to a mere nullity, in comparison to what I have acquired since. inscrutable misery and mischief, and can never be studied to so much advantage as in Self is a subject of the dark; for as the bright beams of the sun seem to impart a beauty to the most unsightly objects, so the light of God's countenance, vouchsafed to a fallen creature, so sweetens him and softens him for the time, that he seems both to others and to himself to have nothing selfish or sordid about him. But the heart is a nest of serpents, and will be such while it continues to beat. If God cover the mouth of that nest with his hand, they are hush and snug; but if he withdraw his hand the whole family lift up their heads and hiss, and are as active and venomous as ever. This I always professed to believe from the time that I had embraced the truth, but I never knew it as I know it now. To what end I have been made to know it as I do, whether for the benefit of others or for my own, or for both, or for neither, will appear hereafter." pp. 150-152. So far was Cowper from looking back upon the years of his religious existence as fraught with gloom and terror, that he ever reverted to them with melancholy delight, and only wished he could recover what he once enjoyed. Observe what he said when he removed from his miserable ruinated abode at Olney to his pleasant retreat at Weston; and the language in which he accosts his old friend and spiritual adviser, Mr. Newton, whom some have delighted to represent as a sort of Dominic, fit only to wield brands and found an Inquisition, but whom Cowper ever looked up to as his best comforter : "We find ourselves here in a comfortable house. Such it is in itself; and my cousin, who has spared no expence in dressing it up for us, has made it a genteel one. Such, at least, it will be, when its contents are a little harmonized. She left us on Tuesday, and on Wednesday Mrs. Unwin and I took possession of our new abode. I could not help giving a last look to my old prison, and its precincts; and though I cannot easily account for it, having been miserable there so many years, felt something like a heart-ache, when I took my leave of a scene, that certainly in itself had nothing to engage affection. But I recollected that I had once been happy there, and 'could not, without tears in my eyes, bid adieu to a place in which God had so often found me. The human mind is a great mystery; mine, at least, appears to be such upon this occasion. I found that I not only had a tenderness for that ruinous abode, because it had once known me happy in the presence of God, but that even the distress I had there suffered, for so long a time, on account of his absence, had endeared it to me as much. I was weary of every object, had long wished for a change, yet could not take leave without a pang at parting. What consequences are to attend our removal, God only knows. I know well that it is not in the power of situation to effect a cure of melancholy like mine." pp. 165, 166. "You do justice to me, and to Mrs. Unwin, when you assure yourself that to hear of your health will give us pleasure. I know not, in truth, whose health and wellbeing could give us more. The years that we have seen together will never be out of our remembrance; and, so long as we remember them, we must remember you with affection. In the pulpit, and out of the pulpit, you have laboured in every possible way to serve us; and we must have a short memory indeed for the kindness of a friend, could we by any means become forgetful of yours." p. 252. But we must "change our hand" before our readers recoil from these gloomy records. The following passages are in a different characternamely, in this admirable man's own light, playful, epistolary style, which, however, he well knew how to mix up with the most tender sentiments, the most striking images, and the most just and solid arguments. He writes to Mr. Unwin, who had procured him a donation of blankets from Mr. Thornton to distribute among his poor neighbours : “I have thought with pleasure of the summer that you have had in your heart, while you have been employed in softening the severity of winter in behalf of so many who must otherwise have been exposed to it. You never said a better thing in your life than when you assured Mr. of the expedience of a gift of bedding to the poor at Olney. There is no one article of this world's comforts with which, as Falstaff says, they are so heinously unprovided. When a poor woman, and an honest one, whom we know well, carried home two pair of blankets, a pair for herself and husband, and a pair for her six children, that you kindly placed at my disposal; as soon as the children saw them, they jumped out of their straw, caught them in their arms, kissed them, blessed them, and danced for joy. An old woman, a very old one, the first night that she found herself so comfortably covered, could not sleep a wink, being kept awake by the contrary emotions of transport on the one hand, and the fear of not being thankful enough on the other." pp. 185, 186. The following was his introduction to the parish clerk of Northampton :"On Monday morning last, Sam brought me word that there was a man in the kitchen, who desired to speak with me. I ordered him in: a plain, decent, elderly looking figure, made its appearance, and being desired to sit, spoke as follows: Sir, I am clerk of the parish of All Saints, in Northampton; brother of Mr. C. the upholsterer it is customary for the person in my office to annex to a bill of mortality, which he publishes at Christmas, a copy of verses. You would do me a great favour, Sir, if you would furnish me with one." To this I replied: Mr. C. you have several men of genius in your town, why have you not applied to some of them? There is namesake of yours in particular, Mr. C. the statuary, who every body knows is a first-rate maker of verses ; he surely is the man, of all the world, for your purpose. Alas! Sir,' replied he, I have heretofore borrowed help from him, but he is