able to conjecture. The battle is made up of the battles of all ages and nations; "red-mouth'd cannons, uproaring to the clouds," and "hands grasp. ing firm the glittering shield." The only military operations of which this part of the poem reminds us are those which reduced the Abbey of Quedtinburgh to submission. The Templar with his cross-the Austrian and Prussian grenadiers in full uniform-and Curtius and Dentatus with their batteringWe ought not to pass by unnoticed the slain war-horse, who will no ram. more "Roll his red eye, and rally for the fight;" or the slain warrior, who, while "lying on his bleeding breast," contrives to stare ghastly and grimly on the skies" As to this last exploit, we can only say, as Dante did on a similar occasion, "Forse per forza gia di parlasia Si stravolse cosi alcun del tutto: The tempest is thus described— "But lo! around the marsh'lling clouds unite, Rear their white heads, and race along the main !" What, we should like to know, is the difference between the two operations which Mr. Robert Montgomery so accurately distinguishes from each other,the fierce sweeping of the tempest-spirits through the air and the rushing of the maniac blasts from their caverns? And why does the former operation end exactly when the latter commences? We cannot stop over each of Mr. Robert Montgomery's descriptions. We have a shipwrecked sailor, who "visions a viewless temple in the air;"- -a murderer, who stands on a heath, "with ashy lips, in cold convulsion spread;" --a pious man, to whom, as he lies in bed at night, "The panorama of past life appears, Warms his pure mind, and melts it into tears;" a traveller, who loses his way owing to the thickness of the "cloud-battalion," and the want of "heaven-lamps, to beam their holy light." We have a description of a convicted felon, stolen from that incomparable passage in Crabbe's Borough, which has made many a rough and cynical reader cry like a child. We can, however, conscientiously declare that persons of the most excitable sensibility may safely venture upon it in Mr. Robert Montgomery's alteration. Then we have the "poor, mindless, pale-faced, maniac boy," who "Rolls his vacant eye, 99 To greet the glowing fancies of the sky.' What are the glowing fancies of the sky? And what is the meaning of the two lines which almost immediately follow? "A soulless thing, a spirit of the woods, He loves to commune with the fields and floods." How can a soulless thing be a spirit? Then comes a panegyric on the Sunday. A baptism follows;-after that a marriage;-and we then proceed, in due course, to the visitation of the sick and the burial of the dead." Often as Death has been personified, Mr. Montgomery has found something new to say about him. "O Death! thou dreadless vanquisher of earth, The elements shrank blasted at thy birth! If there be any one line in this passage about which we are more in the dark than about the rest, it is the fourth. What the difference may be between the victims and the martyrs, and why the martyrs are to lie before Death, and the victims behind him, are to us great mysteries. We now come to the third part, of which we may say with honest Cassio, "Why, this is a more excellent song than the other." Mr. Robert Montgomery is very severe on the infidels, and undertakes to prove that, as he clegantly expresses it, "One great Enchanter helm'd the harmonious whole." What an enchanter has to do with helming, or what a helm has to do with harmony, we do not quite understand. He proceeds with his argument thus: "And dare men dream that dismal Chance has framed All that the eye perceives, or tongue has named; The spacious world, and all its wonders, born Designless, self-created, and forlorn ; Like the flashing bubbles on a stream, Fire from the cloud, or phantom in a dream?" We should be sorry to stake our faith in a higher Power on Mr. Robert Montgomery's logic. Does he believe that lightning, and bubbles, and the phenomena of dreams, are designless and self-created? If he does, we can. not conceive why he may not believe that the whole universe is designless and self-created. A few lines before he tells us that it is the Deity who bids "thunder rattle from the skiey deep." His theory is therefore this, that God made the thunder, but that the lightning made itself. But Mr. Robert Montgomery's metaphysics are not at present our game. IIe proceeds to set forth the fearful effects of atheism. "Then, blood-stain'd Murder, bare thy hideous arm, Burst from your bonds, and battle with the time! " Mr. Robert Montgomery is fond of personification, and belongs, we need not say, that school of poets who hold that nothing more is necessary to a personification in poetry than to begin