PR 
 
 4381 
 54 
 
 
AN INQUIRY 
 
 INTO 
 
 THE MORAL CHARACTER 
 
 OF 
 
 
 To Philosophy, enh'^hteiiert by the Affections, does it alone belong properly to 
 estimate the claims of the deceasocl on the one hand, and of the present age and 
 future generations on the other, and to strike tlie balance between tliem. 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 BY JiW. SIMMONS. 
 
 > 
 
 NEW YORK : 
 
 PUBLISHED BY E. BLISS & E. WHITE, No. 128 BROADWAIT. 
 
 Dodd & Manter, Printers, No. 1 Thames Street. 
 
 1824. 
 

^■/ 
 
 AN INQUIRY 
 
 INTO 
 OF / 
 
 LORD BYRON. 
 
 CERTAIN Critics of the present day, Puritans 
 in morals, and E})icnreans in philosophy, imagine 
 they liave discovered that all the reorrcts whiclt 
 have been poured over the tombs of ill-starred 
 Genius, and all the sympathies which have been 
 consecrated to its mournful memory, have been a 
 species of mere fanfaro?io,des issuin<^ from the lips 
 of those who seem to think that the darkest sor- 
 rows of this life are the peculiar inheritance of in- 
 spired minds, and constitute the melancholy con- 
 ditions upon w^hich great talents are conferred. («) 
 They "can see no reason why men of genius should 
 not he just as comfortable in the world, and par- 
 take as fully and with as much zest of its good 
 things, as their humhle fellow mortals of plain and 
 inoffensive understandings. In short, they appre- 
 hend, that a general survey of the history of men ol" 
 literary eminence, will show that, instead of being 
 as wretched as here (St. Pierrie on Rousseau) and 
 elsewhere represented, they enjoy life quite as 
 much as any other class ofpei'sons." (h) From "a 
 
general survey of the history of men of literary 
 eminence," or rather, men of genius, (for literary 
 eminence does not always imply genius, as our cri- 
 tic probably can testify,) an inference the reverse 
 of this, we apprehend, is to be drawn. From such 
 a survey, we are unavoidably led to deduce the 
 discouraging truth, that, while it is made the foun- 
 dation of Natural Law, that man should be left to 
 pursue his own happiness in his own way ; happi- 
 ness is almost entirely dependant upon circumstan- 
 ces over which we can have no possible controul ; 
 and seems to be least attainable by those who have 
 usually the greatest capacity for its enjoyment — 
 men of acute intellectual sensibility. These re- 
 marks are suggested by the personal history of the 
 extraordinary Individual whose Moral Character 
 we purpose briefly to consider. The somewhat 
 anomalous character of Lord Byron, both as a 
 writer and a man, presents a w ide field of inquiry 
 to the philosopher, and the critic, and is calculated 
 perhaps, to exhaust, alike the ingenuity of specula- 
 tion and the powers of metaphysical analysis. His 
 frame, morally and intellectually, may be said re- 
 peatedly to have undergone the nicest operations 
 of the anatomical pen; and yet the mystery of his 
 being, remains still to be developed. The analysis 
 of Mind, unlike that of Matter, requires in every 
 stage of its progress, certain data and criteria in 
 order to direct and facilitate its operations, which, 
 while they are but rarely afforded to the inquirer,^ 
 are at the same time, in a great degree, vague, hy- 
 pothetical, and unsatisfactory. It is in such cases 
 that we are led to remark, and to lament the limita- 
 tion which seemed set to the researches of the hu- 
 man mind. Unlike the natural, the intellectual 
 
world has but one horizon, and that, perhaps in 
 wisdom, is the sensible. We are not among the ad- 
 vocates of the doctrine of the perfectibihty of mind, 
 because we are not certain that Ave possess any 
 definite notions of that state, whether moral, intel- 
 lectual, or physical, which we generalize under the 
 term perfection, and which we would designate 
 by that term.(c) But we do think that the perfec- 
 tibility of Moral Science might be predicated up- 
 on more rational grounds, were we able to origi- 
 nate and practically to apply a species of moral 
 equations, whereby we might be enabled to ascer- 
 tain and classify the phenomena of the social as 
 well as those of the natural world ; and where the 
 contiguity of any two personal actions, like that of 
 any two natural events, might be resolved into the 
 process of cause and effect. The great truths of 
 Morality, as well as of Revelation, have been long 
 since expounded and promulgated; notwithstand- 
 ing which, both Ethics and Religion continue to be, 
 the one problematical, and the other subjected to 
 the test, not of faith, but of reason. And, as there 
 have been zealots in religion, so, there have been 
 persecutors in morals ; and if the heretic has been 
 subjected to the pyre and the stake, the man of 
 doubtful morality has been consigned to a mode of 
 punishment, even more unenlightened and unchris- 
 tian; and this frequently for no other reason, than 
 because his morality has been peculiar. The 
 chief object of this Inquiry into the moral charac- 
 ter of Lord Byron, a man who has been for so 
 many years the admiration and the wonder of the 
 age, is to afford, if possible, a metaphysical solu- 
 tion of the moral problem, into which the strange 
 discrepancy between his sentiments and his ac- 
 