a gentleman of so much reading, that the people of our town cannot understand him.' I confess I felt all the force of the compliment implied in this speech, and was almost ready to answer, Perhaps, my good friend, they may find me unintelligible for the same reason. But on asking him whether he had walked over to Weston on purpose to implore the assistance of my muse, and on his replying in the affirmative, I felt my mortified vanity a little consoled, and pitying the poor man's distress, which appeared to be considerable, promised to supply him. The waggon has accordingly gone this day to Northampton, loaded in part with my effusions in the mortuary style. A fig for poets who write epitaphs upon individuals, I have written one that serves two hundred persons." p. 227. Dr. Johnson's two volumes of Cowper's Letters, published in 1824, and which are, of course, less known than Hayley's former collections, and, we presume, are at present restricted from the competition of free cheap circulation by the law of copyright, contain many admirable epistles, of which Mr. Taylor has made ample and judicious use. Hayley had the chief of these letters before him (with the exception of the series to Mrs. Hill) when he made his selections; but he left very valuable gleanings untouched, and particularly from those more melancholy letters which are essential to a right knowledge of Cowper's case, and to which, therefore, we have particularly adverted. Hayley was unwilling to say too much upon this afflicting topic, which also, unhappily, he misunderstood. Mr. Taylor also has left, of necessity, not only gleanings, but whole sheaves untouched; but the reader who has not Hayley and Johnson will heartily thank him for what his limits allowed and his good taste has selected. We need hardly say, that Mr. Taylor's extracts and remarks, both original and compiled, are all designed to subserve that great cause which was dearest to Cowper's heart. It had indeed been sacrilege, if a biographer of Cowper had not felt, that to promote the glory of God and the best welfare of the human soul ought to be the great object of his narrative. Among the passages in Dr. Johnson's collection of Cowper's letters which Mr. Taylor has not made use of, we are tempted to copy two or three. The following is a statement of what was doing, or rather not doing, upon the subject of West-Indian Slavery, in the year 1788. Let the reader mark its graphic correctness of application to every cabinet and every parliament up to the present hour, with the sole exception of the abolition of the Slave Trade in 1809. May next month prove a second memorable exception. "I fear that neither you nor I, with all our reasoning and rhyming, shall effect much good in this matter. So far as I can learn, and I have had intelligence from a quarter within the reach of such as is respectable, our governors are not animated altogether with such heroic ardour as the occasion might inspire. They consult frequently, indeed, in the cabinet about it; but the frequency of their consultations in a case so plain as this would be (did not what Shakspeare calls commodity, and what we call political expediency, cast a cloud over it), rather bespeaks a desire to save appearances, than to interpose to purpose. Laws will, I suppose, be enacted for the more humane treatment of the Negroes; but who shall see to the execution of them? The planters will not, and the Negroes cannot. In fact, we know that laws of this tendency have not been wanting, enacted even amongst themselves; but there has been always a want of prosecutors, or righteous judges; deficiencies which will not be very easily supplied. The newspapers have lately told us, that these merciful masters have, on this occasion, been occupied in passing ordinances, by which the lives and limbs of their slaves are to be secured from wanton cruelty hereafter. But who does not immediately detect the artifice, or can give them a moment's credit for any thing more than a design, by this show of lenity, to avert the storm which they think hangs over them. On the whole, I fear there is reason to wish, for the honour of England, that the nuisance had never been troubled; lest we eventually make ourselves justly chargeable with the whole offence by not removing it. The enormity cannot be palliated; we can no longer plead that we were not aware of it, or that our attention was otherwise engaged; and shall be inexcusable, therefore, ourselves, if we leave the least part of it unredressed. Such arguments as Pharaoh might have used, to justify his destruction of the Israelites, substituting only sugar for bricks, may lie ready for our use also; but I think we can find no better." Letters, pp. 130–132. We will give another untouched specimen, in a lighter and descriptive vein, and which on that account Hayley would probably have copied, but that it happens to be in one of the letters to Mrs. King, which he had not access to. "There was a time, but that time was before I commenced writer for the press, when I amused myself in a way somewhat similar to yours; allowing, I mean, for the difference between masculine and female operations. The scissors and the needle are your chief implements; mine were the chisel and the saw. In those days you might have been in some danger of too plentiful a return for your favours. Tables, such as they were, and joint-stools such as never were, might have travelled to Perton-hall in most inconvenient abundance. But I have long since discontinued this practice, and many others which I found it necessary to adopt, that I might escape the worst of all evils, both in itself and in its consequences an idle life. Many arts I have exercised with this view, for which nature never designed me; though among them were some in which I arrived at considerable proficiency, by mere dint of the most heroic perseverance. There is not a 'squire in all this country who can boast of having made better squirrel-houses, hutches for rabbits, or bird-cages, than