a word with a capital letter. Murder may, without impropriety, bare her arm,—as she did long ago, in Mr. Campbell's Pleasures of Hope. But what possible motive Rebellion can have for weltering in her storm,-what avenging crime may be,-who its spirits may be,-why they should burst from their bonds,-what their bonds may be,why they should battle with the time,-what the time may be,-and what a battle between the time and the spirits of avenging crime would resemble, we must confess ourselves quite unable to understand. "And here let Memory turn her tearful glance Whether Rebellion shakes her own hand, shakes the hand of Memory, or shakes the hand of France, or what any one of these metaphors would mean, we know no more than we know what is the sense of the following passage: "Let the foul orgies of infuriate crime When leagued Rebellion march'd to kindle man, And thou, sweet flower of Austria, slaughter'd Queen, Who dropp'd no tear upon the dreadful scene, Thy look obedience, and thy smile a law," &c. What is the distinction between the foul orgies and the raging havoc which the foul orgies are to picture? Why does Fright go behind Rebellion, and Murder before? Why should not Murder fall behind Fright? Or why should not all the three walk abreast? We have read of a hero who had "Amazement in his van, with Flight combined, is "9 Gray, we suspect, could have given a reason for disposing the allegorical attendants of Edward thus. But to proceed,-" Flower of Austria stolen from Byron. "Dropped" is false English. "Perish'd in the storm means nothing at all; and "thy look obedience" means the very reverse of what Mr. Robert Montgomery intends to say. Our poet then proceeds to demonstrate the immortality of the soul : "And shall the soul, the fount of reason, die, When dust and darkness round its temple lie? Dimless and quenchless, though the breath expire." The soul is a fountain; and therefore it is not to die, though dust and darkness lie round its temple, because an ethereal fire has been breathed into it, which cannot be quenched though its breath expire. Is it the fountain or the temple that breathes, and has fire breathed into it? Mr. Montgomery apostrophizes the "Immortal beacons,-spirits of the just," and describes their employments in another world, which are to be, it seems, bathing in light, hearing fiery streams flow, and riding on living cars of lightning. The deathbed of the sceptic is described with what we suppose is meant for energy. "See how he shudders at the thought of death! The gibbering teeth, glazed eye, and marble limb. A man as stiff as marble shuddering and gibbering violently would certainly present so curious a spectacle that the shades, if they came in his way, might well stare. We then have the deathbed of a Christian made as ridiculous as false imagery and false English can make it. But this is not enough :-The Day of Judgment is to be described,—and a roaring cataract of nonsense is poured forth upon this tremendous subject. Earth, we are told, is dashed into eternity. Furnace blazes wheel round the horizon, and burst into bright wizard phantoms. Racing hurricanes unroll and whirl quivering fire-clouds. The white waves gallop. Shadowy worlds career around. The red and raging eye of Imagination is then forbidden to pry further. But further Mr. Robert Montgomery persists in prying. The stars bound through the airy roar. The unbosomed deep yawns on the ruin. The billows of eternity then begin to advance. The world glares in fiery slumber. A car comes forward driven by living thunder. "Creation shudders with sublime dismay And in a blazing tempest whirls away," And this is fine poetry! This is what ranks its writer with the masterspirits of the age! This is what has been described over and over again, in terms which would require some qualification if used respecting Paradise Lost! It is too much that this patchwork, made by stitching together old odds and ends of what, when new, was, for the most part, but tawdry frippery, is to be picked off the dunghill on which it ought to rot, and to be held up to admiration as an inestimable specimen of art. And what must we think of a system, by means of which verses like those which we have quoted-verses fit only for the poet's corner of the Morning Post-can produce emolument and fame? The circulation of this writer's poetry has been greater than that of Southey's Roderic, and beyond all comparison greater than that of Cary's Dante, or of the best works of Coleridge. Thus encouraged, Mr. Robert Montgomery has favoured the public with volume after volume. We have given so much space to the examination, of his first and most popular performance that we have none to spare for his Universal