6 
 
 tions, between his theory and jiractice of morals, 
 may be said to have resolv ed itself. The nearest 
 and the only approach to a philosophical analysis 
 of this sort, with which we are acquainted, is to be 
 met with in the twelfth number, of the New Month- 
 ly Magazine. (Art. De Mussefs Life of Rousseau.) 
 In commenting upon the singular contradiction 
 which Rousseau's conduct afforded of his princi- 
 ples, Mr. Campbell (for the article alluded to, car- 
 ries with it all the evidences of his liberal and en- 
 lightened mind) remarks, that the latter had be- 
 come depraved before he was old enough to regu- 
 late the former. This, from all that we have been 
 able to gather of that extraordinary man, seems 
 undoubtedly to have been the case. Rousseau's 
 moral principles and feelings had become the one 
 warped, and the other radically depraved, long 
 previous to the unfolding of his fine and vigorous 
 intellect. Long before his beautiful mind had put 
 forth in bloom, his enthusiastic morals had "grown 
 to seed." In other and more philosophical words, 
 his passive impressions had been confirmed before 
 his active principles had unfolded themselves. It 
 is to be remarked, that the very laws of our consti- 
 tution in which is founded our capacity for moral 
 improvement, is founded, at the same time, our 
 capacity for moral evil. Much therefore, will de- 
 pend upon Education, particular modes of life, and 
 the nature of our more constant occupations. 
 Herein obtains the difference between the man of 
 the world, or the man of business, and the man of 
 secluded habits of life. Although the latter be pos- 
 sessed of higher powers of mind, and of greater 
 purity and nobleness of principle, yet, from habitu- 
 al indulgence in the fatal propensity of genius, to 
 
'-accommodate the shows of things, to the desires 
 of the mind," from a kind oi routine of thought, soh- 
 tary but enthusiastic, he is hable to become the 
 victim of his own delusions. These delusions, at 
 the same time, untempered, or, at least, not modi- 
 fied by that general experience, or experience of 
 the world, ^\ hich forms the sad, though perhaps, 
 the solitary corrective of those habits of mental in- 
 dulgence, which prove so often fatal to the peace 
 and welfare of their possessor: whereas, the for- 
 mer becomes confirmed in his active principles, by 
 having his passive impressions continually influen- 
 ced by a moi"al experience. So entirely does our 
 moral improvement seem to depend upon our mo- 
 ral experience — the latter giving rise to the former, 
 and afterwards confirming it. Our "bane and an- 
 tidote," being thus placed before us, as it were, by 
 nature herself, the question suggests itself, does it 
 ilepend entirely upon ourselves whether we avail 
 us of these original, though somewhat enexplicable 
 provisions of nature ? The answer is perhaps ob- 
 vious — something does depend upon ourselves; but 
 more rests with education and our active princi- 
 ples. It has been objected to Rousseau's system 
 of Education, as unfolded in the Emelius, that it 
 applies rather to the species than to the individual. 
 It does not admit of those exceptions which na- 
 ture herself seems to have been studious in form- 
 ing, and which, iji the persons of such men as 
 Rousseau himself, and in an equally remarkable 
 degree, the Subject of this inquiry, set at defiance 
 alike the wisest provisions of human experience, 
 and the profoundest investigations of moral science. 
 Rousseau's system of education, however perfect 
 in theory it may be, admits not of being put into 
 
