen to lie at +the foot of the mountain, are quite out of breath when they get to the +top, and the sand, so noisy on the summit of a hill, is dumb at its +foot. The very crocodiles, too, are _mute_--not dumb but _mute_. The +'red-combed dragon curl'd' is next introduced-- + + 'Look to him, father, lest he wink, and the golden apple be stolen + away, + For his ancient heart is drunk with overwatchings night and day, + Sing away, sing aloud evermore, in the wind, without stop.' + +The north wind, it appears, has by this time awaked again-- + + 'Lest his scaled eyelid drop, + For he is older than the world'-- + +older than the _hills_, besides not rhyming to 'curl'd,' would hardly +have been a sufficiently venerable phrase for this most harmonious of +lyrics. It proceeds-- + + 'If ye sing not, if ye make false measure, + We shall lose eternal pleasure, + Worth eternal want of rest. + Laugh not loudly: watch the treasure + Of the wisdom of the west. + In _a corner_ wisdom whispers. Five and three + (_Let it not be preached abroad_) make an awful mystery.'--p. 102. + +This recipe for keeping a secret, by singing it so loud as to be heard +for miles, is almost the only point, in all Mr. Tennyson's poems, in +which we can trace the remotest approach to anything like what other men +have written, but it certainly does remind us of the 'chorus of +conspirators' in the Rovers. + +Hanno, however, who understood no language but Punic--(the Hesperides +sang, we presume, either in Greek or in English)--appears to have kept +on his way without taking any notice of the song, for the poem +concludes,-- + + 'The apple of gold hangs over the sea, + Five links, a gold chain, are we, + Hesper, the Dragon, and sisters three; + Daughters three, + Bound about + All around about + The gnarled bole of the charmed tree, + The golden apple, the golden apple, the hallowed fruit, + Guard it well, guard it warily, + Watch it warily, + Singing airily + Standing about the charmed root.'--p. 107. + +We hardly think that, if Hanno had translated it into Punic, the song +would have been more intelligible. + +The 'Lotuseaters'--a kind of classical opium-eaters--are Ulysses and his +crew. They land on the 'charmed island,' and 'eat of the charmed root,' +and then they sing-- + + 'Long enough the winedark wave our weary bark did carry. + This is lovelier and sweeter, + Men of Ithaca, this is meeter, + In the hollow rosy vale to tarry, + Like a dreamy Lotuseater--a delicious Lotuseater! + We will eat the Lotus, sweet + As the yellow honeycomb; + In the valley some, and some + On the ancient heights divine, + And no more roam, + On the loud hoar foam, + To the melancholy home, + At the limits of the brine, + The little isle of Ithaca, beneath the day's decline.'--p. 116. + +Our readers will, we think, agree that this is admirably characteristic, +and that the singers of this song must have made pretty free with the +intoxicating fruit. How they got home you must read in Homer:--Mr. +Tennyson--himself, we presume, a dreamy lotus-eater, a delicious +lotus-eater--leaves them in full song. + +Next comes another class of poems,--Visions. The first is the 'Palace of +Art,' or a fine house, in which the poet _dreams_ that he sees a very +fine collection of well-known pictures. An ordinary versifier would, no +doubt, have followed the old routine, and dully described himself as +walking into the Louvre, or Buckingham Palace, and there seeing certain +masterpieces of painting:--a true poet dreams it. We have not room to +hang many of these _chefs-d'oeuvre_, but for a few we must find +space.--'The Madonna'-- + + 'The maid mother by a crucifix, + In yellow pastures sunny warm, + Beneath branch work of costly sardonyx + Sat smiling--_babe in arm_.'--p. 72. + +The use of the latter, apparently, colloquial phrase is a deep stroke of +art. The form of expression is always used to express an habitual and +characteristic action. A knight is described '_lance in rest_'--a +dragoon, '_sword in hand_'--so, as the idea of the Virgin is inseparably +connected with her child, Mr. Tennyson reverently describes her +conventional position--'_babe in arm_.' + +His gallery of illustrious portraits is thus admirably arranged:--The +Madonna--Ganymede--St. Cecilia--Europa--Deep-haired +Milton--Shakspeare--Grim Dante--Michael Angelo--Luther--Lord +Bacon--Cervantes--Calderon--King David--'the Halicarnassean' (_quaere_, +which of them?)--Alfred, (not Alfred Tennyson, though no doubt in any +other man's gallery _he_ would have a place) and finally-- + + 'Isaiah, with fierce Ezekiel, + Swarth Moses by the Coptic sea, + Plato, _Petrarca_, Livy, and Raphael, + And eastern Confutzee!' + +We can hardly suspect the very original mind of Mr. Tennyson to have +harboured any recollections of that celebrated Doric idyll, 'The groves +of Blarney,' but certainly there is a strong likeness between Mr. +Tennyson's list of pictures and the Blarney collection of statutes-- + + 'Statues growing that noble place in, + All heathen goddesses most rare, + Homer, Plutarch, and Nebuchadnezzar, + All standing naked in the open air!' + +In this poem we first observed a stroke of art (repeated afterwards) +which we think very ingenious. No one who has ever written verse but +must have felt the pain of erasing some happy line, some striking +stanza, which, however excellent in itself, did not exactly suit the +place for which it was destined. How curiously does an author mould and +remould the plastic verse in order to fit in the favourite thought; and +when he finds that he cannot introduce it, as Corporal Trim says, _any +how_, with what reluctance does he at last reject the intractable, but +still cherished offspring of his brain! Mr. Tennyson manages this +delicate matter in a new and better way; he says, with great candour and +simplicity, 'If this poem were not already too long, _I should have +added_ the following stanzas,' and _then he adds them_, (p. 84;)--or, +'the following lines are manifestly superfluous, as a part of the text, +but they may be allowed to stand as a separate poem,' (p. 121,) _which +they do_;--or, 'I intended to have added something on statuary, but I +found it very difficult;'--(he had, moreover, as we have seen, been +anticipated in this line by the Blarney poet)--'but I have finished the +statues of _Elijah_ and _Olympias_--judge whether I have succeeded,' (p. +73)--and then we have these two statues. This is certainly the most +ingenious device that has ever come under our observation, for +reconciling the rigour of criticism with the indulgence of parental +partiality. It is economical too, and to the reader profitable, as by +these means + + 'We lose no drop of the immortal man.' + +The other vision is 'A Dream of Fair Women,' in which the heroines of +all ages--some, indeed, that belong to the times of 'heathen goddesses +most rare'--pass before his view. We have not time to notice them all, +but the second, whom we take to be Iphigenia, touches the heart with a +stroke of nature more powerful than even the veil that the Grecian +painter threw over the head of her father. + + ----'dimly I could descry + The stern blackbearded kings with wolfish eyes, + Watching to see me die. + + The tall masts quivered as they lay afloat; + The temples, and the people, and the shore; + One drew a sharp knife through my tender throat-- + Slowly,--and _nothing more_!' + +What touching simplicity--what pathetic resignation--he cut my +throat--'_nothing more_!' One might indeed ask, 'what _more_' she would +have? + +But we must hasten on; and to tranquillize the reader's mind after this +last affecting scene, shall notice the only two pieces of a lighter +strain which the volume affords. The first is elegant and playful; it is +a description of the author's study, which he affectionately calls his +_Darling Room_. + + 'O darling room, my heart's delight; + Dear room, the apple of my sight; + With thy two couches, soft and white, + There is no room so exquis_ite_; + No little room so warm and bright, + Wherein to read, wherein to write.' + +We entreat our readers to note how, even in this little trifle, the +singular taste and genius of Mr. Tennyson break forth. In such a dear +_little_ room a narrow-minded scribbler would have been content with +_one_ sofa, and that one he would probably have covered with black +mohair, or red cloth, or a good striped chintz; how infinitely more +characteristic is white dimity!--'tis as it were a type of the purity of +the poet's mind. He proceeds-- + + 'For I the Nonnenwerth have seen, + And Oberwinter's vineyards green, + Musical Lurlei; and between + The hills to Bingen I have been, + Bingen in Darmstadt, where the _Rhene_ + Curves toward Mentz, a woody scene. + + 'Yet never did there meet my sight, + In any town, to left or right, + A little room so exquis_ite_, + With _two_ such couches soft and white; + Nor any room so warm and bright, + Wherein to read, wherein to write.'--p. 153. + +A common poet would have said that he had been in London or in Paris--in +the loveliest villa on the banks of the Thames, or the most gorgeous +chateau on the Loire--that he has reclined in Madame de Stael's boudoir, +and mused in Mr. Roger's comfortable study; but the _darling room_ of +the poet of nature (which we must suppose to be endued with sensibility, +or he would not have addressed it) would not be flattered with such +common-place comparisons;--no, no, but it is something to have it said +that there is no such room in the ruins of the Drachenfels, in the +vineyard of Oberwinter, or even in the rapids of the _Rhene_, under the +Lurleyberg. We have ourselves visited all these celebrated spots, and +can testify in corroboration of Mr. Tennyson, that we did not see in any +of them anything like _this little room so exquis_ITE. + +The second of the lighter pieces, and the last with which we shall +delight our readers, is a severe retaliation on the editor of the +Edinburgh Magazine, who, it seems, had not treated the first volume of +Mr. Tennyson with the same respect that we have, we trust, evinced for +the second. + + 'To CHRISTOPHER NORTH. + You did late review my lays, + Crusty Christopher; + You did mingle blame and praise + Rusty Christopher. + + When I learnt from whom it came + I forgave you all the blame, + Musty Christopher; + I could _not_ forgive the praise, + Fusty Christopher.'--p. 153. + +Was there ever anything so genteelly turned--so terse--so sharp--and the +point so stinging and _so true_? + + 'I could not forgive the _praise_, + Fusty Christopher!' + +This leads us to observe on a phenomenon which we have frequently seen, +but never been able to explain. It has been occasionally our painful lot +to excite the displeasure of authors whom we have reviewed, and who have +vented their dissatisfaction, some in prose, some in verse, and some in +what we could not distinctly say whether it was verse or prose; but we +have invariably found that the common formula of retort was that adopted +by Mr. Tennyson against his northern critic, namely, that the author +would always + + --Forgive us all the _blame_, + But could _not_ forgive the _praise_. + +Now this seems very surprising. It has sometimes, though we regret to +say rarely, happened, that, as in the present instance, we have been +able to deal out unqualified praise, but never found that the dose in +this case disagreed with the most squeamish stomach; on the contrary, +the patient has always seemed exceedingly comfortable after he had +swallowed it. He has been known to take the 'Review' home and keep his +wife from a ball, and his children from bed, till he could administer it +to them, by reading the article aloud. He has even been heard to +recommend the 'Review' to his acquaintance at the clubs, as the best +number which has yet appeared, and one, who happened to be an M.P. as +well as an author, gave a _conditional_ order, that in case his last +work should be favourably noticed, a dozen copies should be sent down by +the mail to the borough of ----. But, on the other hand, when it has +happened that the general course of our criticism has been unfavourable, +if by accident we happened to introduce the smallest spice of _praise_, +the patient immediately fell into paroxysms--declaring that the part +which we foolishly thought might offend him had, on the contrary, given +him pleasure--positive pleasure, but _that_ which he could not possibly +either forget or forgive, was the grain of praise, be it ever so small, +which we had dropped in, and for which, and _not for our censure_, he +felt constrained, in honour and conscience, to visit us with his extreme +indignation. Can any reader or writer inform us how it is that praise in +the wholesale is so very agreeable to the very same stomach that rejects +it with disgust and loathing, when it is scantily administered; and +above all, can they tell us why it is, that the indignation and nausea +should be in the exact inverse ratio to the quantity of the ingredient? +These effects, of which we could quote several cases much more violent +than Mr. Tennyson's, puzzle us exceedingly; but a learned friend, whom +we have consulted, has, though he could not account for the phenomenon, +pointed out what he thought an analogous case. It is related of Mr. +Alderman Faulkner, of convivial memory, that one night when he expected +his guests to sit late and try the strength of his claret and his head, +he took the precaution of placing in his wine-glass a strawberry, which +his doctor, he said, had recommended to him on account of its cooling +qualities: on the faith of this specific, he drank even more deeply, +and, as might be expected, was carried away at an earlier period and in +rather a worse state, than was usual with him. When some of his friends +condoled with him next day, and attributed his misfortune to six bottles +of claret which he had imbibed, the Alderman was extremely +indignant--'the claret,' he said, 'was sound, and never could do any man +any harm--his discomfiture was altogether caused by that damned single +strawberry' which he had kept all night at the bottom of his +glass.