ever, warned by the following passage, fore, the power of creation, of raising the which looks towards us and our brethren dead, and transporting the living, is the great with a formidable expression of counte- prerogative of the poetical mind, and that nance, "Quorum alii septimo quoque die, alii modestiores singulis mensibus, qui summa abstinentia utuntur, quater certe in anno redeunt, Criticorum nomine et loco gestientes. Rarissimi sunt, qui in illa celeritate scribendi non plurima secus di-tablished their authority over the vast emcant, atque id, quod unice deceat." which not only gives it the claim to an intellectual sovereignty, but enables it to administer it. And it is by their marvellous exhibition of this power that Homer, Shakspeare, and Dante, have so irresistibly es pire of the human heart. And, therefore, Of these volumes, and of the many topics it should never be said that we possess no of literary interest that occupy their pages, magic and no sorcery by which the past and it would be impossible for us to offer any ap- distant scenes can be revived. We have propriate exposition. We shall content our-read, in the thrilling legends of ancient selves with indicating a few trains of thought days, of wonderful mirrors into which the which have been awakened by their perusal, wand of the enchanter summoned the faces in the hope that our readers may be in- and the dwellings of those whom the quesduced to take up and enlarge them. A tioner desired to behold. And we have lecturer is obliged to commence his dis- heard how the glowing cheek of beauty, quisition with a definition of the subject of and the glittering plume of war, and the which he discourses. Of poetry, so often solemn forehead of learning, glimmered explained, and so variously illustrated, it into the illuminated glass; and how the may be expected that every thing true has English maiden saw there the knight who been said already, and that whatever has had gone to rescue the Sepulchre of his the recommendation of being new, incurs Lord, pining in the dungeon of the Infidel; the perilous probability of being rejected and how the mother, trembling for the genas false. Keble adopts the humbler and tle daughter of her love, grew pale as she saw the wiser course of reproducing and re- the white rose planted, and the green osier shaping the opinions already received. If woven round a new tomb in the churchhe calls in the coinage of criticism, it is yard of her own village. And in the sefa only that it may be restored to its former bulous mirrors, thus uttering their melancirculation when its genuineness and weight choly oracles of the past, and their sadder have been ascertained. In defining poetry, prophecies of the future, we can recognize he requires only two concessions to be that collecting and combining power of made to him; 1, that it must in some man-memory which, when it has been magniner be continually associated with number, fied and colored by the rays of imagination, and harmonious gradation of sound; 2, may be properly called poetry or invention. and that it be employed chiefly in creation It is the vivid reproduction of buried oband representation; in making the absent jects, the luminous revelation of forgotten present, the dead alive, things that are not pageants, the sunny transparency of faded as things that are. And the first conces-landscapes, that affixes the seal to the poetsion will be rhythm; and the second will be phantasy. Either quality, in the absence of the other, possesses its charm; and it has been remarked by Coleridge that the sweet combination of sounds, even when destitute of any particular signification, exercises a pleasing influence on the ear, and through the ear upon the feelings. An illustration of this power may be found in the effect produced by a brook tinkling over pebbles, and heard, not seen, in the twilight of a green lane on a summer even- A consideration of the elements of the ing. But though it is possible for Chris- poetical temperament leads Mr. Keble to tianity to subsist without music, and to speak of that mute, that unconscious poetry, constitute poetry by its own essential ex- which dwells in so many bosoms, and may cellence and principle of vitality, it is not be said to characterize the inhabitants of possible for rhythm to communicate the our villages and rural solitudes; such as same privilege of existence. And, there- the attachment to particular places, the ical title-deed. Hence it happens that we never think of any great poem, whether of ancient or modern times, without perceiving that a long procession of magnificent scenes