practice; and is perhaps one of the most visiona- 
 ry and gratuitous of the speculations of moral 
 economy. Human life admits not in its every 
 day, and practical forms, of the concentration of 
 those " traits of truth,'' which, according to Mr. 
 Campbell, is more practical than truth itself Un- 
 happily for man, his heart rather than his under- 
 standing, seems to require the aid of cultivation, 
 while, at the same time, the latter is generally 
 allowed to receive that degree and measure of care 
 and cultivation, which had been perhaps more 
 appropriately and happily bestowed upon the for- 
 mer. Mr. Stewart observes of Lock, in his View 
 of the Progress of Metaphysical Philosophy, that, 
 "in every thing connected with the culture of the 
 heart, he distrusted nature altogether; placing his 
 sole reliance in the effect of a systematical and 
 vigilant discipline." Mr. Stewart dissents from 
 Lock upon this point, and takes occasion to re- 
 mark that^the great object of education is " not to 
 thwart and disturb, but to study the aim and fa- 
 cilitate the accomplishment of the beneficial ar- 
 rangements of nature." But surely this remark 
 does not tend to affect the soundness of the doc- 
 trine broached by Lock. The heart is naturally 
 prone to evil, and requires therefore, the aid of 
 this "systematical and vigilant discipline." We 
 are inclined to believe that many a well disposed 
 mind has become depraved from the want of it; and 
 that many an ill-disposed one has been reclaimed 
 and corrected by it. There is a taint of original 
 sin in our nature ; " For Virtue cannot so inoculate 
 our old stock, but we shall relish of it ; and it 
 requires early and vigilant attention on the part 
 of those who have the care of our education* 
 
.9 
 
 to repress and to repel the first workings of that 
 principle of Evili which, however, the idea may be 
 reprobated as either false or irreverent, is still la- 
 tent in the mind, and forever tending to counter- 
 act the benevolent suggestions of education, and 
 afterwards of our moral experience. The mind 
 left to itself, will frequently, by virtue of its strong 
 divinity, thrive and expand even under the pres- 
 sure of adverse circumstances; but once neglect 
 the heart, and it sinks to its natural level — yields to 
 its downward tendency, and travels the road to 
 ruin with a facility the most disgusting, and a cele- 
 rity the most incomputable. The Evangelist has 
 accordingly with great beauty and justness of illus- 
 tration, likened the nature of man to that of "the 
 wild Ass's colt," which must be broke before it can 
 be tamed, and even then retains a portion of its 
 original propensity to evil. But while this syste- 
 matical and vigilant discjphne, which Lock recom- 
 mends, seems to be essential in the culture of the 
 moral powers, the misfortune is, that they will not 
 always admit of it : because, as we shall have oc- 
 casion more fully to remark, at that very period of 
 life at Avhich education should properly commence, 
 the heart will generally be found, more particu- 
 larly with minds of an high order and a certain 
 constitutional temperament, to take upon itself the 
 culture and direction of its powers. The poetical 
 temperament is, beyond all others, liable to those 
 inward influences, those original suggestions of its 
 own exclusive nature, which, while it should be 
 the business of education to correct them, are be- 
 yond its power to controul — acquiring, as they do, 
 their full force precisely at that period at which 
 education should come in to oppose, by anticipa- 
 
10 
 
 ting, as it were, their growth and operation. With 
 minds of a different cast and tendency irom the 
 poetical, the case is widely otherwise. And this 
 because with such minds, (minds whose powers 
 do not lie within the department of the Fine Arts) 
 Education is the mere handmaid to nature her- 
 self; subservient to her views and promoting her 
 designs. Accordingly, when Locke attributes to 
 education the existence of the moral qualities he 
 possessed, we understand and coincide with him ; 
 because the constitution of his mind was such as 
 to render it open to the influences of education ; 
 its tendency was in an eminent degree practical. 
 To all such minds, education is perhaps of incal- 
 culable benefit. The habitual attentions of such 
 minds is directed to subjects calculated to reflect 
 back upon them the most wholesome influence. 
 And herein obtains the distinction between all such 
 minds, and others of less practical tendency — in 
 selecting for the exercise of their attention, classes 
 of objects essentially different in themselves. This 
 selection, at the same time, not being a casual and 
 voluntary direction of the powers of the mind and 
 a capricious choice of subjects for the exercise of 
 its attention, but the result of its constitutional 
 temperament and tendency ; and over this tem- 
 perament and this tendency, education appears to 
 us to exercise a very limited, or rather, a very 
 questionable influence. No man's education was, 
 perhaps, more faulty than that of Gibbon ; but we 
 are not disposed, at the same time, to attribute to 
 this circumstance, as many have done, the exis« 
 tence of that spirit of infidelity which has diffused 
 a moral gloom around the splendours of his genius. 
 We doubt whether the most rigid and unremitting 
 