--_The Quarterly Review_. + +[Footnote O: See Quarterly Review, vol. XIX, p. 204.] + +[Footnote P: The same Camelot, in Somersetshire, we presume, which is +alluded to by Kent in 'King Lear'-- + + 'Goose! if I had thee upon Sarum plain, + I'd drive thee cackling home to Camelot.' +] + + +_The Princess; a Medley_. By Alfred Tennyson. Moxon. + +That we are behind most even of our heaviest and slowest contemporaries +in the notice of this volume, is a fact for which we cannot +satisfactorily account to ourselves, and can therefore hardly hope to be +able to make a valid excuse to our readers. The truth is, that whenever +we turned to it we became, like the needle between positive and negative +electric poles, so attracted and repelled, that we vibrated too much to +settle to any fixed condition. Vacillation prevented criticism, and we +had to try the experiment again and again before we could arrive at the +necessary equipose to indicate the right direction of taste and opinion. +We will now, however, note our variations, and leave them to the public +judgment. + +The first lines of the prologue were repulsive, as a specimen of the +poorest Wordsworth manner and style-- + + "Sir Walter Vivian all a summer's day + Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun + Up to his people: thither flock'd at noon + His tenants, wife and child, and thither half + The neighbouring borough with their Institute + Of which he was the patron. I was there + From college, visiting the son,--the son + A Walter too,--with others of our set." + +The "wife and child" of the tenants is hardly intelligible; and the +"set" is but a dubious expression. Nor can we clearly comprehend the +next line and a half-- + + "And me that morning Walter show'd the house, + Greek, set with busts:" + +Does this mean that Sir Walter Vivian inhabited a Greek house, and that +the college "set" were guests in that dwelling "set with busts"? To say +the least, this is inelegant, and the affectations proceed-- + + "From vases in the hall + _Flowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their names_, + Grew side by side." + +Persons conversant with the botanical names of flowers will hardly be +able to realize (as the Yankees have it) the idea of their loveliness; +the loveliness of Hippuris, Dolichos, Syngenesia, Cheiranthus, +Artocarpus, Arum dracunculus, Ampelopsis hederaca, Hexandria, Monogynea, +and the rest. + +A good description of the demi-scientific sports of the Institute +follows; but the house company and inmates retire to a ruined abbey:-- + + "High-arch'd and ivy-claspt, + Of finest Gothic, lighter than a fire." + +This is a curious jumble in company, two lights of altogether a +different nature; but the party get into a rattling conversation, in +which the noisy babble of the College Cubs is satirically characterized: +we + + "Told + Of college: he had climb'd across the spikes, + And he had squeez'd himself betwixt the bars, + And he had breathed the Proctor's dogs; and one + Discuss'd his tutor, rough to common men + But honeying at the whisper of a lord; + And one the Master, as a rogue in grain + Veneer'd with sanctimonious theory." + +The dialogue happily takes a turn, and the task of writing the +_Princess_ is assigned to the author, as one of the tales in the +Decameron of Boccaccio. A neighbouring princess of the south (so the +story runs as the prince tells it) is in childhood betrothed to a like +childish prince of the north:-- + + "She to me + Was proxy-wedded with a _bootless calf_ [?] + At eight years old." + +Both grew up, the prince, all imaginative, filling his mind with +pictures of her perfections; but she turning a female reformer of the +Wolstencroft [_sic_] school, resolved never to wed till woman was raised +to an equality with men, and establishing a strange female colony and +college to carry this vast design into effect. In consequence of this +her father is obliged to violate the contract, and his indignant father +prepares for war to enforce it. The prince, with two companions, flies +to the south, to try what he can do for himself; and in the disguise of +ladies they obtain admission to the guarded precincts of the new +Amazonian league. He, meanwhile, sings sweetly of his mistress-- + + "And still I wore her picture by my heart, + And one dark tress; and all around them both + Sweet thoughts would swarm as bees about their queen." + +And of his friend-- + + "My other heart, + My shadow, my half-self, for still we moved + Together, kin as horse's ear and eye." + +His evasion is also finely told-- + + "But when the council broke, I rose and past + Through the wild woods that hang about the town; + Found a still place, and pluck'd her likeness out: + Laid it on flowers, and watch'd it lying bathed + In the green gleam of dewy-tassell'd trees: + What were those fancies? wherefore break her troth? + Proud look'd the lips: but while I meditated + A wind arose and rush'd upon the South, + And shook the songs, the whispers, and the shrieks + Of the wild woods together; and a Voice + Went with it 'Follow, follow, thou shalt win!'" + +Almost in juxtaposition with these beauties, we find one of the +disagreeable blots, so offensive to good taste, which disfigure the +poem. The travellers are interrogating the host of an inn close to the +liberties where the princess holds her petticoated sway:-- + + "And at the last-- + The summer of the vine in all his veins-- + 'No doubt that we might make it worth his while. + For him, he reverenced his liege-lady there; + He always made a point to post with mares; + His daughter and his housemaid were the boys. + The land, he understood, for miles about + Was till'd by women; all the swine were sows, + And all the dogs'"-- + +This is too bad, even for medley; but proceed we into the interior of +the grand and luxurious feminine institution, where their sex is +speedily discovered, but for certain reasons concealed by the +discoverers. Lectures on the past and what might be done to accomplish +female equality, and description of the boundaries, the dwelling place, +and the dwellers therein, fill many a page of mingled excellence and +defects. Here is a sample of both in half a dozen lines:-- + + "We saw + The Lady Blanche's daughter where she stood, + Melissa, with her hand upon the lock, + A rosy blonde, and in a college gown + _That clad her like an April daffodilly_ + (Her mother's colour) with her lips apart, + And all her thoughts as fair within her eyes, + _As bottom agates seem to wave and float + In crystal currents of clear morning seas_." + +Curious contradictions in mere terms, also occasionally occur. Thus, of +a frightened girl, we are told that-- + + "_Light_ + As flies the _shadow_ of a bird she fled." + +Events move on. The prince reasons as a man in a colloquy with the +princess, and speaks of the delights of maternal affections, and she +replies-- + + "We are not talk'd to thus: + Yet will we say for children, would they grew + Like field-flowers everywhere! we like them well: + But children die; and let me tell you, girl, + Howe'er you babble, great deeds cannot die: + They with the sun and moon renew their light + Forever, blessing those that look on them: + Children--that men may pluck them from our hearts, + Kill us with pity, break us with ourselves-- + O--children--there is nothing upon earth + More miserable than she that has a son + And sees him err:" + +A song on "The days that are no more," seems to us to be too laboured, +nor is the other lyric introduced, "The Swallow," much more to our +satisfaction. It is a mixture of prettinesses: the first four triplets +run thus, ending in a poetic beauty-- + + "O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South, + Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves, + And tell her, tell her what I tell to thee. + + "O tell her, Swallow, thou that knowest each, + That bright and fierce and fickle is the South, + And _dark_ and true and tender is the North. + + "O Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and light + Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, + And _cheep and twitter twenty million loves_. + + "O were I thou that she might take me in, + And lay me on her bosom, _and her heart + Would rock the snowy cradle till I died_." + +The prince saves the princess from being drowned, when the secret +explodes like a roll of gun cotton, and a grand turmoil ensues. The +rival kings approach to confines in battle array, and the princess +resumes the declaration of war:-- + + "A tide of fierce + Invective seem'd to wait behind her lips, + As waits a river level with the dam + Ready to burst and flood the world with foam: + And so she would have spoken, but there rose + A hubbub in the court of half the maids + Gather'd together; from the illumin'd hall + Long lanes of splendour slanted o'er a press + Of snowy shoulders, thick as herded ewes, + And rainbow robes, and gems and gemlike eyes, + And gold and golden heads; they to and fro + Fluctuated, as flowers in storm, some red, same pale, + All open-mouth'd, all gazing to the light, + Some crying there was an army in the land, + And some that men were in the very walls, + And some they cared not; till a clamour grew + As of a new-world Babel, woman-built, + And worse-confounded: high above them stood + The placid marble Muses, looking peace." + +She denounces the perils outside and in-- + + "I dare + All these male thunderbolts: what is it ye fear? + Peace! there are those to avenge us and they come: + If not,--myself were like enough, O girls, + To unfurl the maiden banner of our rights, + And clad in iron burst the ranks of war, + Or, falling, protomartyr of our cause, + Die: yet I blame ye not so much for fear; + Six thousand years of fear have made ye that + From which I would redeem ye: but for those + That stir this hubbub--you and you--I know + Your faces there in the crowd--to-morrow morn + We meet to elect new tutors; then shall they + That love their voices more than duty, learn + With whom they deal, dismiss'd in shame to live + No wiser than their mothers, household stuff, + Live chattels, mincers of each other's fame, + Full of weak poison, turnspits for the clown, + The drunkard's football, laughing-stocks of Time, + Whose brains are in their hands and in their heels, + But fit to flaunt, to dress, to dance, to thrum, + To tramp, to scream, to burnish, and to scour + For ever slaves at home and fools abroad." + +Ay, just as Shakspere hath it-- + + "To suckle fools and chronicle small beer." + +The hero also meets the shock, at least in poetic grace:-- + + "Upon my spirits + Settled a gentle cloud of melancholy, + Which I shook off, for I was young, and one + To whom the shadow of all mischance but came + As night to him that sitting on a hill + Sees the midsummer, midnight, Norway sun, + Set into sunrise." + +It is agreed to decide the contest by a combat of fifty on each +side--the one led by the prince, and the other by Arac, the brother of +the princess. And clad in "harness"-- + + "Issued in the sun that now + Leapt from the dewy shoulders of the Earth, + And hit the northern hills." + +To the fight-- + + "Then rode we with the old king across the lawns + Beneath huge trees, a thousand rings of Spring + In every bole, a song on every spray + Of birds that piped their Valentines." + +The prince and his companions are defeated; and he, wounded almost to +the death, is consigned at her own request to be nursed by the +princess:-- + + "So was their sanctuary violated, + So their fair college turn'd to hospital; + At first with all confusion; by and by + Sweet order lived again with other laws; + A kindlier influence reign'd; and everywhere + Low voices with the ministering hand + Hung round the sick." + +The result may be foreseen-- + + "From all a closer interest flourish'd up. + Tenderness touch by touch, and last, to these, + Love, like an Alpine harebell hung with tears + By some cold morning glacier; frail at first + And feeble, all unconscious of itself, + But such as gather'd colour day by day." + +And the agreement is filled up:-- + + "Dear, but let us type them now + In our lives, and this proud watchword rest + Of equal; seeing either sex alone + Is half itself, and in true marriage lies + Nor equal, nor unequal: each fulfils + Defect in each, and always thought in thought, + Purpose in purpose, will in will, they grow, + The single pure and perfect animal, + The two-cell'd heart beating with one full stroke + Life" + + "O we will walk this world, + Yoked in all exercise of noble end, + And so through those dark gates across the wild + That no man knows. Indeed I love thee; come, + Yield thyself up; my hopes and thine are one; + Accomplish thou my manhood and thyself + Lay thy sweet hands in mine and trust to me." + +Who will question the true poetry of this production, or who will deny +the imperfections, (mostly of affectation, though some of tastelessness) +which obscure it? Who will wonder at our confessed wavering when they +have read this course of alternate power, occasionally extravagant, and +feebleness as in the long account of the _emeute_? Of the extravagant, +the description of the princess, on receiving the declaration of war, is +an example:-- + + "She read, till over brow + And cheek and bosom brake the wrathful bloom + As of some fire against a stormy cloud, + When the wild peasant rights himself, and the rick + Flames, and his anger reddens in the heavens." + +The heroine, it must be acknowledged, is much of the virago throughout, +and the prince rather of the softest; but the tale could not be +otherwise told. We add four examples--two to be admired, and two to be +contemned, in the fulfilment of our critique. + + "For was, and is, and will be, are but is," + +is a noble line; and the following, on the promised restoration of a +child to its mother, is very touching-- + + "Again she veiled her brows, and prone she sank, and so + Like tender things that being caught feign death, + Spoke not, nor stirr'd." + +Not so the burlesque eight daughters of the plough, the brawny ministers +of the princess' executive, and their usage of a herald. They were-- + + "Eight daughters of the plough, stronger than men, + Huge women blowzed with health, and wind, and rain + And labour. Each was like a Druid rock; + Or like a spire of land that stands apart + Cleft from the main, and clang'd about with mews." + +And they-- + + "Came sallying through the gates, and caught his hair, + And so belabour'd him on rib and cheek + They made him wild." + +Nor the following-- + + "When the man wants weight the woman takes it up, + And topples down the scales; but this is fixt + As are the roots of earth and base of all. + Man for the field and woman for the hearth; + Man for the sword and for the needle she; + Man with the head and woman with the heart; + Man to command and woman to obey; + All else confusion. Look to it; the gray mare + Is ill to live with, when her whinny shrills + From tile to scullery, and her small goodman + Shrinks in his arm-chair while the fires of Hell + Mix with his hearth; but take and break her, you! + She's yet a colt. Well groom'd and strongly curb'd + She might not rank with those detestable + That to the hireling leave their babe, and brawl + Their rights or wrongs like potherbs in the street. + They say she's comely; there's the fairer chance: + _I_ like her none the less for rating at her! + Besides, the woman wed is not as we, + But suffers change of frame. A lusty brace + Of twins may weed her of her folly. Boy, + The bearing and the training of a child + Is woman's wisdom." + +--_The Literary Gazette_. + + + + +ROBERT BROWNING + + +_Paracelsus_. By Robert Browning. + +There is talent in this dramatic poem, (in which is attempted a picture +of the mind of this celebrated character,) but it is dreamy and obscure. +Writers would do well to remember, (by way of example,) that though it +is not difficult to imitate the mysticism and vagueness of Shelley, we +love him and have taken him to our hearts as a poet, not _because_ of +these characteristics--but _in spite_ of them.