myself; and in the article of cabbage-nets, I had no superior. I even had the hardiness to take in hand the pencil, and studied a whole year the art of drawing. Many figures were the fruit of my labours, which had, at least, the merit of being unparalleled by any production either of art or nature. But before the year was ended, I had occasion to wonder at the progress that may be made, in despite of natural deficiency, by dint alone of practice; for I actually produced three landscapes, which a lady thought worthy to be framed and glazed. I then judged it high time to exchange this occupation for another, lest, by any subsequent productions of inferior merit, I should forfeit the honour I had so fortunately acquired. But gardening was, of all employments, that in which I succeeded best; though even in this I did not suddenly attain perfection. I began with lettuces and cauliflowers: from them I proceeded to cucumbers; next to melons. I then purchased an orange-tree, to which, in due time, I added two or three myrtles. These served me day and night with employment during a whole severe winter. To defend them from the frost, in a situation that exposed them to its severity, cost me much ingenuity and much attendance. I contrived to give them a fire heat; and have waded night after night through the snow, with the bellows under my arm, just before going to bed, to give the latest possible puff to the embers, lest the frost should seize them before morning. Very minute beginnings have sometimes important consequences. From nursing two or three little evergreens, I became ambitious of a green-house, and accordingly built one; which, verse excepted, afforded me amusement for a longer time than any expedient of all the many to which I have fled for refuge from the misery of having nothing to do. When I left Olney for Weston, I could no longer have a green-house of my own; but in a neighbour's garden I find a better, of which the sole management is consigned to me." Letters, pp. 163-166. The following is a letter in the same collection to the unhappy Charlotte Smith. It was written while visiting Hayley at Eartham, in the autumn of 1792, and therefore not very long before his last eclipse. It shews how tenderly he could sympathize with a sufferer, though one of a very different character to himself. "I would give you, madam, not my counsel only, but consolation also, were I not disqualified for that delightful service by a great dearth of it in my own experience. I too often seek, but cannot find it. Of this, however, I can assure you, if that may at all comfort you, that both my friend Hayley and myself most truly sympathise with you under all your sufferings. Neither have you, I am persuaded, in any degree lost the interest you always had in him, or your claim to any service that it may be in his your power to render you. Had you no other title to his esteem, his respect for talents, and his feelings for your misfortunes, must ensure to you the friendship of such a man for ever. I know, however, there are seasons when, look which way we will, we see the same dismal gloom enveloping all objects. This is itself an affliction ; and the worse, because it makes us think ourselves more unhappy than we are; and at such a season it is, I doubt not, that you suspect a diminution of our friend's zeal to serve you." "I was much struck by an expression in your letter to Hayley, where you say that you 'will endeavour to take an interest in green leaves again. This seems the sound of my own voice reflected to me from a distance. I have so often had the same thought and desire; a day scarcely passes, at this season of the year, when I do not contemplate the trees soon to be stript, and say, Perhaps I shall never see you clothed again. Every year, as it passes, makes this expectation more reasonable; and the year with me cannot be very distant, when the event will verify it. Well, may God grant us a good hope of arriving in due time where the leaves never fall, and all will be right!" Letters, pp. 300, 301. One extract more, as the volumes are in our hands, and probably are not in those of our readers. That extract shall relate to a female author likewise, but one of a very different character to Charlotte Smith-we mean, Hannah More, whose early writings Cowper frequently mentions with just eulogy, chiefly on account of their religious character, at a time when writings of that class were much more rare than at present. He is writing to Mr. Newton. The Cowslip Green mentioned in the extract-we know it well; and those visiters who take a pilgrimage to deserted Barley Wood ought not to forget to prolong their pilgrimage a little lower down the hill, to glance at it was the residence of Mrs. H. More and her sisters for many years after she became known to fame, till she took the little demesne of Barley Wood, and caused paradise to open in the wild. It is a small but beautiful cottage-made beautiful by simple good taste—and blushing from thatch to porch with roses; and the roses still blow on the neighbouring banks, and amidst the hedges in the fields and lanes where these illustrious sisters, then an unbroken circle, delighted to plant them. But Cowslip Green is forgotten, and Barley Wood is only thought of with pain; for from that lovely spot, said Hannah More to us, from that earthly paradise, was I driven-but not by angels.