.11 
 
 system of education would have exercised any 
 very decided influence upon the character of his 
 gorgeous and romantic mind. This powerful and 
 original mind — constitutionally prone to excess, 
 coming in contact with the gloomy but sublime 
 fables of Antiquity, and, more particularly, the 
 early and fascinating history of that splendid and 
 almost fabulous People, the decline and fall of 
 whose once boundless empire, he has recorded 
 and commemorated with a spirit and a zeal, a fer- 
 vour and an eloquence, not unworthy of the in- 
 spiring theme — this early initiation into the sub- 
 lime mysteries and moralities of ancient times — its 
 Mythology, its Poetry and its Heroism — over all of 
 which there reigned a pure and beautiful delusion, 
 and into all of which there was infused the spirit al- 
 mostofanotherand an elder world than man's — thus 
 educated, as it were, in the midst of all that was 
 sublime in morals and in mind, grand and impos- 
 ing, yet pure, primeval and visionary, even to ro- 
 mance, in character — dwelling continually in the 
 midst of solemn forms, gorgeous emblems, and con- 
 secrated relics of things ineffable to the uninitiat- 
 ed, and for that reason, awful and impressive — the 
 mind of Gibbon became oe'rinformed by the subli- 
 mities in which it was continually inveloped, and 
 which, from administring to its high moral and in- 
 tellectual cravings, with ai* 
 
 " Even handed justice, 
 
 Commended th' ingredients of his poisoned chalice, 
 To his own lips." 
 
 And thus it would appear that, while education is 
 unable to administer to minds of a certain consti- 
 tutional temperament, such minds, at the same time^ 
 
12- 
 
 in the earliest stages of their developemeiit, by a 
 congenial sympathy, a sort of principle of attrac- 
 tion, are found to yearn after and to embrace, with 
 a fervour peculiar to genius, precisely those studies 
 which are in an eminent degree calculated to con- 
 firm this temperament. And thus it is that those 
 minds which "are of imagination all compact," are 
 perhaps the least susceptible of that moral culture 
 to which minds of an inferior order are exclu- 
 sively indebted, perhaps, for every virtue which 
 they may possess. And thus it is, by further con- 
 sequence, that such minds are impelled and driven 
 forAvard, as clouds obey the wind, in their meteor 
 and erratic courses, by this powerful impulse 
 which nature herself seems to have given, and 
 which only acquires additional force by the aid of 
 those circumstances to which the mind is subject- 
 ed in obeying the very direction it has thus re- 
 ceived. It is a little singular that Mr. Stewart 
 should undertake to reject as false and mistaken, 
 the very impartial estimate which Locke seems to 
 have formed of his own character. He attributed 
 to the education he had received, the existence of 
 those moral qualities which, however, according 
 to Mr. Stewart, " he owed to the regulating influ- 
 ence of his own reason, in fostering his natural dis- 
 positions." The writings of Locke could have 
 afforded to Mr. Stewai-t no possible insight into 
 what may have been his "natural dispositions;" and 
 in no other way, we presume, could he have be- 
 come acquainted with them. When Locke assures 
 us, therefore, that he owed the correction of his na- 
 tural dispositions to the influence of education, we 
 are surely bound to believe him, and to reject Mr. 
 Stewart's opinion to the contrary. Mr. Stewart's 
 
13 
 
 remark, that nature should be left to " the accom- 
 plishment of her own beneficial arrangements," 
 does not tend, we repeat, to impugn the force of 
 Locke's position that, in the culture of the heart 
 education is alone to be relied upon. When Mr. 
 Stewart tells us further, that " the great object of 
 education is not to thwart, but to study the aim 
 and facilitate the accomplishment of the arrange- 
 ments of nature," he only repeats the observation 
 of Rousseau; Avhich, however plausible it may ap- 
 pear, is without any foundation in reason. Nor 
 will this subject admit of the common illustrations 
 which have been brought to bear upon it. The 
 growth of the child may be impeded by certain 
 devices employed in early liiis in order to preserve 
 the proportions of the body, and by bending the 
 twig too far, you may retard the growth and des- 
 troy the symmetry of the tree. But no illustra- 
 tions derived from matter can throw any light upon 
 mind; and the education of moral and intelligent 
 beings is not to be compared to the culture of trees. 
 All men, at a certain time of life, undergo the same, 
 or very nearly the same education, as relates both 
 to morals and to mind. It is only at this age that 
 education can be said " to study the aim and fa- 
 cilitate the accomplishment of the beneficial ar- 
 rangements of nature." And yet, how does edu- 
 cation effect this end.^^ or, can it be said to effect 
 it at all? How is the nature and disposition of 
 the child to be discovered before this age ^ And 
 after it, the disposition, whatever it may be, has 
 become so confirmed by nature herself, that it may 
 be said to react. — it assumes the reign, and directs 
 instead of being directed by education. The 
 slightest observation, we apprehend, will have fur- 
 