--_The Athenaeum_. + + +_Sordello_. By Robert Browning. London: Moxon. 1840. + +The scene of this poem is laid in Italy, when the Ghibelline and Guelph +factions were in hottest contest. The author's style is rather peculiar, +there being affectations of language and invertions of thought, and +other causes of obscurity in the course of the story which detract from +the pleasure of perusing it. But after all, we are much mistaken if Mr. +Browning does not prove himself a poet of a right stamp,--original, +vigorous, and finely inspired. He appears to us to possess a true sense +of the dignity and sacredness of the poet's kingdom; and his imagination +wings its way with a boldness, freedom and scope, as if he felt himself +at home in that sphere, and was resolved to put his allegiance to the +test.--_The Monthly Review_. + + +_Men and Women_. By Robert Browning. Two Volumes. Chapman and Hall. + +It is really high time that this sort of thing should, if possible, be +stopped. Here is another book of madness and mysticism--another +melancholy specimen of power wantonly wasted, and talent deliberately +perverted--another act of self-prostration before that demon of bad +taste who now seems to hold in absolute possession the fashionable +masters of our ideal literature. It is a strong case for the +correctional justice of criticism, which has too long abdicated its +proper functions. The Della Crusca of Sentimentalism perished under the +_Baviad_--is there to be no future Gifford for the Della Crusca of +Transcendentalism? The thing has really grown to a lamentable head +amongst us. The contagion has affected not only our sciolists and our +versifiers, but those whom, in the absence of a mightier race, we must +be content to accept as the poets of our age. Here is Robert Browning, +for instance--no one can doubt that he is capable of better things--no +one, while deploring the obscurities that deface the _Paracelsus_ and +the _Dramatic Lyrics_, can deny the less questionable qualities which +characterized those remarkable poems--but can any of his devotees be +found to uphold his present elaborate experiment on the patience of the +public? Take any of his worshippers you please--let him be "well up" in +the transcendental poets of the day--take him fresh from Alexander +Smith, or Alfred Tennyson's _Maud_, or the _Mystic_ of Bailey--and we +will engage to find him at least ten passages in the first ten pages of +_Men and Women_, some of which, even after profound study, he will not +be able to construe at all, and not one of which he will be able to +read off at sight. Let us take one or two selections at random from the +first volume, and try. What, for instance, is the meaning of these four +stanzas from the poem entitled "By the Fireside"?-- + + My perfect wife, my Leonor, + Oh, heart my own, oh, eyes, mine too, + Whom else could I dare look backward for, + With whom beside should I dare pursue + The path grey heads abhor? + + For it leads to a crag's sheer edge with them; + Youth, flowery all the way, there stops-- + Not they; age threatens and they contemn, + Till they reach the gulf wherein youth drops, + One inch from our life's safe hem! + + With me, youth led--I will speak now, + No longer watch you as you sit + Reading by fire-light, that great brow + And the spirit-small hand propping it + Mutely--my heart knows how-- + + When, if I think but deep enough, + You are wont to answer, prompt as rhyme; + And you, too, find without a rebuff + The response your soul seeks many a time + Piercing its fine flesh-stuff-- + +We really should think highly of the powers of any interpreter who could +"pierce" the obscurity of such "stuff" as this. One extract more and we +have done. A gold medal in the department of Hermeneutical Science to +the ingenious individual, who, after any length of study, can succeed in +unriddling this tremendous passage from "Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha," +the organist:-- + + First you deliver your phrase + --Nothing propound, that I see, + Fit in itself for much blame or much praise-- + Answered no less, where no answer needs be: + Off start the Two on their ways! + + Straight must a Third interpose, + Volunteer needlessly help-- + In strikes a Fourth, a Fifth thrusts in his nose, + So the cry's open, the kennel's a-yelp, + Argument's hot to the close! + + One disertates, he is candid-- + Two must dicept,--has distinguished! + Three helps the couple, if ever yet man did: + Four protests, Five makes a dart at the thing wished-- + Back to One, goes the case bandied! + + One says his say with a difference-- + More of expounding, explaining! + All now is wrangle, abuse, and vociferance-- + Now there's a truce, all's subdued, self-restraining-- + Five, though, stands out all the stiffer hence. + + One is incisive, corrosive-- + Two retorts, nettled, curt, crepitant-- + Three makes rejoinder, expansive, explosive-- + Four overbears them all, strident and strepitant-- + Five ... O Danaides, O Sieve! + + Now, they ply axes and crowbars-- + Now they prick pins at a tissue + Fine as a skein of the casuist Escobar's + Worked on the bone of a lie. To what issue? + Where is our gain at the Two-bars? + + _Est fuga, volvitur rota!_ + On we drift. Where looms the dim port? + One, Two, Three, Four, Five, contribute their quota-- + Something is gained, if one caught but the import-- + Show it us, Hugues of Saxe-Gotha! + + What [with] affirming, denying, + Holding, risposting, subjoining, + All's like ... it's like ... for an instance I'm trying ... + There! See our roof, its gilt moulding and groining + Under those spider-webs lying? + + So your fugue broadens and thickens, + Greatens and deepens and lengthens, + Till one exclaims--"But where's music, the dickens? + Blot ye the gold, while your spider-web strengthens, + Blacked to the stoutest of tickens?" + +Do our readers exclaim, "But where's poetry--the dickens--in all this +rigmarole?" We confess we can find none--we can find nothing but a set +purpose to be obscure, and an idiot captivity to the jingle of +Hudibrastic rhyme. This idle weakness really appears to be at the bottom +of half the daring nonsense in this most daringly nonsensical book. +Hudibras Butler told us long ago that "rhyme the rudder is of verses;" +and when, as in his case, or in that of Ingoldsby Barham, or +Whims-and-Oddities Hood, the rudder guides the good ship into tracks of +fun and fancy she might otherwise have missed, we are grateful to the +double-endings, not on their own account, but for what they have led us +to. But Mr. Browning is the mere thrall of his own rudder, and is +constantly being steered by it into whirlpools of the most raging +absurdity. This morbid passion for double rhymes, which is observable +more or less throughout the book, reaches its climax in a long copy of +verses on the "Old Pictures of Florence," which, with every disposition +to be tolerant of the frailties of genius, we cannot hesitate to +pronounce a masterpiece of absurdity. Let the lovers of the Hudibrastic +admire these _tours de force_:-- + + Not that I expect the great Bigordi + Nor Sandro to hear me, chivalric, bellicose; + Nor wronged Lippino--and not a word I + Say of a scrap of Fra Angelico's. + But you are too fine, Taddeo Gaddi, + So grant me a taste of your intonaco-- + Some Jerome that seeks the heaven with a sad eye? + No churlish saint, Lorenzo Monaco? + + * * * * * * * + + Margheritone of Arezzo, + With the grave-clothes garb and swaddling barret, + (Why purse up mouth and beak in a pet so, + You bald, saturnine, poll-clawed parrot?) + No poor glimmering Crucifixion, + Where in the foreground kneels the donor? + If such remain, as is my conviction, + The hoarding does you but little honour. + +The conclusion of this poem rises to a climax:-- + + How shall we prologuise, how shall we perorate, + Say fit things upon art and history-- + Set truth at blood-heat and the false at zero rate, + Make of the want of the age no mystery! + Contrast the fructuous and sterile eras, + Show, monarchy its uncouth cub licks + Out of the bear's shape to the chimaera's-- + Pure Art's birth being still the republic's! + + Then one shall propose (in a speech, curt Tuscan, + Sober, expurgate, spare of an "_issimo_,") + Ending our half-told tale of Cambuscan, + Turning the Bell-tower's altaltissimo. + And fine as the beak of a young beccaccia + The Campanile, the Duomo's fit ally, + Soars up in gold its full fifty braccia, + Completing Florence, as Florence, Italy. + +How really deplorable is all this! On what theory of art can it possibly +be defended? In all the fine arts alike--poetry, painting, sculpture, +music--the master works have this in common, that they please in the +highest degree the most cultivated, and to the widest extent the less +cultivated. _Lear_ and the _Divine Comedy_ exhaust the thinking of the +profoundest student, yet subdue to hushed and breathless attention the +illiterate minds that know not what study means. The "Last Judgment," +the "Transfiguration," the "Niobe," and the "Dying Gladiator" excite +alike the intelligent rapture of artists, and the unintelligent +admiration of those to whom art and its principles are a sealed book. +Handel's _Israel in Egypt_--the wonder of the scientific musician in his +closet--yet sways to and fro, like a mighty wind upon the waters, the +hearts of assembled thousands at an Exeter Hall oratorio. To take an +instance more striking still, Beethoven, the sublime, the rugged, the +austere, is also, as even Mons. Jullien could tell us, fast becoming a +popular favourite. Now why is this? Simply because these master minds, +under the divine teaching of genius, have known how to clothe their +works in a beauty of form incorporate with their very essence--a beauty +of form which has an elective affinity with the highest instincts of +universal humanity. And it is on this beauty of form, this exquisite +perfection of style, that the Baileys and the Brownings would have us +believe that they set small account, that they purposely and scornfully +trample. We do not believe it. We believe that it is only because they +are half-gifted that they are but half-intelligible. Their mysticism is +weakness--weakness writhing itself into contortions that it may ape the +muscles of strength. Artistic genius, in its higher degrees, necessarily +involves the power of beautiful self-expression. It is but a weak and +watery sun that allows the fogs to hang heavy between the objects on +which it shines and the eyes it would enlighten; the true day-star +chases the mists at once, and shows us the world at a glance. + +Our main object has been to protest against what we feel to be the false +teachings of a perverted school of art; and we have used this book of +Mr. Browning's chiefly as a means of showing the extravagant lengths of +absurdity to which the tenets of that school can lead a man of admitted +powers. We should regret, however in the pursuit of this object to +inflict injustice on Mr. Browning. This last book of his, like most of +its predecessors, contains some undeniable beauties--subtle thoughts, +graceful fancies, and occasionally a strain of music, which only makes +the chaos of surrounding discords jar more harshly on the ear. The +dramatic scenes "In a Balcony" are finely conceived and vigorously +written; "Bishop Blougram's Apology," and "Cleon," are well worth +reading and thinking over; and there is a certain grace and beauty in +several of the minor poems. That which, on the whole, has pleased us +most--really, perhaps, because we could read it off-hand--is "The Statue +and the Bust," of which we give the opening stanzas:-- + +[Quotes fourteen stanzas of _The Statue and the Bust_.] + +Why should a man, who, with so little apparent labour, can write +naturally and well, take so much apparent labour to write affectedly and +ill? There can be but one of two solutions. Either he goes wrong from +want of knowledge, in which case it is clear that he wants the highest +intuitions of genius; or he sins against knowledge, in which case he +must have been misled by the false promptings of a morbid vanity, eager +for that applause of fools which always waits on quackery, and which is +never refused to extravagance when tricked out in the guise of +originality. It is difficult, from the internal evidence supplied by +his works, to know which of these two theories to adopt. Frequently the +conclusion is almost irresistible, that Mr. Browning's mysticism must be +of _malice prepense_: on the whole, however, we are inclined to clear +his honesty at the expense of his powers, and to conclude that he is +obscure, not so much because he has the vanity to be thought original, +as because he lacks sufficient genius to make himself clear.