reflection, find the passion so just, that we should be surprised if we had not wept, and wept at that very moment.

How astonishing is it, again, that the passions directly opposite to these, laughter and spleen, are no less at his command! that he is not more a master of the great than the ridiculous in human nature; of our noblest tendernesses, than of our vainest foibles; of our strongest emotions, than of our idlest sensations!

Nor does he only excel in the passions: in the coolness of reflection and reasoning, he is full as admirable. His sentiments are not only in general the most pertinent and judicious upon every subject; but by a talent very peculiar, something between penetration and felicity, he hits upon that particular point on which the bent of each argument turns, or the force of each motive depends. This is perfectly amazing, from a man of no education or experience in those great and public scenes of life which are usually the subject of his thoughts: so that he seems to have known the world by intuition, to have looked through human nature at one glance, and to be the only author that gives ground for a very new opinion, that the philosopher, and even the man of the world, may be born, as well as the poet.

HOMER AND VIRGIL COMPARED.

Preface to Shakespeare.

On whatever side we contemplate Homer, what principally strikes us is his invention. It is that which forms the character of each part of his work; and accordingly we find it to have made his fable more extensive and copious than any other, his manners more lively and strongly marked, his speeches more affecting and transporting, his sentiments more warm and sublime, his images and descriptions more full and animated, his expression more raised and daring, and his numbers more rapid and various. I hope, in what has been said of Virgil, with regard to any of these heads, I have no way derogated from his character. Nothing is more absurd or endless, than the common method of comparing eminent writers by an opposition of particular passages in them, and forming a judgment from thence of their merit upon the whole. We ought to have a certain knowledge of the principal character and distinguished excellence of each: it is in that we are to consider him, and in proportion to his degree in that we are to admire him. No author or man ever excelled all the world in more than one faculty: and as Homer has done this in invention, Virgil has in judgment. Not that we are to think Homer wanted judgment, because Virgil had it in a more eminent degree; or that Virgil wanted invention, because Homer possessed a larger share of it: each of these great authors had more of both

than perhaps any man besides, and are only sa.d to have less in comparison with one another. Homer was the greater genius; Virgil, the better artist. In one we most admire the man; in the other, the work. Homer hurries and transports us with a commanding impetuosity; Virgil leads us with an attractive majesty: Homer scatters with a generous profusion; Virgil bestows with a careful magnificence: Homer, like the Nile, pours out his riches with a boundless overflow; Virgil, like a river in its banks, with a gentle and constant stream. When we behold their battles, methinks the two poets resemble the heroes they celebrate: Homer, boundless and irresistible as Achilles, bears all before him, and shines more and more as the tumult increases; Virgil, calmly daring like Æneas, appears undisturbed in the midst of the action; disposes all about him, and conquers with tranquillity. And when we look upon their machines, Homer seems like his own Jupiter in his terrors, shaking Olympus, scattering the lightnings, and firing the heavens; Virgil, like the same power in his benevolence, counselling with the gods, laying plans for empires, and regularly ordering his whole creation.

Preface to the Iliad.

ROBERT BLAIR. 1699-1746.

ROBERT BLAIR, the author of "The Grave," was born in 1699. But few particulars are known respecting his life. After receiving a liberal educa tion, he travelled on the continent for further improvement, and in 1731 was ordained as a minister of the parish of Athelstaneford, in East Lothian, where he spent the remainder of his life, which was terminated by a fever, in 1746, in the forty-seventh year of his age.

"The eighteenth century has produced few specimens of blank verse of so powerful and simple a character as that of the Grave.' It is a popular poem, not merely because it is religious, but because its language and imagery are free, natural, and picturesque. In the eye of fastidious criticism, Blair may be a homely and even a gloomy poet; but there is a masculine and pronounced character even in his gloom and homeliness, that keeps it most distinctly apart from either dryness or vulgarity. His style pleases us like the powerful expression of a countenance without regular beauty."1

THE GRAVE.

Whilst some affect the sun, and some the shade,

Some flee the city, some the hermitage;

Their aims as various as the roads they take
In journeying through life;-the task be mine
To paint the gloomy horrors of the tomb;
Th' appointed place of rendezvous, where all
These travellers meet.-Thy succors I implore,

1 Campbell's Specimens, vol. v. p 204

Eterna, King! whose potent arm sustains

The keys of hell and death.-The Grave-dread thing!
Men shiver when thou'rt named. Nature, appall'd,
Shakes off her wonted firmness.-Ah! how dark

Thy long-extended realms, and rueful wastes!
Where naught but silence reigns, and night, dark night,
Dark as was chaos, ere the infant sun

Was roll'd together, or had tried his beams
Athwart the gloom profound.-

DEATH-DIVIDED FRIENDSHIPS.

Invidious Grave! how dost thou rend in sunder
Whom love has knit, and sympathy made one!
A tie more stubborn far than nature's band.
Friendship! mysterious cement of the soul!
Sweetener of life! and solder of society!

I owe thee much. Thou hast deserved from me
Far, far beyond what I can ever pay.

Oft have I proved the labors of thy love,
And the warm efforts of thy gentle heart,

Anxious to please. Oh! when my friend and I

In some thick wood have wander'd heedless on
Hid from the vulgar eye, and sat us down
Upon the sloping cowslip-cover'd bank,
Where the pure limpid stream has slid along
In grateful errors through the underwood,

Sweet murmuring, methought the shrill-tongued thrush
Mended his song of love; the sooty blackbird
Mellow'd his pipe, and soften'd every note;

The eglantine smell'd sweeter, and the rose

Assumed a dye more deep; whilst every flower
Vied with its fellow-plant in luxury

Of dress! Oh! then the longest summer's day
Seem'd too, too much in haste: still, the full heart
Had not imparted half: 'twas happiness

Too exquisite to last. Of joys departed

Not to return, how painful the remembrance!