Prayer, and his smaller poems, which, as the puffing journals tell us, would alone constitute a sufficient title to literary immortality. We shall pass at once to his last publication, entitled Satan. This poem was ushered into the world with the usual roar of acclamation. But the thing was now past a joke. Pretensions so unfounded, so impudent, and so successful, had aroused a spirit of resistance. In several magazines and reviews, accordingly, Satan has been handled somewhat roughly, and the arts of the puffers have been exposed with good sense and spirit. We shall, therefore, be very concise. Of the two poems, we rather prefer that on the Omnipresence of the Deity, for the same reason which induced Sir Thomas More to rank one bad book above another. "Marry, this is somewhat. This is rhyme. But the other is neither rhyme nor reason." Satan is a long soliloquy, which the Devil pronounces in five or six thousand lines of blank verse conccerning geography, politics, newspapers, fashionable society, theatrical amusements, Sir Walter Scott's novels, Lord Byron's poetry, and Mr. Martin's pictures. The new designs for Milton have, as was natural, particularly attracted the attention of a personage who occupies so conspicuous a place in them. Mr. Martin must be pleased to learn that, whatever may be thought of those performances on earth, they give full satisfaction in Pandemonium, and that he is there thought to have hit off the likenesses of the various Thrones and Dominations very happily. The motto to the poem of Satan is taken from the Book of Job :-"Whence comest thou?-From going to and fro in the earth, and walking up and down in it." And certainly Mr. Robert Montgomery has not failed to make his hero go to and fro, and walk up and down. With the exception, however, of this propensity to locomotion, Satan has not one Satanic quality. Mad Tom had told us that "the prince of darkness is a gentleman ;" but we had yet to learn that he is a respectable and pious gentleman, whose principle fault is that he is something of a twaddle, and far too liberal of his good advice. That happy change in his character which Origen anticipated, and of which Tillotson did not despair, seems to be rapidly taking place. Bad habits are not eradicated in a moment. It is not strange, therefore, that so old an offender should now and then relapse for a short time into wrong dispositions. But to give him his due, as the proverb recommends, we must say that he always returns, after two or three lines of impiety, to his preaching tone. We would seriously advise Mr. Montgomery to omit, or alter, about a hundred lines in different parts of this large volume, and to republish it under the name of Gabriel. The reflections of which it consists would come less absurdly, as far as there is a more and a less in extreme absurdity, from a good than from a bad angel. We can afford room only for a single quotation. We give one taken at random-neither worse nor better, as far as we can perceive, than any other equal number of lines in the book. The Devil goes to the play, and moralises thereon as follows: "Music and Pomp their mingling spirit shed 'Creatures whose souls outbalance worlds awake!' Methinks I hear a pitying angel cry." Here we conclude. If our remarks give pain to Mr. Robert Montgomery, we are sorry for it. But, at whatever cost of pain to individuals, literature must be purified from this taint. And, to show that we are not actuated by any feelings of personal enmity towards him, we hereby give notice that, as soon as any book shall, by means of puffing, reach a second edition, our intention is to do unto the writer of it as we have done unto Mr. Robert Montgomery. CIVIL DISABILITIES OF THE JEWS. Statement of the Civil Disabilities and Privations affecting Jews in England. THE distinguished member of the House of Commons who, towards the close of the late Parliament, brought forward a proposition for the relief of the Jews, has given notice of his intention to renew it. The force of reason, in the last session carried it through one stage, in spite of the opposition of power. Reason and power are now on the same side; and we have little doubt that they will conjointly achieve a decisive victory. In order to contribute our share to the success of just principles, we propose to pass in review, as rapidly as possible, some of the arguments, or phrases claiming to be arguments, which have been employed to vindicate a system full of absur lity and injustice. The Constitution-it is said-is essentially Christian; and, therefore, to admit Jews to office is to destroy the Constitution. Nor is the Jew injured by being excluded from political power. For no man has any right to power, |