--_The +Saturday Review_. + + + + +NOTES + + +THOMAS GRAY + +When Gray's _Elegy Written in a Country Church-Yard_ appeared in 1751, +the _Monthly Rev._, IV, p. 309, gave it the following curious +notice:--"The excellence of this little piece amply compensates for its +want of quantity." The immediate success and popularity of the _Elegy_ +established Gray's poetical reputation; hence his _Odes_ (1757) were +received and criticized as the work of a poet of whom something entirely +different was expected. The thin quarto volume containing _The Progress +of Poesy_ and _The Bard_ (entitled merely Ode I and Ode II in that +edition) was printed for Dodsley by Horace Walpole at Strawberry Hill, +and was published on August 8, 1757. Within a fortnight Gray wrote to +Thomas Warton that the poems were not at all popular, the great +objection being their obscurity; a week later he wrote to Hurd:--"Even +my friends tell me they [the Odes] do not succeed ... in short, I have +heard nobody but a player [Garrick] and a doctor of divinity [Warburton] +that profess their esteem for them." For further comment, see Gray's +_Works_, ed. Gosse, II, pp. 321-328. + +Our review, which is reprinted from _Monthly Rev._, XVII (239-243) +(September, 1757), was written by Oliver Goldsmith, and is included in +most of the collected editions of his works. Although it was practically +wrung from Goldsmith while he was the unwilling thrall of Griffiths, it +is a noteworthy piece of criticism for its time--certainly far superior +to the general standard of the _Monthly Review_. While recognizing the +scholarly merit of the poet's work, Goldsmith showed clearly why the +Odes could not become popular. A more favorable notice of the volume +appeared in the _Critical Rev._, IV, p. 167. + +In reprinting this review, the long quotations from both odes have been +omitted. This precedent is followed in all cases where the quotations +are of inordinate length, or are offered merely as "specimens" without +specific criticism. No useful end would be served in reprinting numerous +pages of classic extracts that are readily accessible to every student. +All omissions are, of course, properly indicated. + +1. _Quinault_. Philippe Quinault (1635-1688), a popular French dramatist +and librettist. + +2. _Mark'd for her own_. An allusion to the line in the Epitaph appended +to the _Elegy_: "And Melancholy marked him for her own." + + +OLIVER GOLDSMITH + +Goldsmith's _Traveller_ (1764) was begun as early as 1755--before he had +expressed what Professor Dowden calls his "qualified enthusiasm" and +"official admiration" for Gray's _Odes_. In criticizing Gray, he quoted +Isocrates' advice--_Study the people_--and properly bore that precept in +mind while he was shaping his own verses. The _Odes_ and the _Traveller_ +are respectively characteristic utterances of their authors--of the +academic recluse, and of the warm-hearted lover of humanity. + +The review, quoted from the _Critical Rev._, XVIII (458-462) (December, +1764), is from the pen of Dr. Samuel Johnson. Apart from its +distinguished authorship and the strong words of commendation in the +final sentence, it possesses slight interest as literary criticism. It +is, in fact, little more than a brief summary of the poem, enriched by a +few well-chosen illustrative extracts. The fact that Johnson contributed +nine or ten lines to the poem (see Boswell, ed. Hill, I, p. 441, n. 1, +and II, p. 6) may account partly for the character of the review. +Johnson's quotations from the poem are not continuous and show several +variations from authoritative texts. + + +WILLIAM COWPER + +Cowper stands almost alone among English poets as an instance of late +manifestation of poetic power. He was over fifty years of age when he +offered his first volume of _Poems_ (1782) to the public. This +collection, which included _Table-Talk_ and other didactic poems, +appeared at the beginning of the most prosaic age in the history of +modern English literature; yet the critics did not find it sufficiently +striking in quality to differentiate it from the level of contemporary +verse, or to forecast the success of _The Task_ and _John Gilpin's Ride_ +three years later. + +The notice in the _Critical Rev._, LIII (287-290), appeared in April, +1782. While the same poems are but slightly esteemed to-day, it must be +recognized that the attitude of the reviewer was severe for his time. +The age had grown accustomed to large draughts of moralizing and +didacticism in verse, and the quality of Cowper's contribution was +assuredly above the average. The _Monthly Rev._, LXVII, p. 262, gave the +_Poems_ a much more favorable reception. + +10. _Non Dii, non homines, etc._ Properly, _non homines, non di_, +Horace, _Ars Poetica_, l. 373. + +10. _Caraccioli_. _Jouissance de soi-meme_ (ed. 1762), cap. xii. + +11. _There needs no ghost, etc._ See _Hamlet_, I, 5. 110. + + +ROBERT BURNS + +The Kilmarnock edition (1786) of Burns' _Poems_ was published during the +most eventful period of the poet's life; the almost universally kind +reception accorded to this volume was the one source of consolation amid +many sorrows and distractions. Two reviews have been selected to +illustrate both the Scottish and English attitude toward the newly +discovered "ploughman-poet." The _Edinburgh Magazine_, IV (284-288), in +October, 1786, gave Burns a welcome that was hearty and sincere; though +we may smile to-day at the information that he has neither the "doric +simplicity" of Ramsay, nor the "brilliant imagination" of Ferguson. +Besides the poems mentioned in brackets, the magazine published further +extracts from Burns in subsequent numbers. The _Critical Review_, LXIII +(387-388), gave the volume a belated notice in May, 1787, exceeding even +the Scotch magazine in its generous appreciation. With the generally +accepted fact in mind that all of Burns' enduring work is in the +Scottish dialect, and that his English poems are comparatively inferior, +it is interesting to note the _Critical Review's_ regret that the +dialect must "obscure the native beauties" and be often unintelligible +to English readers. The same sentiment was expressed by the _Monthly +Review_, LXXV, p. 439, in the critique reprinted (without its curious +anglified version of _The Cotter's Saturday Night_) in Stevenson's +_Early Reviews_. + +There is perhaps no other English poet whose fame was so suddenly and +securely established as Burns'. At no time since the appearance of the +Kilmarnock volume has the worth of his lyrical achievement been +seriously questioned. The _Reliques_ of Burns, edited by Dr. Cromek in +1808, were reviewed by Walter Scott in the first number of the +_Quarterly Review_, and by Jeffrey in the corresponding number of the +_Edinburgh_. Both articles are valuable to the student of Burns, but +their great length made their inclusion in the present volume +impracticable. + +14. _Rusticus abnormis sapiens, etc._ Horace, Sat. II, l. 3. + +15. _A great lady ... and celebrated professor_. Evidently Mrs. Dunlop +and Professor Dugald Stewart, who both took great interest in Burns +after the appearance of the Kilmarnock volume. + + +WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +The thin quartos containing _An Evening Walk_ and _Descriptive Sketches_ +were published by Wordsworth in 1793. The former was practically a +school-composition in verse, written between 1787-89 and dedicated to +his sister; the latter was composed in France during 1791-92 and was +revised shortly before publication. The dedication was addressed to the +Rev. Robert Jones, fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, who was +Wordsworth's companion during the pedestrian tour in the Alps. Though +_An Evening Walk_ was published first, the _Monthly Review_, XII, n.s. +(216-218), in October, 1793, noticed both in the same issue and +naturally gave precedence to the longer poem. Specific allusions in the +text necessitate the same order in the present reprint. + +The impatience of the reviewer at the prospect of "more descriptive +poetry" was due to the fact that many such productions had recently been +noticed by the _Monthly_, and that the volumes then under consideration +evidently belonged to the broad stream of mediocre verse that had been +flowing soberly along almost since the days of Thomson. These first +attempts smacked so decidedly of the older manner that we cannot censure +the critic for failing to foresee that Wordsworth was destined to +glorify the "poetry of nature," and to rescue it from the rut of +listless and soporific topographical description. Both poems, in the +definitive text, are readable, and exhibit here and there a glimmer of +the poet's future greatness; yet it must be borne in mind that +Wordsworth was continually tinkering at his verse, to the subsequent +despair of conscientious variorum editors, and that most of the +absurdities and infelicities in his first editions disappeared under the +correcting influence of his sarcastic critics and his own maturing +taste. + +A collation of the accepted text with the _Monthly Review's_ quotations +will repay the student; thus, the twelve opening lines quoted by the +reviewer are represented by eight lines in Professor Knight's edition, +and only four of these correspond to the original text. The reviewer +confined his remarks to the first thirty lines of the poem and very +properly neglected the rest. He followed, with moderate success, the +method of quotation with interpolated sarcasm and badinage--a method +that was afterwards effectively pursued by the early Edinburgh Reviewers +and the Blackwood coterie. There are few examples of that style in the +eighteenth century reviews, but some noteworthy specimens of a later +period--_e.g._, the _Edinburgh Review_ on Coleridge's _Christabel_ and +the _Quarterly_ on Tennyson's _Poems_--are reprinted in this volume. + +The review of _An Evening Walk_ is simply an appended paragraph to the +previous article. Wordsworth evidently appreciated the advice conveyed +in the reviewer's final sentence and found many of the lines that +"called loudly for amendment." More favorable notices of both poems will +be found in _Critical Review_, VIII, pp. 347 and 472. + + +_Lyrical Ballads_ + +The _Lyrical Ballads_ by Wordsworth and Coleridge were published +anonymously early in September, 1798--a few days before the joint +authors sailed for Germany. Coleridge's contributions were _The Rime of +the Ancient Mariner_, _The Foster-Mother's Tale_, _The Nightingale_, and +_The Dungeon_; the remaining nineteen poems were by Wordsworth. As the +publication of this volume has been accepted by most critics as the +first fruit of the new romantic spirit and the virtual beginning of +modern English poetry, the reception accorded to the _Lyrical Ballads_ +becomes a matter of prime importance. It is well known that the effort +was a failure at first and that the apparent triumph of romanticism did +not occur until the publication of Scott's _Lay of the Last Minstrel_ +(1805); but a contemporary blindness to the beauty of two of the finest +poems in English literature cannot be permitted to figure in the +critics' dispassionate investigation of causes and influences. + +There were four interesting reviews of the first edition of the _Lyrical +Ballads_, namely, (1) _Critical Rev._, XXIV, n.s. (197-204), in October, +1798, which is reprinted here; (2) _Analytical Rev._, XXVIII (583-587), +in December, 1798; (3) _Monthly Rev._, XXIX, n.s. (202-210), in May, +1799, reprinted in Stevenson's _Early Reviews_; (4) _British Critic_, +XIV (364-369) in October, 1799. + +The article in the _Critical Review_ was written by Robert Southey under +conditions most favorable for such a malicious procedure. The publisher, +his friend Cottle, had transferred the copyright of the _Lyrical +Ballads_ to Arch, a London publisher, within two weeks of the appearance +of the volume, giving as a shallow excuse the "heavy sale" of the book. +Both Wordsworth and Coleridge were in Germany. Southey had quarreled +with Coleridge, and was probably jealous of the latter's extravagant +praise of Wordsworth. He accordingly seized the opportunity to assail +the work without injuring Cottle's interests or entailing the immediate +displeasure of the travelling bards. + +He covered his tracks to some extent by referring several times to "the +author," although the joint authorship was well known to him. While +severe in most of his strictures on Wordsworth, Southey reserved his +special malice for _The Ancient Mariner_. He called it "a Dutch attempt +at German sublimity"; and in a letter written to William Taylor on +September 5, 1798--probably while he was writing his discreditable +critique--he characterized the poem as "the clumsiest attempt at German +sublimity I ever saw." Southey's responsibility for the article became +known to Cottle, who communicated the fact to the poets on their return +a year later. Wordsworth declared that "if Southey could not +conscientiously have spoken differently of the volume, he ought to have +declined the task of reviewing it." Coleridge indited an epigram, _To a +Critic_, and let the matter drop. Shortly afterwards he showed his +renewed good-will by aiding Southey in preparing the second _Annual +Anthology_ (1800). + +The subsequent reviews of the _Lyrical Ballads_ adopted the tone of the +_Critical_ (then recognized as the leading review) and internal evidence +shows that they did not hesitate to borrow ideas from Southey's article. +The _Analytical Review_ also saw German extravagances in _The Ancient +Mariner_; the _Monthly_ borrowed Southey's figure of the Italian and +Flemish painters, and called _The Ancient Mariner_ "the strangest story +of a cock and bull that we ever saw on paper ... a rhapsody of +unintelligible wildness and incoherence." The belated review in the +_British Critic_ was probably written by Coleridge's friend, Rev. +Francis Wrangham, and was somewhat more appreciative than the rest. For +further details, consult Mr. Thomas Hutchinson's reprint (1898) of the +_Lyrical Ballads_, pp. (xiii-xxviii). Despite the unfavorable reviews, +the Ballads reached a fourth edition in 1805 (besides an American +edition in 1802), thus achieving the popularity alluded to by Jeffrey at +the beginning of our next review. + + +_Poems_ (1807) + +Wordsworth's fourth publication, the _Poems_ (1807), included most of +the pieces written after the first appearance of the _Lyrical Ballads_. +It was likewise his first venture subsequent to the founding of the +_Edinburgh Review_. Jeffrey had assailed the theories of the "Lake +Poets" (and, incidentally, coined that unfortunate term) in