rises under the spell of recollection. The happiest criticism ever given of Spenser was that which Pope records, and which compares him to an artist displaying a sumptuous gallery of pictures to some wondering visitor. So it is with the historical portraits of Shakspeare. tender recollection of departed friends, and | The stooping shadows of those who have a general sentiment of reverence for things come in the quiet of the evening time to pertaining to religion. The charm of local weep there, seem still to cast a solemn attachment especially deserves to be enu- gloom and sanctity over the grass. The merated among the elements of the poet- son desires to lay his ashes with those of ical mind, so abundantly and unconscious- her at whose knee he had first folded his litly possessed. Absent in the remotest re- tle hands in the prayer of childhood, and of gions of the world, the exiles still return in him by whose wise counsel he had been thought to the scenes and haunts of affec-guided in the difficult pilgrimage of life. tion and memory. The English corn-field The religion of the children is warmed waves and glistens beneath the Indian sun, by the pious histories of their kindred, the smoke of the white cottage, as it nestled thus, ground, A grateful earnest of eternal peace." among the embowering woodbine, slowly ❝In still small accents whispering from the ascends over the feathery crown of the palm, and the steeple of the village church glimmers through the dark branches of the banyan. The sentiment is bestowed upon the many, the utterance of it upon the few. The heart feels, the genius expresses. Keble gives a charming specimen both of the sentiment and the expression in some lines of Burns, which he hesitated to translate into Greek because they breathe already the rhyme and the grace of Theocritus: "I look to the west when I gae to rest, For far in the west is he I lo'e best, The lad that is dear to my baby and me.' νυκτος αεί ζέφυρον ποτιδέρκομαι ὁπποτ' ες ευναν Virgil has made a beautiful use of this local memory, shedding a peace and joy over the dying eyes of the exile. One of the most affecting exemplifications of its influence is afforded by the familiar story of the Swiss soldiers who had been received into the pay of France. It was the evening hymn of their native mountains that restored health to their bodies and hope to their minds after every other remedy had failed. Their own song transformed a strange into a beloved land, and seemed to give to them the scenery and the friends, as well as the music of their home. Not less lively is the affectionate interest towards the spots where the loved in life sleep in death. It is not alone the poetical mind of Burke that desires to relinquish Wesminster Abbey for the dear old family burial-ground, "Where red and white with intermingling The graves look beautiful with sun and showers; We have hitherto been speaking of the first and second lectures, the third enters upon a wide and interesting path: it professes to examine what is called the poetical, as developed in painting and sculpture, in architecture and music; and, lastly, in rhetoric. Under the first division the lecturer selects two painters, the chief of their respective schools, Raphael and Rubens; and two pictures, which are accustomed to be regarded as the triumphs of each artist in his own peculiar walk of art. The parallel, as might be supposed, is extremely interesting between the Roman painter, impelled by nature and restrained by the gentle jurisdiction of the purest taste, and the Flemish, swayed by his own discipline of habit; one, contemplating a certain divine form and image of beauty, which he had delineated in the secret recesses of his own mind, and producing at will an uniform chastity of color and design; the other seizing upon every variety of hue and figure, in every possible combination. And so the difference between Raphael and Rubens is, that in the work of the first you forget the workman, while, in the second, the workman obscures the work. To Raphael Mr. Keble thinks that the endowment of poetical light is never refused; that the claim of Rubens, if not impugned, is never constantly admitted. From painting he passes to sculpture, which requires, as he observes, a purer and a severer taste to appreciate its beauties than is demanded by the more dazzling attractions of color. But architecture is far more intimately associated with poetry; whether it be the exquisite temple of Greek idolatry, with its solemn mysits magnificent images of gods, darting rays teries of superstition, its dim shrines, or of unearthly splendor from