--Which of the sisters is meant as bidding defiance to wind, weather, and bad roads, we cannot tell; for Martha (it was an affront to call her any thing but Patty), who is there mentioned, was delicate, at least for some years before her death: but they all continued to be active and self-denying when good was to be done; and not least the present aged and venerable survivor, who never had a day's sound health, or total freedom from pain, in her life. But for the extract. "I was much pleased with your account of your visit to Cowslip Green; both for the sake of what you saw there, and because I am sure you must have been as happy in such company, as any situation in this world can make you. Miss More has been always employed, since I first heard of her doings, as becomes a Christian. was, while endeavouring to reform the unreformable Great; and so she is, while framing means and opportunities to instruct the more tractable Little. Horace's Virginibus, puerisque, may be her motto; but in a sense much nobler than he has annexed to it. I cannot, however, be entirely reconciled to the thought of her being henceforth silent, though even for the sake of her present labours. A pen useful as hers ought not, perhaps, to be laid aside: neither, perhaps, will she altogether renounce it, but when she has established her schools, and habituated them to the discipline she intends, will find it desirable to resume it.—I rejoice that she has a sister like herself, capable of bidding defiance to fatigue and hardship, to dirty roads and wet raiment, in so excellent a cause. So she "I beg that when you write next to either of those ladies, you will present my best compliments to Miss Martha, and tell her that I can never feel myself flattered more than I was by her application. God knows how unworthy I judge myself, at the same time, to be admitted into a collection [of autographs] of which you are a member. Were there not a crowned head or two to keep me in countenance, I should even blush to think of it." Letters, pp. 273-275. Cowper's contribution to the album stood as follows, after some verbal alterations suggested by Mr. Newton : "In vain to live from age to age We modern bards endeavour; You gain your point for ever.' But we must go back to Mr. Taylor, from whom we have strayed a little while, not playfully, but sadly, knowing that he had only painful intelligence to tell us upon our return. And so it is; for soon follows Mrs. Unwin's illness and its heavy effect upon Cowper, who felt that his own troubles had been the cause of hers, and had weighed her down to a most pitiable state of weakness both of mind and body. We must not pass her over without a few brief notices: they are an essential part of the life of her suffering friend. Hayley thus describes them both, as he found them at Weston in 1792. "Their reception of me was kindness itself; I was enchanted to find that the manners and conversation of Cowper resembled his poetry, charming by unaffected elegance, and the graces of a benevolent spirit. I looked with affectionate veneration and pleasure on the lady who, having devoted her life and fortune to the service of this tender and sublime genius, in watching over him with maternal vigilance, through so many years of the darkest calamity, appeared to be now enjoying a reward justly due to the noblest exertions of friendship, in contemplating the health and the renown of the poet, whom she had the happiness to preserve. It seemed hardly possible to survey human nature in a more touching, and a more satisfactory point of view. Their tender attention to each other, their simple, devout gratitude for the mercies which they had experienced together, and their constant but unaffected propensity to impress on the mind and heart of a new friend, the deep sense which they incessantly felt, of their mutual obligations to each other; afforded me very singular gratification." p. 270. During Hayley's visit, Mrs. Unwin sustained a paralytic stroke-the second-from the effects of which she never recovered. It was the deathblow to Cowper's few remaining hopes and enjoyments. Cowper now nursed her as affectionately as she had nursed him; and would scarcely read or write, because such an employment left her solitary, and defrauded her of his assiduities. She lingered till the close of the year 1796, having been removed, with Cowper, the previous year, by the affectionate care of Mr. Johnson, first to North Tuddenham in Norfolk; thence to Mundesley, a village on the Norfolk coast; and lastly to Johnson's own residence at Dereham, in the same neighbourhood, where both the sufferers closed their last hours. The following is Mr. Taylor's account of the death-bed of Mrs. Unwin. The "In December, 1796, it became evident that Mrs. Unwin's life was rapidly drawing to a close; she had been gradually sinking for a considerable time; and on the seventeenth day of this month, in the 72d year of her age, she peacefully, and without a groan or a sigh, resigned her happy spirit into the hands of God. Her life had been eminently distinguished by the most fervent and unaffected piety, which she had displayed in circumstances the most trying and afflicting, and her end was peace. day before she expired, Cowper, as he had long been accustomed to do at regular periods, spent a short time with his afflicted and long-tried friend; and though to his inmates he appeared so absorbed in his own mental anguish as to take little, if any, notice of her condition, it was evident afterwards that he clearly perceived how fast she was sinking; for, as a faithful servant of himself and his afflicted friend was opening the window of his chamber the following morning, he addressed her in a tone the most plaintive and affecting, Sally, is there life above stairs!' a convincing proof that the acuteness of his own anguish had not prevented him from bestowing great attention to the sufferings of his aged friend. He saw her, for the last time, about an hour before she expired; and, notwithstanding the intensity of his own distress, he was much affected, though he clearly perceived that she enjoyed the utmost tranquillity. He saw the corpse once after her decease; and after looking at it attentively for a short time, he suddenly withdrew, under the influence of the strongest emotions. She was buried, in Dereham church, on the 23d December, 1796, and a marble tablet was raised to her memory." Letters, pp. 320, 321. Cowper never once adverted to the event; he ceased to mention her name; nor did he ever make the slightest inquiry respecting the funeral. Mr. Taylor attributes this to "insensibility," induced by his own intense |