14 
 
 nished us ivith this fact. It is with the moral as 
 with the intellectual powers, after having received 
 a certain degree of culture, they are generally 
 found to develope themselves. The direction 
 which the mind is destined to take through life, 
 usually discloses itself at an early period ; and if 
 the bias be a strong one, as in most gifted minds it 
 is, so far from being able to eradicate, as many have 
 supposed it capable of doing, education has scarce- 
 ly sufficient power even to modify it.(c^) Of what 
 use then, it may be asked, is the culture of the mo- 
 ral powers ? To this we m ould answer that, where 
 the bias we have been speaking of, happens to be 
 of a cheerful and pratical nature, the effect of a 
 proper education may be to strengthen and con- 
 firm it; and where it is of an opposite description, 
 at least, perhaps, to temper and to modify it. But 
 there are kinds and degrees of education very dif- 
 ferent in themselves, and producing, perhaps, equal- 
 ly opposite effects. Of these, the education by ex- 
 ample appears to us to be the most practical in its 
 tendency, and the most replete with moral dignity. 
 But of this practical wisdom, supposing the exam- 
 ple set to be at once characterised by virtue and 
 intelligence, the mind cannot avail itself until its 
 powers begin to unfold themselves. Until the mo- 
 ral sense, which discriminates between the nicest 
 shades of virtue and vice, right and wrong, has par- 
 tially unfolded itself, and has commenced the first 
 of that series of observations upon human life and 
 character, which in turn afford to this sense those 
 facts and that experience Avhich are essential to the 
 success of its future investigations and inductions. 
 It would seem to follow from this that, afler the 
 mind has once begun to unfold its powers, the mo- 
 
15 
 
 ral character educates itself, from those patterns 
 of Truth and Virtue set before it, silently inculcat- 
 ing what mere precept never could instil. From 
 being continually in the presence of Virtue, sur- 
 rounded by its emblems and inspirations, Truth 
 and Innocence, it seems to result almost as necessa- 
 rily that the character should imbibe, if not the 
 spirit, at least the love of that which is Pure, Ho- 
 nourable and Humane, as that the copy should 
 bear a resemblance to the thing copied. The mo- 
 ral character, we repeat, educates itself after the 
 mind begins to unfold its powers. Before that 
 period, what is commonly called education is per- 
 haps the merest mummery and mockery in the 
 w orld. Not but that there are a thousand things 
 whose influence upon the character of the man, 
 may be traced down to their first effect upon the 
 child : we would be understood expressly to speak 
 of the formal inculcation of moral principles at 
 a very early period of life. This may be of service 
 to coarse and common minds, incapable of instruct- 
 ing themselves, and requiring to be drilled into every 
 thing. But to a mind born to think for itself, it 
 merely affords subtleties for ingenuity to develope, 
 and themes f(jr the profoundest investigations of 
 philosophy. It will be remembered that we are 
 speaking of the effect of moral culture upon the 
 poetical mind. The effect of Education upon its 
 intellectual powers we apprehend to be the same, 
 or very nearly so. We are almost tempted to 
 think, that that perversion of the moral principle 
 which dictated Swift's extraordinary conduct to 
 Stella and Vanessa, was in all probability the re- 
 sult of the same cause which may be said, however 
 remotely, to have occasioned his failure in obtain- 
 
16 
 
 ing a deajree at Trinity College. And this cause will 
 be found, we apprehend, to have lain in the weak- 
 ness of those active principles which, if they be 
 the source of practical virtue, suggest to the un- 
 derstanding at the same time, the propriety as 
 w^ll as the prudence of exerting its energies in 
 , cases in which the usual incentive to 'action, at 
 least with the particular mind we are considering, 
 may be wanting — namely, that peculiar interest 
 which such a mind usually imparts to its subject, 
 and which in turn reflects a beauty and a grace 
 upon this subject. We beg leave to repeat here 
 a few remarks which we ventured to offer a short 
 time ago upon the subject of the Active Principles 
 of our nature. In what appears to us to have 
 been the extreme weakness of these principles, in 
 the person of the extraordinary Individual whose 
 moral character we propose more particularly to 
 investigate, resulted many of those errors and mis- 
 fortunes which threw a gloom over his eventful 
 life, and constituted one of the many sources of 
 his grief For the mind ot" Lord Byron was keenly 
 alive to a perception of its ow n frailties, over which 
 his great and proud spirit wept in secret, with a 
 deep and unutterable feeling. T^ese remarks 
 moreover, are offered as perhaps affording a solu- 
 tion of the difficulty we set out w ith proposing to 
 investigate, namely, that of supposing vicious ha- 
 bits to be blended in one and the same mind, with 
 the most vivid and the purest impressions of virtue. 
 The premises assumed by Bisliop Butler in his 
 Analogy of Religion, in treating of the moral-ap- 
 proving and disapproving faculty, will be admitted, 
 we apprehend, to be at once philosophical and 
 just. From these premises therefore, we will 
 