their emerald eyes; or the rich and fantastic graceful- but though there is resemblance, there is ness of Oriental Paganism; or, above all, no identity. Magnificence of diction, sweetthe long-drawn aisles and fretted vault of ness of pathos, charm of expression,-all our own sacred churches. Upon such a may be present, without constituting a subject we should expect the writer of the poet; for Cicero had them all; yet he still Christian Year to speak with more than remained a rhetorician; while of Plato it common enthusiasm. For on our own part has been affirmed, that he is more poetical we think, and have said upon a former oc- than Homer. The contrast indicated by casion, that a cathedral and the Faery Keble is just and happy. Cicero always Queene breathe the same spirit; that one seems to encircle himself with the theatre, is a poem in stone, and one in metre; and the crowd, the applause; you see the flucthe painted window and flowery clusterings tuating wares of spectators; you hear the of the walls form the more eloquent and gathering thunder of kindling hands. With the most congenial commentary upon Spen- Plato, on the contrary, all is tranquil and ser. We shall quote a portion of this de- subdued; he appears to be his own audiscription of our sacred architecture, and, ence; his is the quiet eye that broods upon instead of a translation, would refer the his own heart; any noisy expression of adreader to a metrical illustration from his miration would desecrate the serene maown Christian Year :jesty of his contemplations. The orator's "Vetustissima supersunt prægrandi columrhetoric speaks to the busy, the idle, the narum mole; simplici figura januarum, laque-hard-hearted, the worldly; the poetry of arium, fenestrarum; sculptili opere non ad- the philosopher steals only into the ear of modum vario, neque in multas diffuso partes; the pensive, the meditative, and the refined. quod adeo ad formam totius ædificii vix magis pertinere videatur, quam ad montis alicujus superficiem flores herbæque, si quæ ibi nascuntur. Itaque solidam quandam præ se ferunt durissimæ firmitatis, ne dicam immortalitatis, speciem. Deique cultoribus ipso visu servandam commendant animi constantiam, et pertinacem sine fastu fortitudinem. Hæc pervetera et fortasse rudiora paullatim excepit ædificandi ratio, omnium, ut mihi quidem videtur, elegantissima et sacris longe dignissima mysteriis. Acui jam fornicum culmina, atque in sublime efferri: columnæ non simplices illæ, sed virgatæ, fascium ritu, tamquam expluribus quæque constet columellis, inter se stipatis vinctisque; tum capita, mira arte cœlata, sensim cum laquearibus impingi; fenestræ plurimæ. amplissimis luminibus, sculptili opere quam delicatissimo; quarum quasi fibræ, foliorum similes, non vagan tur illæ quidem, libere tamen huc illuc feruntur." The association of poetry with rhetoric is, of course, more intimate and defined; BURKE. "It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the Queen of France at Versailles; and surely never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she just began to move in, glittering like the morning star, full of life, and splendor, and joy. Oh! what a revolution! and what a heart must I have to contemplate without emotion that elevation and that fall!" The oracular breastplate of the intellectual high-priest returns no answer to the profane and unworthy questioner. Every precious jewel of thought is clouded and silent. To illustrate his distinction between the rhetorical and the poetical mind, Keble adduces two specimens from two English writers, each alike celebrated in his own particular walk of thought,-Burke, the pride of the Senate,-Taylor, the glory of the Church. The passage from Burke is the famous description of the unfortunate Queen of France, selected from the Essay on the French Revolution; and the quotation from Taylor occurs in his funeral sermon on Lady Carbery. We give the original and the translation; and we think that even the graceful figures of the orator and the splendid image of the preacher will gather a new melody of sound from the exquisite Latin music to which they have been set by this accomplished critic : BURKE TRANSLATED. "Vidi equidem multis abhinc annispulcherrimam, qualem ne insomniis quidem hunc orbem tetigisse crediderim (si modo revera tetigit;) vidi diluculo quodam suo, margine cæli, vixdum exortam ; superna, quo properabat, loca, etiam tum læto lumine fovebat. Quid multa? Eoo lucidior emicabat, plena splendore, plena gaudio, quantum eheu! jam mutata! idem ego quam durus forem, si fixis oculis intueri possem, tali ortu, tam misere