the first +number of the _Review_, in an article on Southey's _Thalaba_, and three +years later (1805), in criticizing _Madoc_, he again expressed his views +on the subject. Now came the first opportunity to deal with the +recognized leader of the "Lakers"--the poet whose work most clearly +illustrated the poetic theories that Jeffrey deemed pernicious. + +The article here reprinted from the _Edinburgh Rev._, XI (214-231), of +October, 1807, and Jeffrey's review of _The Excursion_, in _ibid._, XXIV +(1-30), are perhaps the two most important critiques of their kind. No +student of Wordsworth's theory of poetry, as set forth in his various +prefaces, can afford to ignore either of these interesting discussions +of the subject. (For details, see A.J. George's edition of the +_Prefaces_ of Wordsworth, Gates' _Selections_ from Jeffrey, Beers' +_Nineteenth Century Romanticism_, Hutchinson's edition of _Lyrical +Ballads_, etc.) It was undoubtedly true that Jeffrey, although an able +critic, failed to grasp the real significance of the new poetic +movement, and to appreciate the influence wrought by the doctrines of +the Lake Poets on modern conceptions of poetry. Yet he was far from +wrong in many of his criticisms of Wordsworth. While deprecating the +latter's theories, it is clear that Jeffrey regarded him as a poet of +great power who was being led astray by his perverse practice. The +popular conception of Jeffrey as a hectoring and blatant opponent of +Wordsworth is not substantiated by the review. The impartial reader must +agree with Jeffrey at many points, and if he will take the trouble to +collate Jeffrey's quotations with the revised text of Wordsworth, he +will learn that the poet did not disdain to take an occasional +suggestion for the improvement of his verse. + +We recognize Wordsworth to-day as the most unequal of English poets. +There is little that is common to the inspired bard of _Tintern Abbey_, +the _Immortality Ode_ and the nobler _Sonnets_, and the unsophisticated +scribe of _Peter Bell_ and _The Idiot Boy_. Like Browning, he wrote too +much to write well at all times, and if both poets were capable of the +sublimest flights, they likewise descended to unimagined depths; but the +fault of Wordsworth was perhaps the greater, because his bathos was the +result of a deliberate and persistent attempt to enrich English poetry +with prosaically versified incidents drawn at length from homely rural +life. + + +SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE + +The first part of Coleridge's _Christabel_ was written in 1797 during +the brief period of inspiration that also gave us _The Ancient Mariner_ +and _Kubla Khan_--in short, that small group of exquisite poems which in +themselves suffice to place Coleridge in the front rank of English +poets. The second part was written in 1800, after the author's return +from Germany. The fragment circulated widely in manuscript among +literary men, bewitched Scott and Byron into imitating its fascinating +rhythms, and, at Byron's suggestion, was finally published by Murray in +1816 with _Kubla Khan_ and _The Pains of Sleep_. It is probable that the +high esteem in which these poems were held by Coleridge's literary +friends led him to expect a favorable reception at the hands of the +critics; hence his keen disappointment at the general tone of their +sarcastic analysis and their protests against the absurdity and +obscurity of the poems. The principal critiques on _Christabel_ +were:--(1) _Edinburgh Rev._, XXVII (58-67), which is here reprinted; (2) +_Monthly Rev._, LXXXII, n.s. (22-25), reprinted in Stevenson's _Early +Reviews_; (3) _The Literary Panorama_, IV, n.s. (561-565); and (4) +_Anti-Jacobin Rev._, L (632-636). + +It is evident that Coleridge was eminently successful in the gentle art +of making enemies. We have seen that Southey's attack on the _Lyrical +Ballads_ was a direct result of his ill-will toward Coleridge; the +outrageous article in the _Edinburgh Review_ was written by William +Hazlitt under similar inspiration, and was followed by abusive papers in +_The Examiner_ (1816, p. 743, and 1817, p. 236). There was no +justification for Hazlitt, and none has been attempted by his +biographers. Judged by its intrinsic merits, the Edinburgh article is +one of the most absurd reviews ever written by a critic of recognized +ability. Hazlitt followed the method of outlining the story by quotation +with interspersed sarcasm and ironical criticism. As a coarse boor might +crumple a delicate and beautifully wrought fabric to prove that it has +not the wearing qualities of a blacksmith's apron, Hazlitt seized upon +the ethereal story of _Christabel_, with its wealth of mediaeval and +romantic imagery, and held up to ridicule the incidents that did not +conform to modern English conceptions of life. It requires no great art +to produce such a critique; the same method was applied to _Christabel_ +with hardly less success by the anonymous hack of the _Anti-Jacobin_. +Whatever may have been Hazlitt's motives, we cannot understand how a +critic of his unquestioned ability could quote with ridicule some of the +very finest lines of _Kubla Khan_, and expect his readers to concur with +his opinion. The lack of taste was more apparent because he quoted, with +qualified praise, six lines of no extraordinary merit from _Christabel_ +and insisted, that with this one exception, there was not a couplet in +the whole poem that achieved the standard of a newspaper poetry-corner +or the effusions scratched by peripatetic bards on inn-windows. An +interesting discussion between Mr. Thomas Hutchinson and Col. Prideaux +concerning Hazlitt's responsibility for this and other critiques on +Coleridge in the _Edinburgh Review_ will be found in _Notes and Queries_ +(Ninth Series), X, pp. 388, 429; XI, 170, 269. + +The other reviews of _Christabel_ were all unfavorable. Most extravagant +was the utterance of the _Monthly Magazine_, XLVI, p. 407, in 1818, when +it declared that the "poem of Christabel is only fit for the inmates of +Bedlam. We are not acquainted in the history of literature with so great +an insult offered to the public understanding as the publication of that +r[h]apsody of delirium." + +Hazlitt's primitive remarks on the metre of _Christabel_ are of little +interest. Coleridge was, of course, wrong in stating that his metre was +founded on a new principle. The irregularly four-stressed line occurs in +Spenser's _Shepherd's Calender_ and can be traced back through the +halting tetrameters of Skelton. Coleridge himself alludes to this fact +in his note to his poem _The Raven_, and elsewhere. + +Coleridge's earlier poetical publications were received with commonplace +critiques usually mildly favorable. For reviews of his _Poems_ (1796) +see _Monthly Rev._, XX, n.s., p. 194; _Analytical Rev._, XXIII, p. 610; +_British Critic_, VII, p. 549; and _Critical Rev._, XVII, n.s., p. 209; +the second edition of _Poems_ (1797) is noticed in _Critical Rev._, +XXIII, n.s., p. 266; for _Lyrical Ballads_, see under Wordsworth; for +the successful play _Remorse_ (1813), see _Monthly Rev._, LXXI, n.s., p. +82, and _Quarterly Rev._, XI, p. 177. + + +ROBERT SOUTHEY + +_Madoc_, a ponderous quarto of over five hundred pages and issued at two +guineas, was published by Southey in 1805 as the second of that +long-forgotten series of interminable epics including _Thalaba_, _The +Curse of Kehama_, and _Roderick, Last of the Goths_. These huge unformed +productions were not poems, but metrical tales, written in a kind of +verse that could have flowed indefinitely from the author's pen. In +short, Southey was not a poet, and the whole bulk of his efforts in +verse, with but one or two exceptions, seems destined to oblivion. As +poet-laureate for thirty years and the associate of Wordsworth and +Coleridge in the "Lake School," Southey will, however, remain a figure +of some importance in the history of English poetry. + +The review of _Madoc_ reprinted from the _Monthly Rev._, XLVIII +(113-122) for October, 1805, was written in the old style then fast +giving way to the sprightlier methods of the _Edinburgh_. Here we find a +style abounding in literary allusions and classical quotations, and +evincing a generally patronizing attitude toward the author under +discussion. Most readers will agree with the sentiments expressed by the +reviewer, who succeeded in making his article interesting without +descending to the depths of buffoonery. No apology is necessary for the +excision of the reviewer's unreasonably long extracts from the poem. +_Madoc_ was also reviewed at great length in the _Edinburgh Review_ by +Francis Jeffrey. + +61. _Ille ego, qui quondam, etc._ The lines usually prefixed to the +_AEneid_. + +61. _Prorumpere in medias res_. Cf. Horace, _Ars Poetica_, l. 148. + +61. _Macklin's Tragedy_. _Henry VII_ (1746), his only tragedy, and a +failure. + +61. _Toto carere possum_. Cf. Martial, _Epig._ XI, 56. + +61. _Camoens_. The author of the Portuguese _Lusiad_ (1572) which +narrates the adventures of Vasco da Gama. + +62. _Milton_. Quoted from Sonnet XI.--_On the Detraction which followed +upon my writing certain Treatises_. + +63. _Snatching a grace, etc._ Pope's _Essay on Criticism_, l. 153. + + +CHARLES LAMB + +Most of Lamb's earlier poetical productions appeared in conjunction with +the work of other poets. Four of his sonnets were printed with +Coleridge's _Poems on Various Subjects_ (1796), and he was more fully +represented in _Poems by S.T. Coleridge. Second Edition_. _To which are +now added Poems by Charles Lamb and Charles Lloyd_ (1797). In the +following year appeared _Blank Verse_, by Charles Lloyd and Charles +Lamb. For new and interesting material concerning the three poets, see +E.V. Lucas' _Charles Lamb and the Lloyds_ (1899). Lloyd (1775-1839) +wrote melancholy verses and a sentimental, epistolary novel _Edmund +Oliver_, but nothing of permanent value. However, in 1798, he was almost +as well known as Coleridge, and was hailed in some quarters as a +promising poet. + +The _Monthly Rev._, XXVII, n.s. (104-105), in September, 1798, published +the critique of _Blank Verse_ which is here reprinted. Its principal +interest lies in the scant attention shown to Lamb, although the volume +contained his best poem--the tender _Old Familiar Faces_. Dr. Johnson's +characterization of blank-verse as "poetry to the eye" will be found at +the end of his _Life of Milton_ as a quotation from "an ingenious +critic." + +Lamb's drama, _John Woodvil_ (1802), written in imitation of later +Elizabethan models, was a failure. It was unfavorably noticed in the +_Monthly Rev._, XL, n.s., p. 442 and at greater length in the _Edinburgh +Rev._, II, p. 90 ff. + +Many years later (1830) Lamb prepared his collection of _Album-Verses_ +at the request of his friend Edward Moxon, who had achieved some fame as +a poet and was enabled (by the generous aid of Samuel Rogers) to begin +his more lucrative career as a publisher. Three years after the +appearance of _Album-Verses_, he married Lamb's adopted daughter, Emma +Isola. The _Album-Verses_, like most of their kind, were a collection of +small value; the _Literary Gazette_, 1830 (441-442), consequently lost +no time in assailing them. The _Athenaeum_, 1830, p. 435, at that time +the bitter rival of the _Gazette_, published a more favorable review, +and a few weeks later (p. 491) printed Southey's verses, _To Charles +Lamb, on the Reviewal of his Album-Verses in the Literary Gazette_, +together with a sharp commentary on the methods of the _Gazette_. +Several times during that year the _Athenaeum_ assailed the system of +private puffery which was followed by the _Gazette_ and eventually +caused its downfall. There is a reply to the _Athenaeum_ in the _Literary +Gazette_, 1833, p. 772. + + +WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR + +Landor was twenty-three when he published _Gebir_ anonymously in +1798--the year of the _Lyrical Ballads_--and he lived until 1864. The +nine decades of his life covered an important period of literature. He +was nine years old when the great Johnson died, yet he lived to see the +best poetic achievements of Tennyson, Browning, and Arnold. However, he +did not live to see _Gebir_ a popular poem. Southey gave it a favorable +welcome in the _Critical Review_, and became a life-long admirer of +Landor; but our brief notices reprinted from the _Monthly Rev._, XXXI, +n.s., p. 206, and _British Critic_, XV, p. 190 of February, 1800, +represent more nearly the popular verdict. Both reviewers complain of +the obscurity of the poem, which, it will be remembered, had been +originally written in Latin, then translated and abridged. +Notwithstanding the fact that Landor declared himself amply repaid by +the praise of a few appreciative readers, he prepared a violent and +scornful reply to the _Monthly Review_, and would have published it but +for the sensible dissuasion of a friend. Some interesting extracts from +the letter are printed in Forster's _Life of Landor_, pp. (76-85). He +protested especially against the imputed plagiarisms from Milton and +gave ample evidence of the pugnacious spirit that brought him into +difficulties several times during his life. See also the _Imaginary +Conversation_ between Archdeacon Hare and Walter Landor, wherein the +reception of _Gebir_ is discussed and Southey's poetry is praised at the +expense of Wordsworth's. Landor's first publication, the _Poems_ (1795) +was noticed in the _Monthly Rev._, XXI, n.s., p. 253. + + +SIR WALTER SCOTT + +The successful series of metrical tales which Scott inaugurated with the +_Lay of the Last Minstrel_ (1805) had for its second member the more +elaborate _Marmion_ (1808). From the first, Scott's poems and romances +were favorably received by the reviews and usually noticed at great +length. There was always a story to outline and choice passages to +quote. As suggested in the Preface, these paeans of praise are of +comparatively little interest to the student, and need hardly be cited +here in detail. + +The critique of _Marmion_, written by Jeffrey for the _Edinburgh Rev._, +XII (1-35), had the place of honor in the number for April, 1808. It was +chosen for the present reprints partly as a fitting example of Jeffrey's +fearlessness in expressing his opinions, and partly for its historic +interest as the article that contributed to Scott's rupture with the +Edinburghers and to his successful founding of a Tory rival in the +_Quarterly Review_. Although the article has here been abridged to about +half of its original length by the omission of six hundred quoted lines +and a synopsis of the poem, it is still the longest of these reprints. +Jeffrey evidently felt that a detailed account of the story was +necessary in order to justify his strictures on the plot. + +An author of those days could afford to ignore the decisions of the +critical monthlies, but the brilliant criticism and incisive diction of +the _Edinburgh Review_ carried weight and exerted far-reaching +influence. Jeffrey's article was practically the only dissonant note in +the chorus of praise that greeted _Marmion_, and Scott probably resented +the critic's attitude. Lockhart, in his admirable chapter on the +publication of _Marmion_, admits that "Jeffrey acquitted himself on this +occasion in a manner highly creditable to his courageous sense of duty." +The April number of the _Edinburgh_ appeared shortly before a particular +day on which Jeffrey had engaged to dine with Scott. Fearing that under +the circumstances he might be an unwelcome guest, he sent the following +tactful note with the copy which was forwarded to the poet:-- + +"Dear Scott,--If I did not give you credit for more magnanimity than any +other of your irritable tribe, I should scarcely venture to put this +into your hands. As it is, I do it with no little solicitude, and +earnestly hope that it will make no difference in the friendship which +has hitherto subsisted between us. I have spoken of your poem exactly as +I think, and though I cannot reasonably suppose that you will be pleased +with everything I have said, it would mortify me very severely to +believe I had given you pain. If you have any amity left for me, you +will not delay very long to tell me so. In the meantime, I am very +sincerely yours, F. Jeffrey." + +There was but one course open to Scott; accordingly to Lockhart, "he +assured Mr. Jeffrey that the article had not disturbed his digestion, +though he hoped neither his booksellers nor the public would agree with +the opinions it expressed, and begged he would come to dinner at the +hour previously appointed. Mr. Jeffrey appeared accordingly, and was +received by his host with the frankest cordiality, but had the +mortification to observe that the mistress of the house, though +perfectly polite, was not quite so easy with him as usual. She, too, +behaved herself with exemplary civility during the dinner, but could not +help saying, in her broken English, when her guest was departing, 'Well, +good night, Mr. Jeffrey. Dey tell me you have abused Scott in de Review, +and I hope Mr. Constable has paid _you_ very well for writing it.'" + +Jeffrey's article apparently had little influence on the sale of +_Marmion_, which reached eight editions (25,000 copies) in three years. +In October, 1808, the _Edinburgh Review_ published an appreciative +review of Scott's edition of Dryden, and afterwards received with favor +the later poems and the principal Waverley Novels. + +78. _Mr. Thomas Inkle_. The story of Inkle and Yarico was related by +Steele in no. 11 of the _Spectator_. It was afterwards dramatized (1787) +by George Colman. + + +LORD BYRON + +The twentieth number of the _Edinburgh Review_ contained Jeffrey's long +article on Wordsworth's _Poems_ (1807); the twenty-second contained his +review of Scott's _Marmion_; and the twenty-first (January, 1808) +contained a still more famous critique, long attributed to Jeffrey--the +review of Byron's _Hours of Idleness_ (1807). It is reprinted from +_Edinburgh Rev._, XI (285-289) in Stevenson's _Early Reviews_ and forms +Appendix II of R.E. Prothero's edition of Byron's _Letters and +Journals_. We know definitely that the article was written by Henry +Brougham. (See Prothero, op. cit., II, p. 397, and Sir M.E. Grant Duff's +_Notes from a Diary_, II, p. 189.) + +It is hardly within the province of literary criticism to deal with +hypothetical conditions in authors' lives; but it is at least a matter +of some interest to conjecture whether Byron would have become a great +poet if this stinging review had not been published. It is evident that +the _Hours of Idleness_ gave few signs of promise, and the poet, fully +intent upon a political career, himself expressed his intention of +abandoning the muse. Many an educated Englishman has published such a +volume of _Juvenilia_ and sinned no more. But a nature like Byron's +could not overlook the effrontery of the _Edinburgh Review_. The +proud-spirited poet was evidently far more incensed by the patronizing +tone of the article than by its strictures: what could be more galling +than the reiterated references to the "noble minor," or the withering +contempt that characterized a particular poem as "the thing in page 79"? +Many years later, Byron wrote to Shelley:--"I recollect the effect on me +of the _Edinburgh_ on my first poem; it was rage, and resistance, and +redress--but not despondency nor despair." (Prothero, V, p. 267.) + +There was method in Byron's "rage and resistance and redress." For more +than a year he labored upon a satire which he had begun even before the +appearance of the _Edinburgh_ article. (See letter of October 26, 1807, +in _Letters_, ed. Prothero, I, p. 147.) In the spring of 1809, _English +Bards and Scotch Reviewers_ was given anonymously to the world. The +publication of this vigorous satire virtually decided Byron's career. +Not only did he abuse Jeffrey, whom he believed responsible for the +offending critique, but he flung defiance in the face of almost all his +literary contemporaries. The authorship of the satire was soon apparent, +and in a flippant note to the second edition, Byron became still more +abusive toward Jeffrey and his "dirty pack," and declared that he was +ready to give satisfaction to all who sought it. A few years later he +regretted his rashness in assailing the authors of his time. He also +learned of the injustice done to Jeffrey and had ample reason to feel +embarrassed by the tone of the eight reviews of his poems that Jeffrey +did write for the _Edinburgh_. (See the list in Prothero, II, p. 248.) +In _Don Juan_ (canto X, xvi), he made the following retraction:-- + + "And all our little feuds, at least all _mine_, + Dear Jeffrey, once my most redoubted foe + (As far as rhyme and criticism combine + To make such puppets of us things below), + Are over. Here's a health to 'Auld Lang Syne!' + I do not know you, and may never know + Your face--but you have acted, on the whole, + Most nobly; and I own it from my soul." + +The other reviews of _Hours of Idleness_ are of little interest. The +_Monthly_ and the _Critical_ both praised the book; the _Literary +Panorama_, III, p. 273, said the author was no imbecile, but an +incautious writer. + +98. [Greek: thelo legein],--Anacreon, Ode I. ([Greek: thelo legein +Atreidas, k. t. l.]) + +98. [Greek: mesonyktiois, poth' horais],--Anacreon, Ode III. ([Greek: +mesonyktiois poth' horais, k. t. l.]) + +100. _Sancho_,--Sancho Panza in _Don Quixote_. The proverb is of ancient +origin. See French, Latin, Italian and Spanish forms in Brewer's +_Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_. + + +_Childe Harold_ + +Shortly after the appearance of the second edition of _English Bards and +Scotch Reviewers_, Byron left England and travelled through the East, at +the same time leisurely composing the first two cantos of _Childe +Harold's Pilgrimage_. Their publication in 1812 placed him at the head +of the popular poets of the day. Henceforth the reviews gave extensive +notices to all his productions. (For references, see J.P. Anderson's +bibliography appended to Hon. Roden Noel's _Life of Byron_.) _Childe +Harold_ was reviewed in the _Edinburgh Rev._, XIX (466-477), by Jeffrey; +in the _Quarterly_, VII (180-200), by George Ellis; in the _British +Review_, III (275-302); and _Eclectic Review_, XV (630-641). + +The article here reprinted from the _Christian Observer_, XI (376-386), +of June, 1812, is of special interest as an early protest from +conservative, religious circles against the immoral and irreverent tone +of Byron's poetry. As literary criticism, it is almost worthless, in +spite of the elaborate allusions and quotations with which the +critic--evidently a survivor of the old school--has interlarded his +remarks. Little can be said in defense of an article which insists that +the chief end of poetry is to be agreeably didactic and which (in 1812) +cites Southey as the greatest of living poets. However, it probably +represents the attitude of a large number of worthy people of the time, +who recognized that Byron had genius, and wished to see him exercise his +powers with due regard for the proprieties of civilized life. As +Byron's offences grew more flagrant in his later poems, the criticisms +in the conservative reviews became more vehement. For Byron's +controversy with the _British Review_, which he facetiously dubbed "my +grandmother's review" in _Don Juan_, see Prothero, IV, pp. (346-347), +and Appendix VII. The ninth Appendix to the same volume is Byron's +caustic reply to the brutal review of _Don Juan_ in _Blackwood's +Magazine_, V, p. 512 ff. + +101. _Lion of the north_, Francis Jeffrey. The usual agnomen of Gustavus +Adolphus. Cf. Walter Scott, the "Wizard of the North." + +105. _Faiery Queen will not often be read through_. Hume's _History of +England_, Appendix III. + +106. _Qui, quid sit pulchrum_, etc. Horace, Epis. II (3-4). + +106. _Rursum--quid virtus_, etc. Horace, Epis. II (17-18). + +107. _Our sage serious Spenser, etc._ Milton's _Areopagitica_, _Works_, +ed. Mitford, IV, p. 412. + +107. _Quinctilian_. See Quintilian, Book XII, Chap. I. + +107. _Longinus_. _On the Sublime_, IX, XIII, etc. + +108. _Restoration of Learning in the East_. A Cambridge prize poem +(1805) by Charles Grant, Lord Glenelg (1778-1866). + +109. _Thersites_. See Shakespeare's _Troilus and Cressida_. + +109. _Caliban_. See Shakespeare's _The Tempest_. + +109. _Heraclitus_. The "weeping philosopher" (circa 500 B.C.). + +109. _Zeno_. The founder (342-270 B.C.) of the Stoic School. + +109. _Zoilus_. The ancient grammarian who assailed the works of Homer. +The epithet Homeromastix is sometimes applied to him. + +113. _The philosophic Tully, etc._ See the concluding paragraph of +Cicero's _De Senectute_. + + +PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY + +It is doubtful whether any other poet was so widely and so continuously +assailed in the reviews as Shelley. Circumstances have made certain +critiques on Byron, Keats, and others more widely known, but nowhere +else do we find the persistent stream of abuse that followed in the wake +of Shelley's publications. The _Blackwood_ articles were usually most +scathing, and those of the _Literary Gazette_ were not far behind. +Fortunately, the poet spent most of his time in Italy and thus remained +in ignorance of the great majority of these spiteful attacks in the +less important periodicals. + +_Alastor_, which appeared in 1816, attracted comparatively little +attention. The tone of the brief notice reprinted from the _Monthly +Rev._, LXXIX, n.s., p. 433, shows that the poet was as yet unknown to +the critics. _Blackwood's Magazine_, VI (148-154), gave a longer and, on +the whole, more favorable account of the poem. In the same year, Leigh +Hunt published his _Story of Rimini_, most noteworthy for its graceful +rhythmical structure in the unrestricted couplets of Chaucer. This +departure from the polished heroics of Pope, which were ill-adapted to +narrative subjects in spite of his successful translation of Homer, was +hailed with delight by the younger poets. Shelley imitated the measure +in his _Julian_ and _Maddalo_, and Keats did likewise in _Lamia_ and +_Endymion_. Hunt was soon recognized by the critics as the leader of a +group of liberals whom they conveniently classified as the Cockney +School. Shelley's ill-treatment at the hands of the reviewers dates from +his association with this coterie. His _Revolt of Islam_ (1818) was +assailed by John Taylor Coleridge in the _Quarterly Review_, XXI +(460-471). _The Cenci_ was condemned as a horrible literary monstrosity +by the scandalized critics of the _Monthly Rev._, XCIV, n.s. (161-168); +the _Literary Gazette_, 1820 (209-10); and the _New Monthly Magazine_, +XIII (550-553). The review here reprinted from the _London Mag._, I +(401-405), is comparatively mild in its censure. + +One would naturally suppose that the death of Keats would have ensured +at least a respectful consideration for Shelley's lament, _Adonais_ +(1821); but the callous critics were by no means abashed. The outrageous +article in the _Literary Gazette_ of December 8, 1821, pp. (772-773), is +one of the unpardonable errors of literary criticism; but it sinks into +insignificance beside the brutal, unquotable review which _Blackwood's +Magazine_ permitted to appear in its pages. In the same year Shelley's +youthful poetical indiscretion, _Queen Mab_, which he himself called +"villainous trash," was published under circumstances beyond his +control, and forthwith the readers of the _Literary Gazette_ were +regaled with ten columns of foul abuse from the pen of a critic who +declared that he was driven almost speechless by the sentiments +expressed in the poem. Well could the heartless reviewer of _Adonais_ +write:--"If criticism killed the disciples of that [the Cockney] +school, Shelley would not have been alive to write an elegy on another." + +115. _Eye in a fine phrenzy rolling_. Shakespeare's _Midsummer-Night's +Dream_, V, 1, 12. + +115. _Above this visible diurnal sphere_. Milton's _Paradise Lost_, Book +VII, 22. + +116. _Parca quod satis est manu_. Horace, _Odes_, III, 16, 24. + +116. _Lord Fanny_. A nickname bestowed upon Lord Hervey, an effeminate +noble of the time of George II. + +117. _O! rus, quando ego te aspiciam_. Horace, _Satires_, II, 6, 60. + +117. _Mordecai_. See Book of _Esther_, V, 13. + +118. _Last of the Romans_. Mark Antony in Shakespeare's _Julius Caesar_, +III, 2, 194. + +120. _Full fathom five_. Shakespeare's _The Tempest_, I, 2, 396. + +126. _Ohe! jam satis est_. Horace, _Satires_, I, 5, 12-13. + +126. _Tristram Shandy_. The excommunication is in vol. III, chap. XI. + +133. _Put a girdle_, etc. See Shakespeare's _Midsummer-Night's Dream_, +II, 1, 175. + + +JOHN KEATS + +The history of English poetry offers no more interesting case between +poet and critic than that of John Keats. The imputed influence of a +savage critique in hastening the death of the poet has given the +_Quarterly Review_ an unenviable notoriety which clings in spite of the +efforts of scholars to establish the truth. To many students, Keats, +_Endymion_, and _Quarterly_ are practically connotative terms; and this +is a direct result of the righteous but misguided indignation of +Shelley--misguided because his information was incomplete and the more +guilty party escaped, thus inflicting upon the _Quarterly_ the brunt of +the opprobrium of which far more than half should be accredited to +_Blackwood's Magazine_. + +_Endymion_ was published in April, 1818. One of the publishers (Taylor +and Hessey) requested Gifford, then editor of the _Quarterly Review_, to +treat the poem with indulgence. This indiscreet move probably actuated +Gifford to provide a severe critique; at any rate, in the belated April +number of the _Quarterly_, XIX (204-208), which was not issued until +September, appeared the famous review. A persistent error, which has +crept into W.M. Rossetti's _Life of Keats_, into Anderson's +bibliography, and even into the article on Gifford in the _Dictionary of +National Biography_, attributes this article to Gifford himself; but it +is known to be the work of John Wilson Croker. (See the article on +Croker in _Dict. Nat. Biog._ From the article on John Murray (_ibid._) +we learn that Gifford was not wholly responsible for a single article in +the _Quarterly_.) + +Meanwhile, _Blackwood's Magazine_, III (519-524) had made _Endymion_ the +text of its fourth infamous tirade against the Cockney School of Poetry. +The signature "Z" was appended to all the articles, but the critic's +identity has not yet been discovered. Leigh Hunt thought it was Walter +Scott, Haydon suspected the actor Terry, but it is more probable that +the honor belongs to John Gibson Lockhart. One account attributes the +entire series to Lockhart; another attributes the series to Wilson, but +holds Lockhart responsible for the _Endymion_ article. Mr. Andrew Lang, +in his _Life and Letters of Lockhart_, dismissed the matter by saying +that he did not know who wrote the article. + +The _Quarterly_ critique was reprinted in Stevenson's _Early Reviews_, +in Rossetti's _Life of Keats_, in Buxton Forman's edition of Keats' +_Poetical Works_ (Appendix V) and elsewhere. From a critical point of +view, it is, as Forman terms it, a "curiously unimportant production." +The student will at once question its power to cause distress in the +mind of the poet; as for malignant severity, there are several reviews +among the present reprints that put the brief _Quarterly_ article to +shame. When we turn to what Swinburne calls the "obscener insolence" of +the _Blackwood_ article, we find an unrestrained torrent of abuse +against both Hunt and Keats that amply justified Landor's subsequent +allusions to the _Blackguard's Magazine_. The _Quarterly_ critique was +captious and ill-tempered; but the _Blackwood_ article was a personal +insult. + +It is impossible to consider in detail the vexed question of the +influence which these reviews had upon Keats. In Mr. W.M. Rossetti's +_Life of Keats_, pp. (83-106) there is a full discussion of the evidence +on the subject. Within a few months after the appearance of the +articles, Keats wrote:--"Praise or blame has but a momentary effect on +the man whose love of beauty in the abstract makes him a severe critic +of his own works. My own domestic criticism has given me pain without +comparison beyond what _Blackwood_ or _The Quarterly_ could possibly +inflict." Some weeks later he wrote that the _Quarterly_ article had +only served to make him more prominent among bookmen. After some time +he expressed himself less confidently and deprecated the growing power +of the reviews, but there is no evidence that he fretted over the +critiques. Haydon tells us that Keats was morbid and silent for hours at +a time; but it is quite likely that the consciousness of his physical +affliction--hereditary consumption--was oppressing his mind. His death +occurred on February 23, 1821--about two and a half years after the +appearance of the _Endymion_ critiques. + +Shelley had gone to Italy before the reviews were published. He heard of +the _Quarterly_ article, but knew nothing of _Blackwood's_ while writing +_Adonais_; hence in both poem and preface, the former review is charged +with having caused Keats' death. Shelley declared that Keats' agitation +over the review ended in the rupture of a blood vessel in the lungs with +an ensuing rapid consumption. These statements, which Shelley must have +had indirectly, have not been substantiated. We are forced to the +conclusion now generally accepted--that Keats, although sensitive to +personal ridicule, was superior to the stings of review criticism and +that the distressing events of the last year of his life were sufficient +to assure the early triumph of the inherent and unconquerable disease. + +141. _Miss Baillie_. Joanna Baillie (1762-1851) authoress of numerous +forgotten plays and poems which enjoyed great popularity in their day. + +142. _Land of Cockaigne_. Here means London, and refers specifically to +the Cockney poets. An old French poem on the _Land of Cockaigne_ +described it as an ideal land of luxury and ease. The best authorities +do not accept Cockney as a derivative form. The Cockney School was +composed of Londoners of the middle-class, supposedly ill-bred and +imperfectly educated. The critics took special delight in dwelling upon +the humble origin of the Cockneys, their lack of university training, +and especially their dependence on translations for their knowledge of +the classics. + +142. _When Leigh Hunt left prison_. Hunt had been imprisoned for libel +on the Prince Regent (1812). + +146. _Vauxhall_. The Gardens were a favorite resort for Londoners early +in the eighteenth century and remained popular for a long time. See +Thackeray's _Vanity Fair_ (chap. VI). The implication in the present +passage is that the Cockney poet gets his ideas of nature from the +immediate vicinity of London. + +147. _East of Temple-bar_. That is, living in the City of London. + +150. _Young Sangrado_. An allusion to Doctor Sangrado, in Le Sage's _Gil +Blas_ (1715). + + +ALFRED LORD TENNYSON + +Tennyson's first poetical efforts, which appeared in _Poems by Two +Brothers_ (1827) attracted little critical attention. His prize-poem, +_Timbuctoo_ (1829) received the interesting notice here reprinted from +the _Athenaeum_ (p. 456) of July 22, 1829. _Timbuctoo_ was printed in the +_Cambridge Chronicle_ (July 10, 1829); in the _Prolusiones Academicae_ +(1829); and several times in _Cambridge Prize-Poems_. The use of heroic +metre in prize-poems was traditional; hence the award was an enviable +tribute to the blank-verse of _Timbuctoo_. + +Tennyson's success was emphasized by the remarkable series of reviews +that greeted his earliest volumes of poems. The _Poems, chiefly Lyrical_ +(1830) were welcomed by Sir John Bowring in the _Westminster Review_, by +Leigh Hunt in the _Tatler_, by Arthur Hallam in the _Englishman's +Magazine_, and by John Wilson in _Blackwood's Magazine_. The _Poems_ +(1833) were reviewed by W.J. Fox in the _Monthly Repository_, and by +John Stuart Mill in the _Westminster Review_. This array of names was +indeed a tribute to the poet; but the unfavorable review, was, as usual, +most significant. The article written by Lockhart for the _Quarterly +Rev._, XLIX (81-97), has been characterized as "silly and brutal," but +it was neither. Tennyson's fame is secure; we can at least be just to +his early reviewer. It is true that the poet winced under the lash and +that ten years elapsed before his next volume of collected poems +appeared; but Canon Ainger is surely in error when he holds the +_Quarterly Review_ mainly responsible for this long silence. The rich +measure of praise elsewhere bestowed upon the volume would leave us no +alternative but the conclusion that Tennyson was childish enough to +maintain his silence for a decade because Lockhart took liberties with +his poems instead of joining the chorus of adulation. We know that there +were other and stronger reasons for Tennyson's silence and we also know +that the effect of Lockhart's article was decidedly salutary. When the +next collection of _Poems_ (1842) did appear, the shorter pieces +ridiculed by Lockhart were omitted, and the derided passages in the +longer poems were altered. + +We may, without conscientious scruples, take Mr. Andrew Lang's advice, +and enjoy a laugh over Lockhart's performance. Its mock appreciations +are, perhaps, far-fetched at times; but there are enough effective +passages to give zest to the article. It has been said in all +seriousness that Lockhart failed to appreciate the beauty of most of +Tennyson's lines, and that he confined his remarks to the most +assailable passages. Surely, when a critic undertakes to write a +mock-appreciation, he will not quote the best verses, to the detriment +of his plan. The poet must see to it that his volume does not contain +enough absurdities to form a sufficient basis for such an article. There +is a striking contrast to the humor of Lockhart in the little-known +review of the same volume by the _Literary Gazette_, 1833, pp. +(772-774). The latter seized upon some crudities that had escaped the +_Quarterly's_ notice, and, with characteristic brutality, decided that +the poet was insane and needed a low diet and a cell. + +Although the reception accorded to _Poems_ (1842) was generally +favorable, the publication of _The Princess_ in 1847 afforded the +critics another opportunity to lament Tennyson's inequalities. The +spirit of the review of _The Princess_ here reprinted from the _Literary +Gazette_ of August 8, 1848, is practically identical with that of the +_Athenaeum_ on January 6, 1848, but specifies more clearly the critic's +objections to the medley. It is noteworthy that Lord Tennyson made +extensive changes in subsequent editions of _The Princess_, but left +unaltered all of the passages to which the _Literary Gazette_ took +exception. The beautiful threnody _In Memoriam_ (1850) and Tennyson's +elevation to the laureateship in the same year established his position +as the leading poet of the time; but the appearance of _Maud_ in 1856 +proved to be a temporary check to his popularity. A few personal friends +admired it and praised its fine lyrics; but as a dramatic narrative it +failed to please the reviews. The most interesting of the critiques +(unfortunately too long to be reprinted here) appeared in _Blackwood's +Magazine_, XLI (311-321), of September, 1855,--a forcible, well-written +article, which, incidentally, shows how much the magazine had improved +in respectability since the days of the lampooners of Byron, Shelley, +and Keats. The authorship of the article has not been disclosed, but we +know that W.E. Aytoun asked permission of the proprietor to review +Tennyson's _Maud_. (See Mrs. Oliphant's _William Blackwood and his +Sons_.) The publication of the _Idylls of the King_ (1859), turned the +tide more strongly than before in Tennyson's favor, and subsequent +fault-finding on the part of the critics was confined largely to his +dramas. + +153. _Catullus_. See Catullus, II and III--(_Passer, deliciae meae +puellae_, and _Lugete, O Veneres Cupidinesque_). + +153. [Greek: Eithe lyre, k. t. l.] Usually found in the remains of +Alcaeus. Thomas Moore translates it with his _Odes of Anacreon_ (LXXVII), +beginning "Would that I were a tuneful lyre," etc. Lockhart proceeds to +ridicule Tennyson for wishing to be a river, which is not what the +quoted lines state. Nor does Tennyson "ambition a bolder metamorphosis" +than his predecessors. Anacreon (Ode XXII) wishes to be a stream, as +well as a mirror, a robe, a pair of sandals and sundry other articles. +See Moore's interesting note. + +155. _Non omnis moriar_. Horace, _Odes_, III, 30, 6. + +156. _Tongues in trees_, etc. Shakespeare's _As You Like It_, II, 1, 17. + +157. _Aristaeus_. A minor Grecian divinity, worshipped as the first to +introduce the culture of bees. + +164. _Dionysius Periegetes_. Author of [Greek: periegesis tes ges], a +description of the earth in hexameters, usually published with the +scholia of Eustathius and the Latin paraphrases of Avienus and Priscian. +For the account of AEthiopia, see also Pausanias, I, 33, 4. + +167. _The Rovers_. _The Rovers_ was a parody on the German drama of the +day, published in the _Anti-Jacobin_ (1798) and written by Frere, +Canning and others. It is reprinted in Charles Edmund's _Poetry of the +Anti-Jacobin_. The chorus of conspirators is at the end of Act IV. + +169. _The Groves of Blarney_. An old Irish song. A version may be seen +in the _Antiquary_, I, p. 199. The quotation by Lockhart differs +somewhat from the corresponding stanza of the cited version. + +170. _Corporal Trim_. In Sterne's _Tristram Shandy_. + +173. _Christopher North_. John Wilson, of _Blackwood's Magazine_. + + +ROBERT BROWNING + +The reviews of Browning's poems are singularly uninteresting from a +historical standpoint. There is usually a protest against the obscurity +of the poetry and a plea that the author should make better use of his +manifest genius. For details concerning these reviews, see the +bibliography of Browning in Nicoll and Wise's _Literary Anecdotes of the +Nineteenth Century_. The list there given is extensive, but does not +include several of the reviews mentioned below. + +The early poems were so abstruse that the critics were unable to make +sport of them as they did in the case of Wordsworth, Byron, Tennyson, +and the rest; and when Browning finally deigned to write within range of +the average human intellect, that particular style of reviewing had lost +favor. His earliest publication, _Pauline_ (1832) was well received by +W.J. Fox in _Monthly Repository_, and in the _Athenaeum_. _Tait's +Edinburgh Magazine_ called it a "piece of pure bewilderment." See also +the brief notice in the _Literary Gazette_, 1833, p. 183. _Paracelsus_ +(1835) had a similar experience; the reprint from the _Athenaeum_, 1835, +p. 640, is fairly characteristic of the rest, among which are the +articles in the _Monthly Repository_, 1835, p. 716; the _Christian +Remembrancer_, XX, p. 