DEATH, THE GOOD MAN'S PATH TO ETERNAL JOY.

Thrice welcome Death!

That, after many a painful bleeding step,
Conducts us to our home, and lands us safe

On the long-wish'd-for shore. Prodigious change!
Our bane turn'd to a blessing! Death, disarm'd,
Loses his fellness quite; all thanks to Him
Who scourged the venom out. Sure the last end
Of the good man is peace! How calm his exit!
Night-dews fall not more gently to the ground,
Nor weary worn-out winds expire so soft.
Behold him! in the evening tide of life,
A life well spent, whose early care it was
His riper years should not upbraid his green:
By nnperceived degrees he wears away;
Yet, like the sun, seems larger at his setting!

High in his faith and hopes, look how he reaches
After the prize in view! and, like a bird
That's hamper'd, struggles hard to get away!
Whilst the glad gates of sight are wide expanded
To let new glories in, the first fair fruits
Of the fast-coming harvest. Then, oh, then,
Each earth-born joy grows vile, or disappears,
Shrunk to a thing of naught! Oh, how he longs
To have his passport sign'd, and be dismiss'd!
'Tis done and now he's happy! The glad soul
Has not a wish uncrown'd. E'en the lag flesh
Rests, too, in hope of meeting once again
Its better half, never to sunder more.

Nor shall it hope in vain: the time draws on
When not a single spot of burial earth,
Whether on land, or in the spacious sea,
But must give back its long-committed dust
Inviolate; and faithfully shall these

Make up the full account; not the least atom
Embezzled or mislaid of the whole tale.

Each soul shall have a body ready furnish'd;
And each shall have his own. Hence, ye profane
Ask not how this can be? Sure the same Power
That rear'd the piece at first, and took it down,
Can reassemble the loose scatter'd parts,
And put them as they were. Almighty God
Hath done much more: nor is his arm impair'd
Through length of days; and what he can, he will;
His faithfulness stands bound to see it done.

When the dread trumpet sounds, the slumbering dust,
Not unattentive to the call, shall wake;

And every joint possess its proper place,
With a new elegance of form unknown

To its first state. Nor shall the conscious soul
Mistake its partner, but amidst the crowd,
Singling its other half, into its arms

Shall rush, with all th' impatience of a man

That's new come home, and, having long been absent,
With haste runs over every different room,

In pain to see the whole. Thrice-happy meeting!
Nor time, nor death, shall ever part them more.
'Tis but a night, a long and moonless night;
We make the grave our bed, and then are gone!
Thus, at the shut of even, the weary bird
Leaves the wide air, and in some lonely brake
Cowers down, and dozes till the dawn of day,
Then claps his well-fledged wings, and bears away

JAMES THOMSON. 1700-1748.

JAMES THOMSON, the author of "The Seasons," was the son of a Scotch clergyman, and was born in the year 1700. After completing his academic education at the University of Edinburgh, he entered upon the study of divi nity; but a paraphrase of one of the Psalms having been given, by the professor of divinity, to the class, Thomson's exercise was in so poetical and figurative a style as to astonish all who heard it. This incident made him resolve to quit divinity for poetry, and, after some time, he went to London, poor and friendless, to try his fortune, with the manuscript of "Winter" in his pocket. It was with difficulty he found a purchaser for it, and the price given was trifling. It was published in 1726, and after a period of neglect, was admired and applauded, and a number of editions speedily followed. His "Summer" appeared in 1727, "Spring" in 1728, and « Autumn" in 1730. After the publication of the Seasons, he travelled on the continent with the son of the Lord Chancellor Talbot, and on his return employed himself in the composition of his various tragedies, and his poem on “ Liberty." These are by no means equal to his other performances, and are now but little read. In May, 1748, he finished his "Castle of Indolence," upon which he had been laboring for years. This is the noblest effort of his genius. "To it," says Campbell, he brought not only the full nature, but the perfect art of a poet. The materials of that exquisite poem are derived originally from Tasso; but he was more immediately indebted for them to the Faerie Queene." Indeed, of all the imitations of Spenser, it is the most spirited and beautiful, both for its moral, poetical, and descriptive power. He did not long survive its publication. A violent cold, through inattention, terminated in a fever, and carried him off on the 27th of August, 1748.

In nature and originality, Thomson is superior to all the descriptive poets except Cowper, and few poems in the English language have been more popular than the "Seasons." "It is almost stale to remark," observes Campbell, "the beauties of a poem so universally felt; the truth and genial interest with which he carries us through the life of the year; the harmony of succession which he gives to the casual phenomena of nature; his pleasing transition from native to foreign scenery; and the soul of exalted and unfeigned benevolence which accompanies his prospects of the creation. It is but equal justice to say that, amidst the feeling and fancy of the Seasons,' we meet with interruptions of declamation, heavy narrative, and unhappy digression."

But though Thomson's merits as a descriptive poet are of the first order; though he looks with the eye which nature bestows only on a poet, and with a mind that at once comprehends the vast, and attends to the minute," yet his greatest charm, and that which makes him so popular with all classes, is, that he looks also with a heart that feels for all mankind. As has been well said, "his sympathies are universal." His touching allusions to the con

1 "When Thomson published his "Winter," it lay a long time neglected, till Mr. Spense made hocorable mention of it in his "Odyssey," which, becoming a popular book, made the poem universally known."-Warton.

2 "Thomson was blessed with a strong and copious fancy: he hath enriched poetry with a variety of new and original images, which he painted from nature itself, and from his own actual observa tions: his descriptions have therefore a distinctness and truth which are utterly wanting to those of poets who have only copied from each other, and have never looked abroad on the objects them selves."-Warton's Pope, i. 42.