occidentem." TAYLOR. "In all her religion, and in all her actions of relation towards God, she had a strange evenness and untroubled passage, sliding toward her ocean of God and of infinity with a certain and silent motion." TAYLOR TRANSLATED. "Ita se ad pietatem composuit, is erat tenor eorum, quæm illa Dei causa faciebat, ut esset miris modis tranquilla, nec unquam feretur citato gradu; quæ ad suum illum Oceanum, Deum videlicet et Æternitatem, certo ac quieto itinere laberetur." from a comparison with Burke, or with that writer who might be supposed to suggest a more appropriate parallel, Bossuet; modulated flow of words and arrangement of sentences as compose what we are accustomed to call a style. In that respect he is the Rubens of eloquence; the fascination of his coloring is made to illuminate, if it does not conceal, the frequent deformities of his imagery, and the harshness and abruptness of his language. Keble awards the prize of the orator to Burke, and of the poet to Taylor. "Who will deny," he says, "that these words of the bishop flow from a full breast? Who we allude to his perfect want of any such will doubt that he who has thus spoken would have given utterance to the same sentiment in the solitude and silence of his own chamber?" Now suffer us to say one word in the praise of one of the loveliest minds that ever threw a bloom and a beauty over the sacred teaching of England. Without being a poet-for Taylor's specimens in rhyme have nothing but his name In the fourth prælection the professor to recommend them-he possessed the ele- touches upon the interesting subject of ments of poetry; and of all our writers, he poetical excellence in its relative degrees seems to have had most eminently the of originality and power, and in the highest brooding eye of Plato. For if we were class he places Spenser and Shakspeare. asked to indicate by a single epithet the In this opinion he has the recorded voice broad distinction between the eloquence of Southey to support him; who looked of the rhetorical and the poetical mind, we upon Shakspeare in the dramatic, Milton should say of the one that it was descrip- in the epic, and Spenser in the romantic, tive, and of the other that it was suggestive. as not only above all their successors, but Of the first, that it gave to the spectator a at an unapproachable distance from them. single picture; of the second, that it ex- The admirers of Shakspeare may rejoice to hibited scene after scene glimmering away receive the suffrage of Keble to the charinto the aerial sunnings of perspective. In acter of their poet. He considers his virthis suggestiveness, the writings of Jeremy tues of composition to have belonged to Taylor abound. Southey, while express- himself, and his vices to the age; and he ing his surprise at Mackintosh's high praise thinks that the wilful depravity of his conof the panegyric mysticism of the bishop, temporaries ought be taken as a testimony admits that there are in his works exqui- of the sincere and hearty love and admirasite, and more than Platonically beautiful tion of things deserving praise, by Shakpassages, though he conceives them to be speare:-" Ut facile quis intelligere possit, scattered thinly, like the apparitions of an- quæ aliquando subterpicula intexuntur, pargels in pious story. We enter more con- tim sæculi esse, non scriptoris; partim, ut genially into the remark of Southey's friend, ebrios Laconicis pueris tanquam odiosa ac William Taylor, of Norwich, that it is pleas- vitanda proponi. Ergo illum virtuti ex aniant to get out of the modern shrubberies in mo favisse non est cur dubitemus; cum perpetual flower into the stately yew hedge-præsertim plerique eorum qui tunc scenicis walks, and vased and statued terraces, and fruitful walls, and marble fountains of the old school of oratory. We think with him, and in his own words, "that such things are not made without a greater expense of study and brains than modern method requires;" and we admit, also, with him, that while there is a something of stiffness and inutility to censure there, there is a something of aptness, grace, and convenience to applaud there." 