17 
 
 proceed to make the obvious inductions, which are 
 in favour of the moral character of Lord Byron. 
 " Our perception of vice and virtue," says Butler, 
 " arises from a comparison of the actions with the 
 nature and capacities of the agent" — in other 
 words, it depends almost entirely " upon the nature 
 and capacities of the agent," whether the action be 
 virtuous or otherwise.(/") In one man the same 
 action would be positively vicious, which in ano- 
 ther would be comparatively innocent, or at least, 
 less vicious. We will not suppose an extreme case 
 in order to evince this ; because that would be to 
 prove only what every one knows. We will not, 
 for instance, take the case of a Natural or a Luna- 
 tic who may have committed a murder, and say 
 that because it was not his intention to murder, he 
 is less criminal than another man who is guilty of 
 the same crime, with the deliberate intention to 
 kill. But we will take the case of a man whose 
 passive impressions have been confirmed previous 
 to the developement of his active principles ; whose 
 morals have been depraved ere his understanding 
 had unfolded itself; with whom the moral-appro- 
 ving and disapproving faculty was no guide, be- 
 cause the Agent had become confirmed in those 
 actions which constitute the object of this faculty, 
 ere the faculty itself had been developed. — Of a 
 man who, when he came to know himself, found 
 that he had contracted vicious habits without 
 having known what vice was. — Of one with whom 
 vice and virtue had been mere terms of relation, tp 
 which no definite ideas were attached. In short, 
 we will take the case of a man like Lord Byron, 
 and when we come to compare " the actions 
 with the nature and capacities of the agent," 
 
 3 
 
18 
 
 the moral perception which must result from 
 such comparison, appears to us to be decidedly 
 in favour of his character. (^) The question 
 has been asked, if Virtue be a primary object of 
 natural desire, how comes it that as such it is sel- 
 dom sought, at least, in the way best calculated to 
 obtain it ? or when sought obtained ? Whereas 
 Vice, its contrary, which cannot be considered an 
 object of natural desire, is yet apparantly often 
 pursued, and as often obtained ? To this it may 
 be replied, that Virtue, as an object of natural 
 desire, is a passive impression, and, unhappily for 
 human nature, like all passive impressions, the 
 stronger it is allowed to become, the weaker grows 
 that habit or moral ability by which alone Virtue 
 is to be attained — the Active Principle or habit of 
 practical exertion. The man whose delicacy of 
 sentiment is most perfect, and whose passive im- 
 pressions consequently are in the least degree 
 refined, is less apt to acquire that habit of ex- 
 ertion which seems alone to be regarded as 
 constituting Virtue, than another man of less con- 
 stitutional refinement. The latter, consequently, 
 if not early initiated into practical habits, will be 
 more liable to error and misconduct than the for- 
 mer ; for, as Adam Smith remarks, " this disposi- 
 tion, (delicacy of sentiment) though it may be 
 attended with many imperfections, is incompatible 
 with any thing grossly criminal." This disposi- 
 tion, he proceeds to observe, " is the happiest 
 foundation on which the superstructure of perfect 
 Virtue can be built." But, unhappily, this consti- 
 tutional temperament is often so intense as to 
 become dangerous ,• and has not unfrequently 
 proved fatal to its possessor. The man of dull 
 