346, and the reviews written by John Forster for +the _Examiner_, 1835, p. 563, and the _New Monthly Magazine_, XLVI +(289-308). + +Neither the favorable review of _Sordello_ (1840) in the _Monthly Rev._, +1840, II, p. 149, nor the partly appreciative article in the _Athenaeum_, +1840, p. 431, seems to warrant the well-known anecdotes relating the +difficulties of Douglas Jerrold and Tennyson in attempting to understand +that poem. The _Athenaeum_ gave the poet sound advice, especially in +regard to the intentional obscurity of his meaning. That this admonition +was futile may be gathered from the _Saturday Review's_ article (I, p. +69) on _Men and Women_ (1855) published fifteen years after _Sordello_. +The critic reverted to the earlier style, and produced one of the most +readable reviews of Browning. Whatever may be the final verdict yet to +be passed upon Browning's poetic achievement, the fact remains that the +contemporary reviews from first to last deplored in his work a +deliberate obscurity which was wholly unwarranted and which precluded +the universal appeal that is essential to a poet's greatness. + +189. _Della Crusca of Sentimentalism_. Robert Merry (1755-1798) under +the name Della Crusca became the leader of a set of poetasters who +flourished during the poetic dearth at the end of the eighteenth century +and poured forth their rubbish until William Gifford exposed their +follies in his satires _The Baviad_ (1794) and _The Maeviad_ (1795). + +189. _Alexander Smith_. A Scotch poet (1830-1867). + +189. _Mystic of Bailey_. Philip James Bailey (1816-1902), best known as +the author of _Festus_, published _The Mystic_ in 1855. + +192. _Hudibras Butler, etc._ Samuel Butler, author of _Hudibras_ +(1663-78); Richard H. Barham, author of the _Ingoldsby Legends_ (1840); +and Thomas Hood, author of _Whims and Oddities_ (1826-27). These poets +are cited by the reviewer for their skill with unusual metres and +difficult rhymes. + + + + +INDEX + + +_Academy_, xlii-xliii + +_Account of English Dramatic Poets_, xv + +_Adonais_, by Shelley, reviewed, 129-134; 214, 217 + +_Advice to Young Reviewer_, xxiii + +Ainsworth, Harrison, xlv + +Akenside, Mark, xvi + +_Alastor_, by Shelley, reviewed, 115 + +_Album Verses_, by Lamb, reviewed, 66-67 + +Alford, Dean, xxxv + +Allingham, William, l + +_All the Year Round_, l + +_Analytical Review_, xxii + +_Anti-Jacobin Review_, xxiii + +Appleton, Dr. Charles, xlii + +Arber, Prof. Edward, xiii + +Arnold, Matthew, xxxii, xxxvi, xlii + +_Athenaeum_, xxxviii-xl, liv; + on Tennyson's _Timbuctoo_, 151; + on Browning's _Paracelsus_, 187 + +_Athenian Mercury_, xiv + +_Atlas_, xl + +Austin, Mr. Alfred, xxxvi + + +Bagehot, Walter, xxxii, xxxiv + +Barrow, Sir John, xxviii + +_Battle of the Reviews_, xx-xxi + +Bayle, Pierre, xiii + +_Bee_, xvi + +Behn, Mrs. Aphra, xv + +Beloe, William, xxiii + +Bentham, Jeremy, xxxi + +_Bentley's Miscellany_, l + +Bibliography, lvi-lix + +_Bibliotheca Literaria_, xvi + +_Bibliotheque Ancienne et Moderne_, xvi + +_Bibliotheque Angloise_, xv + +_Bibliotheque Choisee_, xvi + +Blackwood, John, xlvii + +Blackwood, William, xlv + +_Blackwood's Magazine_, xlv-xlvii; + on Keats' _Endymion_, 141-150; 216 + +_Blank Verse_, by Lamb and Lloyd, reviewed, 65 + +Blount, Sir Thomas Pope, xiv + +_Bookman_, xxxvii + +Bower, Archibald, xvi + +_British and Foreign Review_, xxxii + +_British Critic_, xxiii; + on Landor's _Gebir_, 68 + +_British Librarian_, xvi + +_British Magazine_, xxii, xlv + +_British Review_, xxxii, 213 + +Brougham, Henry, xxiv, xxvi-xxvii, xxx, 210 + +Browning, Robert, _Paracelsus_ rev. in _Athenaeum_, 187; + _Sordello_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 188; + _Men and Women_ rev. in _Saturday Rev._, 189-196; 220-222 + +Buckingham, James Silk, xxxviii + +Budgell, Eustace, xvi + +Bulwer, Edward, xxx, xlv + +Bunting, Mr. Percy, xxxvi + +Burns, Robert, _Poems_ rev. in _Edinburgh Mag._, 13-14; + in _Critical Rev._, 15; 199-200 + +Byron, Lord, 47, 48; + _Hours of Idleness_ rev. in _Edinburgh Rev._, 94-100; + _Childe Harold_ rev. in _Christian Observer_, 101-114; 210-213 + + +Campbell, Thomas, xlv + +Carlyle, Thomas, xxx, xlv, xlix + +Cave, Edward, xliv + +_Cenci_, by Shelley, reviewed, 116-128, 214 + +_Censura Celebrium Authorum_, xiv + +_Censura Temporum_, xv + +_Childe Harold_, by Byron, reviewed, 101-114; 212-213 + +_Christabel_, by Coleridge, reviewed, 47-59 + +_Christian Observer_, xxxiii; + on Byron's _Childe Harold_, 101-114 + +_Christian Remembrancer_, xxxii + +Christie, Jonathan Henry, xlviii + +Cleghorn, James, xlvi + +Cobbett, William, xxxvii + +Cockney School, _Blackwood's Mag._ on, 141-150; 216-217 + +Colburn, Henry, xxxvii, xlv + +Coleridge, John Taylor, xxix + +Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, xlvi; + _Christabel_ rev. in _Edinburgh Rev._, 47-59; 201-202, 204-206 + +Collins, Mr. John Churton, li + +Colvin, Mr. Sidney, xlii, liv + +_Compleat Library_, xiv + +Conder, Josiah, xxxii + +_Contemporary Review_, xxxv + +Cook, John D., xli + +Copleston, Edward, xxiii + +_Cornhill Magazine_, l + +Cotton, Mr. James S., xliii + +Courthope, Mr. W.J., xxxvi + +Courtney, Mr. W.L., xxxv + +Cowper, William, _Poems_ rev. in _Critical Rev._, 10-12; 198-199 + +_Critic_, xxxvii + +_Critical Review_, xviii-xxi, xxiii, xxv, xxxiii; + on Goldsmith's _Traveller_, 5-9; + on Cowper's _Poems_, 10-12; + on Burn's _Poems_, 15; + on _Lyrical Ballads_, 20-23 + +Croker, John Wilson, xxviii + + +Dennis, John, xv + +DeQuincey, Thomas, xlviii + +_De Re Poetica_, xiv + +_Descriptive Sketches_, by Wordsworth, reviewed, 16-18 + +Dickens, Charles, l, liv + +Dilke, Charles W., xxxix + +Dixon, William H., xxxix + +Doble, Mr. C.E., xliii + +Dowden, Prof. Edward, xxxiv + +_Dublin Review_, xxxii + +_Dublin University Magazine_, l + +D'Urfey, Thomas, xv + + +_Eclectic Review_, xxxii + +_Edinburgh Magazine_, xliv; + on Burns' _Poems_, 13-14 + +_Edinburgh Review_, xxiv-xxvii, xxix-xxxi, xlvi, liv; + on Wordsworth's _Poems_, 24-46; + on Coleridge's _Christabel_, 47-59; + on Scott's _Marmion_, 70-93; + on Byron's _Hours of Idleness_, 94-100; 209-211 + +Eliot, George, xxxiv, xlvii + +Elliott, Hon. A.R.D., xxxi + +Elwin, Whitwell, xxix + +Empson, William, xxx + +_Endymion_, by Keats, rev. in _Quarterly Rev._, 135-140; + rev. in _Blackwood's Mag._, 141-150; 215-218 + +_English Review_, xxii, xxxii + +Escott, Mr. T.H.S., xxxv + +_Evening Walk_, by Wordsworth, reviewed, 19 + +_Examiner_, xxxvii + + +Fonblanque, Albany, xxxvii + +_Foreign Quarterly Review_, xxxii + +_Foreign Review_, xxxii + +Forster, John, xxxvii + +_Fortnightly Review_, xxxiii-xxxv + +Fox, W.J., xxxiii + +_Fraser's Magazine_, xlix-l + +Froude, James A., l + + +_Gebir_, by Landor, rev. in _British Critic_, 68; + rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 69; 208 + +_Gentleman's Journal_, xv, xliv + +_Gentleman's Magazine_, xv, xliv + +Gifford, William, xxvii, xxviii + +Goldsmith, Oliver, xviii, xxi, xxii, xlv; + _The Traveller_ rev. in _Critical Rev._, 5-9, 197, 198 + +Grant, Charles, 108 + +Gray, Thomas, _Odes_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 1-4; 197-198 + +Green, John Richards, xxiii + +Griffiths, Ralph, xvii, xviii, xx + + +Hallam, Henry, xxx + +Hamilton, Sir William, xxx + +Harris, Mr. Frank, xxxv, xli + +Harwood, Mr. Philip, xli + +Hazlitt, William, 204-205 + +Hervey, Thomas K., xxxix + +Hind, Mr. C. Lewis, xliii + +_Historia Literaria_, xvi + +_History of Learning_, xiv + +_History of the Works of the Learned_, xv, xvi + +Hodge, Mr. Harold, xli + +Hood, Thomas, xlviii + +Hook, Theodore, xlv + +Horne, Richard Hengist, xxxiii + +Horner, Francis, xxiv, xxv + +_Hours of Idleness_, by Byron, reviewed, 94-100; 210-212 + +_Household Words_, l + +Hume, David, 105 + +Hunt, Leigh, xxxiii, xxxvii, 135, 136, 142 + +Hutton, Richard Holt, xxxii, xl + + +Introduction, xiii-lv + + +Jebb, Samuel, xvi + +Jeffrey, Francis, xxiv-xxvi, xxix, xlviii, 203, 206, 209-210 + +Jerdan, William, xxxvii, xxxix + +Johnson, Samuel, xxi, xxii, 198 + +_Journal des Savans_, xiii, xiv, xxi + + +Keats, John, _Endymion_, reviewed in _Quarterly Rev._, 135-140; + in _Blackwood's Mag._, 141-150; 152, 215-218 + +Kenrick, William, xx, xxi, xxii + +Kingsley, Charles, l + +Knowles, Mr. James, xxxv, xxxvi + + +Lamb, Charles, xlviii; + _Blank Verse_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 65; + _Album-Verses_ rev. in _Literary Gazette_, 66-67; 207-208 + +Landor, Walter Savage, _Gebir_ rev. in _British Critic_, 68; + in _Monthly Rev._, 69; 208 + +Langbaine, Gerald, xv + +Le Clerc, Daniel, xvi + +Le Clerc, Jean, xiv, xvi + +Lewes, George Henry, xxxiv + +Lewis, Sir George Cornewall, xxx + +_Literary Chronicle_, xxxviii + +_Literary Gazette_, xxxvii-xxxix; + on Lamb's _Album-Verses_, 66-67; + on Shelley's _Adonais_, 129-134; + on Tennyson's _The Princess_, 176-186; 207-208 + +_Literary Journal_, xvi + +_Literary Magazine_, xvi, xxii + +Lloyd, Charles, _Blank Verse_, rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 65 + +Lloyd, H.E., xxxvii + +Lockhart, John Gibson, xxii, xxxi, 216, 218-219 + +_London Magazine_, xliv, xlvii-xlviii; + on Shelley's _Cenci_, 116-128 + +_London Quarterly Review_, xxxii + +_London Review_, xxii, xxxi + +_Longman's Magazine_, l + +Lowth, Bishop, xvi + +_Lyrical Ballads_, by Wordsworth, reviewed, 20-23; 201-203 + + +Macaulay, Thomas Babington, xxix-xxx + +MacColl, Mr. Norman, xxxix + +Maclise, Daniel, xlix + +_Macmillan's Magazine_, l + +Macpherson, William, xxix + +_Madoc_, by Southey, reviewed, 60-64; 206-207 + +_Marmion_, by Scott, reviewed, 70-93; 208-210 + +Martin, Sir Theodore, l + +Martineau, James, xxxii + +Maty, Paul Henry, xxii + +Maurice, Frederick D., xxxviii + +Maxse, Mr. Louis J., xxxvi + +Melbourne, Lord, xxx + +_Memoirs for the Ingenious_, xiv + +_Memoirs of Literature_, xv + +_Memoires Litteraires_, xv + +_Men and Women_, by Browning, reviewed 189-196, 221 + +_Mercurius Librarius_, xiii + +Meredith, Mr. George, xxxiv + +_Metropolitan_, l + +Mill, John Stuart, xxx, xxxi + +Minto, William, xxxvii + +_Miscellaneous Letters_, xiv + +_Monthly Censor_, xxxiii + +_Monthly Chronicle_, xxxiii + +_Monthly Magazine_, xlv + +_Monthly Miscellany_, xv + +_Monthly Repository_, xxxiii + +_Monthly Review_, xvii-xxi, xxv, xxxiii; + on Gray's _Odes_, 1-4; + on Wordsworth's _Descriptive Sketches_, 16-18; + on Wordsworth's _Evening Walk_, 19; + on Southey's _Madoc_, 60-64; + on Lamb's _Blank Verse_, 65; + on Landor's _Gebir_, 69; + on Shelley's _Alastor_, 115; + on Browning's _Sordello_, 188 + +Moore, Thomas, xlviii + +Morley, Mr. John, xxxiv + +Motteux, Peter Anthony, xv, xliv + +Moxon, Edward, 207 + +Murray, John, xxvii + +_Museum_, xvi + + +Napier, Macvey, xxix + +Nares, Robert, xxxiii + +_National Review_ (quar.), xxxii; + (mon.), xxxvi + +_New Memoirs of Literature_, xvi + +_New Monthly Magazine_, xxxvii, xlv + +_New Review_, xxii + +Nicolas, Sir N.H., xxxii + +_Nineteenth Century_, xxxvi + +_North British Review_, xxxii + +_Nouvelles de la Republique des Lettres_, xiii + + +Oldys, William, xvi + +Oliphant, Mrs. M.O.W., xlvii + + +_Paracelsus_, by Browning, reviewed, 187 + +Parkes, Samuel, xiv + +Pater, Walter, xlii, xliii + +Phillips, Sir Richard, xlv + +Phillips, Mr. Stephen, liv + +Pollock, Mr. W.H., xli + +_Porcupine's Gazette_, xxxvii + +Pratt, Josiah, xxxiii + +_Present State of the Republic of Letters_, xvi + +_Princess_, by Tennyson, reviewed, 176-186 + +Pringle, Thomas, xlvi + +Prothero, Mr. George, xxix + +Prothero, Mr. Rowland, xxix + + +_Quarterly Review_, xxvii-xxix, liv; + on Keats' _Endymion_, 135-140; + on Tennyson's _Poems_, 152-175; 215-217 + +_Quarterly Theological Review_, xxiii + +Quintilian, 107 + + +Reeve, Henry, xxx + +Reid, Andrew, xvi + +Rendall, Mr. Vernon, xxxix + +_Retrospective Review_, xxxii + +_Revue des Deux Mondes_, xxxiii + +Ridpath, George, xv + +Rintoul, Robert S., xl + +Roche, M. de la, xv, xvi + +Roscoe, Mr. E.S., xxxi + +Roscoe, William C., xxxii + +Ross, Miss, xxxvii + +_Royal Magazine_, xliv + +Russell, Lord John, xxx + + +Salisbury, Lord, xli + +Sallo, Denis de, xiii + +_Saturday Review_, xli, liv; + on Browning's _Men and Women_, 189-196 + +_Scots Magazine_, xliv + +Scott, John, xlvii + +Scott, Sir Walter, xxvii; + _Marmion_ rev. in _Edinburgh Rev._, 70-93; 208-210 + +Shelley, Percy Bysshe, _Alastor_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 115; + _Cenci_ rev. in _London Mag._, 116-128; + _Adonais_ rev. in _Literary Gazette_, 129-134, 213-215 + +Shore, Mr. W. Teignmouth, xliii + +Smith, Sydney, xxiv, xxvi + +Smith, Sir William, xxix + +Smollett, Tobias xviii, xx, xlv + +_Sordello_, by Browning, reviewed, 188 + +Southern, Henry, xxxi, xxxii + +Southey, Robert, xxviii; + _Madoc_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 60-64; 109, 202, 206-207 + +_Spectator_, xl-xli + +Stebbing, Henry, xxxviii + +Stephen, (Sir) Leslie, xxxiv + +Sterling, John, xxxviii + +Strachey, Mr. J. St. L., xl + +Swinburne, Mr. A.C., xxxiv, liv + +Symonds, J.A., xxxiv + +Symons, Mr. Arthur, liv + + +_Tait's Edinburgh Magazine_, l + +Taylor, William, xlv + +_Temple Bar_, l + +Tennyson, Alfred, (Lord), xxxvi; + _Timbuctoo_ rev. in _Athenaeum_, 151; + _Poems_ rev. in _Quarterly Rev._, 152-175; + _The Princess_ rev. in _Literary Gazette_, 176-186; 218-220 + +Thackeray, W.M., xxx, xlix, l + +_Theatrum Poetarum_, xv + +_Timbuctoo_, by Tennyson, reviewed, 151 + +Townsend, Meredith, xl + +_Traveller_, by Goldsmith, reviewed, 5-9 + + +_Universal Historical Bibliotheque_, xiv + +_Universal Magazine_, xliv + +_Universal Mercury_, xiv + + +Walpole, Horace, xvi, xx + +Warton, J. and T., xvi + +Watkins, Dr., xlv + +Watts, Alaric A., xlv, xlviii + +_Weekly Memorial_, xiv + +_Weekly Register_, xxxvii + +_Westminster Review_, xxxi-xxxii + +Wilson, John, xlvi + +Wordsworth, William, _Descriptive Sketches_ rev. in _Monthly Rev._, 16-18; + _Evening Walk_ rev. in _ibid._, 19; + _Lyrical Ballads_ rev. in _Critical Rev._, 20-23; + _Poems_ rev. in _Edinburgh Rev._, 24-46; 200-204 + +_Works of the Learned_, xiv + + +_Young Student's Library_, xiv + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Early Reviews of English Poets, by John Louis Haney + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EARLY REVIEWS OF ENGLISH POETS *** + +***** This file should be named 18766.txt or 18766.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/7/6/18766/ + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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