66 In one respect Bishop Taylor must suffer dabant operam, in alia omnia abire consueverint." Of the moral infirmities of Dryden we think that Mr. Keble speaks with a severity that might have been softened. To say that he never praised any one from his heart, is scarcely justified, or rather it is contradicted by his life. Why should we doubt that his panegyric of Oldham was sincere, as we feel it to be eloquent? Many of the intellectual vices of Dryden were the vices of dependence-the vices of poverty. Surely some allowance ought to be made character of Dryden, and instead of transfor a man of genius who was obliged to lating it, give its spirit in a parallel passage keep a sharp eye upon a bookseller's clip- from one of Southey's letters to William ped guineas. We shall quote Keble's brief Taylor : DRYDEN SKETCHED BY SOUTHEY. "I have placed Dryden at the head of the second-rates. I admire, but do not love him; he can mend a versifier, but could never form a poet. His moral imbecility kept him down; with powers for painting, he chose to be a limner by trade; instead of amending ages to come, he was the pimp and pander of his own." DRYDEN SKETCHED BY KEBLE. "Nulli vis major et copia verborum; nulli sententiarum uberior seges; nemo felicius sese tentare, nemo liberius quædammodo et lætius spatiari, suarum virium sensu. Unum illud Vate sacro indignissimum, quod ita parum sibi congruat, ut neminem unquam ex animo laudasse, nulli earum, quas cantaverit, rerum impensius eum studuisse dicas." Mr. Keble might very aptly have brought grace, we say particularly of genius reforward the example of Dryden to support fined by art, because, in this respect Virgil his argument, that great poets are not only excels Homer, and Campbell snatches the willing to employ on fitting occasions the crown from Spenser. It may suit the egolanguage of common discourse, but also tism, and, we are sorry to be obliged to add, that they draw much of their imagery and the extreme vanity of the late poet-laureate, illustration from things familiar and simple. to call Virgil a first-rate language-master, The Night Thoughts of Young he men- but many years must roll by before the tions as suffering from a different the- Kehama will be found on the same shelf ory. with the Eneid. There is deep cause to regret the error In his sixth lecture Mr. Keble comof the poet, because in no book of the eigh- mences a most interesting inquiry into the teenth century, whether it be written in history and structure of the Homeric poprose or verse, is it possible, we think, to ems,-an inquiry prolonged during ten lecfind so much food for thought condensed tures, and presenting subjects of the most and extracted. There can be no question pleasing character. If the late Lord Dudas to the purity of the ore; it is the difficult ley and Ward, whose correspondence with inscription round the edge that keeps the Bishop Copleston has been given to the coin from getting into the general currency public, could have read the professor's obof verse: the inscription rarely ends in the servations upon the Odyssey, he would, dialect in which it began; a new thought perhaps, have deemed it deserving of higher assumed the supremacy in the writer's commendation than that of being a pretty mind, without altogether dethroning the poem. The illustrations of the personal former; and so we have at the same time character and disposition of the Homeric two separate images and superscriptions, writer, derived from his own works, are and two reigns of fancy seem to be run into peculiarly pleasant; and we have been each other. But in one quality of the poet- struck with the contrast which Keble draws ical mind to which reference has been al- between Homer and Burns, in the temper ready made, we consider Young to shine with which they received the dispensation pre-eminent-in the quality of suggestive of a lowly fortune. He discovers a close ness-he indicates, rather than describes, resemblance between the Greek and Scotand he gives you an outline sufficiently tish poet in their poverty and their love of clear to enable an accurate and practical nature. Who does not join him in the wish eye to complete the portrait, or the land- that the same similarity could have been scape; and, therefore, he deserves a seat traced in their behaviour under the diffiin that society of wise writers, of whom culties of the state of life to which they had Keble happily observes, " Itaque qui sapiunt been called? That the fierce exciseman paucis tangunt, quæ maxime commendata of Dumfries had caught some of the smiling velint legenti; et velut convivatoris, ita forbearance of the blind wanderer of Chios, scriptoris, id erit certissimum ingenii spe- and had played with his fortune instead of cimen, si homines dimittat excitato quasi struggling with it! It may not be without palato." With this stimulated palate the reader always rises from the intellectual festival of genius cultivated and refined into profit, as it cannot be without interest, to read the morals which two eminent persons have written at the close of their melancholy |