 i 
 
 I 
 
19 
 
 moral perceptions, and of coarse moral constitu- 
 tion, on the contrary, is most easily susceptible oi" 
 those practical habits which, in the end, undoubt- 
 edly lead to Virtue — that is, to virtuous exertion. 
 Before a man thus constiuted, has ever " gone 
 over the theory of Virtue in his mind," before his 
 passive impressions have acquired strength, his 
 active principles or habits of practical exertion, 
 have been confirmed. (/i) The passive impressions 
 of such a person, are perhaps always weak, if not 
 coarse and common ; they are not likely, there- 
 fore, to acquire any influence, and can conse- 
 quently form no obstacle to the attainment of those 
 active habits which are perhaps the stronger for 
 the want of this original bias of the mind. This 
 bias invariably disposes the mind to theoretical or 
 speculative virtue, and can be overcome only by 
 an early initiation into habits of a practical ten- 
 dency. But, even then, it occasionally gets the 
 better of those habits, and not unfequently mate- 
 rially affects the happiness of the person who may 
 yet appear to be absorbed in the traffic of the 
 world. " Going over the theory of Virtue in the 
 mind," says Bishop Butler, " is so far from im- 
 plying a habit of it in him who thus imploys him- 
 self, that it may harden the mind in a contrary 
 course, and render it gradually more insensible, 
 that is, form a habit of insensibility to all moral 
 considerations."(^) Experience and observation 
 verify the truth of this remark. Passive habits, 
 like all others, become the stronger from indul- 
 gence ; and thus it is that " going over the theory 
 of virtue in the mind," tends to produce a habit of 
 passive exertion, if we may be allowed the ex- 
 pression, which opposes a fatal barrier to the for- 
 
20 
 
 mation of active principles. The man whose 
 active principles have been confirmed by a long 
 and rigid course of practical exertion, is generally 
 lost to that delicate perception of moral beauty 
 which lights up and pervades the being of the man 
 who has been in the habit of contemplating Virtue 
 in her abstract or ideal form. The latter may be 
 said to " accommodate the shows of things to the 
 desires of the mind ;" whereas the former brings 
 down those desires to the realities of things. There 
 is, moreover, an intense though melancholy grati- 
 fication in the indulgence of the former, while, at 
 the same time, it flatters perhaps the canity of our 
 human nature. It is thereby one of those se- 
 ductive habits which require, in order to be over- 
 come, or at least, subdued in part, a degree of 
 resolution which very few are found to possess — 
 and least of all the man who indulges in the habit. 
 The man who is in the practical habit of relieving 
 distress, is less affected by the sight of it than the 
 man who has been in the habit merely of going 
 over the theory of Benevolence in his mind. The 
 former has acquired an aptness and dexterity in 
 affording relief, to which the latter is a stranger, 
 and yet he may be deficient in that deep and gen- 
 uine sensibility which affects the man of passive 
 habits even when the object of that sensibility is 
 not immediately present to him. The former, not- 
 withstanding, appears to the generality of persons 
 to be possessed of those qualities in the very absence 
 of which consists his virtue. But the mere ab- 
 sence of active principles, where passive impres- 
 sions are perfect, cannot be charged upon a man 
 as vicious — although as we have said before, there 
 can be but little positive virtue were these are 
 
21 
 
 wanting. The only charge is, that, with these vir- 
 tuous impressions, vicious habits are not unfre- 
 quently combined. Vice, not being an object of 
 natural desire, the mind cannot be supposed to 
 form to itself a theory of it, and of " going over 
 that theory" for its own sake, so as to form a 
 passive habit of vicious indulgence. Were this 
 the case, the mind would be satisfied with the 
 mere theory ; and virtuous habits would perhaps 
 necessarily result. For the more we contemplate 
 in theory the deformity of Vice, the more struck 
 we should be with the beauty of the contrast 
 which Virtue affords to it — Mr. Pope's opinion to 
 the contrary notwithstanding.(^) The man of virtu- 
 ous passive impressions, we say, is often charged 
 with being guilty of actions, perhaps a series of 
 actions, that are esteemed vicious in the eyes of 
 the world. A person of this description however, 
 it should be remembered, is deprived of that 
 moral experience (as is implied in the notion of 
 mere passive impressions) which affords to Rea- 
 son the matter whence that faculty makes its in- 
 ductions, which are no other than those general 
 rules and maxims in Morals, which serve to guide 
 and direct our conduct in cases in which the ni- 
 cest casuistry would fail perhaps to furnish us with 
 moral hght. These general rules, whether of na- 
 ture, or of positive law, or whether of morals, are 
 those inductions which Reason makes from Expe- 
 rience. Experience offers to the consideration of 
 Reason, that various and compounded knowledge 
 which it has gathered from its intercourse with 
 the world. And Reason, in its turn, proceeds to 
 adjust, as it were, the relative value and compar- 
 tive importance of this knowledge so obtained—- 
 
