'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark
Our coming, and look brighter when we come ;
'Tis sweet to be awakened by the lark,

Or lulled by falling waters, or the hum

Of bees, the voice of girls, the song of birds,
The lisp of children, and their earliest words.

*

Sweet is a legacy, and passing sweet

The unexpected death of some old lady
Or gentlemen of seventy years complete." .

I said on an earlier occasion that the value of a poem must for each of us be estimated by the effect that it produces--not by its seductive beauty, on our taste-not by its wondrous ingenuity, on our intellect -but by its adding to or strengthening our vital beliefs.

Can any of us say with candour that this cynical, humorous, pathetic poem of Byron (to place it in the best light), has had, or is likely to have, the effect of strengthening our character, of revealing to us any glimpse of that perfection on which alone our soul feeds and is strengthened? Indeed, can any of us point to many passages in any of the poems of Byron, which have done this? But I allow that he may be to others what he is not to me.

I know of no poet who can make my blood leap and tingle as he does, for instance, in his description of the storm, or of that magnificent waterfall of Terni ; nor one who as he with a few words can arouse my emotions, as, for example, by the picture of the

Gladiator "butchered to make a Roman holiday," and swooning amidst memories of his far-distant home, of his children and their Dacian mother. know of no poet-except perhaps Dante-whose mastery over language is so extraordinary, nor any who with such intensity of passionate energy can (to use his own words) "wreak his thoughts upon expression." But the question is not merely whether he had great poetic abilities. To this we may answer without hesitation-Yes, indescribably great. But, considering that the value of everything consists entirely in the end to which it may be put, shall we be able to assign a high value to Byron's poetry? I answer, for myself, without any hesitation-No. All these emotions are aroused in me to no purpose. No single memory of what may help me in the dark or dangerous hours of life can I trace back to Byron's poems. One bright smile of a child, one sweet face amid the crowded streets, one little flower, one solitary star-each of these has given me more than all his poems can give. And yet, before he died, he showed at least signs of a larger faith, of a renunciation of self-faith and selfredemption. Even though they may be tinged with a stain of ineradicable cynicism, his words are often expressive of a deep yearning for belief in othersfor a nobler love and faith in some other than himself.

"I have not loved the world, nor the world me-
But let us part fair foes: I do believe,

Though I have found them not, that there may be

Words that are things, hopes which will not deceive,
And virtues which are merciful, nor weave

Snares for the failing: I would also deem
O'er others' griefs that some sincerely grieve:
That two, or one, are almost what they seem :
That goodness is no name, and happiness no dream."

Whether he suffered justly or unjustly perhaps we never shall know for certain; but that he suffered most acutely, not only in the anguish of mortified self-pride, but in the blighting (however they were blighted) of his affections, is most evident.

"Have I not

Hear me, my mother Earth! behold it Heaven !—

Have I not had to wrestle with my lot?

Have I not suffered things to be forgiven?"

But had he really felt what he said that, although he piled on human heads the mountain of his curse, his curse should be forgiveness; if he had really forgiven, really striven after an unselfish love, he might have learnt that true nobility and strength do not lie in defiance. His death at least was a sacrifice to the good (for such he rightly deemed it) of others, in an attempt to realize his dream that Greece might yet be free.

I am unwilling to preserve, as it were, a dissonance in the final chord; but, in spite of all my admiration of his poetic abilities, I cannot for myself assign much true poetic value to his work; and, as for personal character, though I fully allow that I am one of those who are not worthy to pass judgment on him or on

any man, yet I cannot quite agree with Mr. Swinburne, who says: "His glorious courage, his excellent contempt for things contemptible, and hatred of hateful men, are enough in themselves to embalm and endear his memory in the eyes of all who are worthy to pass judgment on him.”

Goethe, perhaps, may resolve the discord for us. "Every extraordinary man," he says, "has a certain mission which he is called upon to accomplish. When he has fulfilled it, he is no longer needed. upon earth in the same form, and Providence uses him for something else. . . . Mozart died in his thirty-sixth year, Raphael at the same age, Byron only a little older. But all of these had perfectly fulfilled their missions, and it was time for them to depart, that other people might have something to do."

CHAPTER X.

SHELLEY.

"I AM a lover of men, a democrat, and an atheist." Such is the translation of a Greek verse * inscribed by Percy Bysshe Shelley in the tourist's book at Chamounix beneath certain pious reflections by a former traveller on the impossibility of atheism amid the grandeur of Alpine scenery. It was one of those defiances that Shelley was for ever hurling at the idolatry of form.

We have considered ere this the question of form with regard to poetic and other artistic productions, and I then shrank from more than just touching on the subject in its connection with life—with our beliefs and actions. We now find ourselves again face to face with this veiled mystery.

I think we may safely allow that form, whether in art, religion, or in anything else, is in itself a nonentity : that, though form is necessary as a co-efficient of

* Εἰμὶ φιλάνθρωπος δημοκρατικός τ ̓ ἄθεός τε.