22 
 
 and accordingly draws its inferences, and makes 
 its inductions. Which process, when compleated, 
 presents us with a set of Rules that frequently 
 possess the precision and are susceptible of the 
 demonstrative evidence of mathematical proposi- 
 tions — unalloyed at the same time, by any admix- 
 ture of that extraneous matter which enters into 
 the composition of strict positive law. These gen- 
 eral rules presuppose the antecedent knowledge 
 of many particular cases of human conduct ; they 
 never therefore, suggest themselves to the mind 
 whose passive impressions imply habits ofcom- 
 parative seclusion and retirement from the busy 
 scenes of active life. A mind under the influ- 
 ence of these habits, has, consequently, little or 
 no moral experience ; and is therefore, by further 
 consequence, unprovided with any practical 
 guides to virtuous conduct. Active principles im- 
 ply nothing more than principles put into action, 
 or practical conduct of any kind. These princi- 
 ples, further, may be said only to illustrate the 
 force of habit, and not the sense of duty. It is of 
 little moment whether these principles be employ- 
 ed in efTecting positive good to others, or in pre- 
 serving such a tenor of conduct as merely results 
 in the absence of ill to ourselves. But the man 
 whose moral constitution is made up of mere pas- 
 sive impressions, in whom the elements of good 
 remain unwrought into any system of practical con- 
 duct, is very apt, if occasionally forced into colli- 
 sion with the rough habits of the world, to perceive 
 the want of those practical principles which he is 
 made to feel lie at the bottom and form the basis 
 of the conduct of those around him. Such a 
 person, therefore, is easily misunderstood — he him- 
 
23 
 
 self, perhaps, feels that his intentions at least are 
 misconstrued — he conceives immediate disgust, 
 and proceeds to wreak, as it were, this feeling of of- 
 fended Virtue in an opposite course of conduct from 
 the one he at first attempted to pursue, but which 
 he finds, as he thinks, is impracticable — inasmuch 
 as it has given offence, and has been misinter- 
 preted. It is impossible to calculate the measure 
 of ill which almost necessarily results from this 
 forced reaction of feelings that are in themselves vir- 
 tuous and intensely vivid — but which have been re- 
 pulsed, sometimes with coldness but oftener with 
 indignity, in their first timid yet open and gene- 
 rous advances to the world. It is certainly a 
 melancholy mode of retaliating the wrongs we may 
 have received from others, by rushing upon the 
 commission of wrong to ourselves ; and of redress- 
 ing the feelings of our injured virtue, by subject- 
 ing those feelings to situations in which their sus- 
 ceptibility can expect only to receive further 
 injury. There is no feeling of our nature so liable 
 to be wounded as that of conscious virtue. Of- 
 fended Pride may be conciliated — offended Vanity 
 may be cajoled — even offended Honour may be 
 appeased — but offended Virtue admits of no atone- 
 ment. If wounded, it pines like the melancholy 
 Eagle, and so dies — no sound escapes— a look of 
 ineffable contempt is all that tells the wretch who 
 gave the blow, how insignificant he is. This Vir- 
 tue, however, is by no means so secure and inde- 
 pendent of fortune, and of the caprice and igno- 
 rance of those we live with, as many have sup- 
 posed it to be. It is, undoubtedly, its own and 
 sole reward in the end, but still it is dependent for 
 a temporary satisfaction upon the reception it may 
 
24 
 
 meet with from the world. But, unhappily for 
 that satisfaction, this reception is generally such 
 as to displease and disappoint, to rebuke and to 
 rebuff, — melancholy and chagrin, united at first 
 with something of resentment, is the almost neces- 
 sary consequence. And it is as impossible to an- 
 swer for the conduct of the man whose mind is 
 under the combined influence of these powerful 
 and subduing emotions, as it is "impossible to 
 answer for the conduct of the man who is without 
 a home.'''' This seems to be the only solution of the 
 difficulty of supposing a naturally virtuous mind re- 
 taining to the last, the impressions and the forms, the 
 emblems and the inspirations of virtue, yet yielding 
 with a facile flexibility to the seductive allure- 
 ments and temptations of vice. There is, perhaps, 
 another circumstance to be considered in cases of 
 this sort, because it tends in a considerable degree 
 to account for, and, at the same time, to excuse, or 
 at least to palliate the inconsistency we have been 
 supposing. It is admitted, we believe, that the 
 capacity for good and evil, for happiness and mi- 
 sery, is greater and more powerful in a mind of 
 acute sensibility, than in one of a contrary temper- 
 ament. The temperament of that mind whose 
 powers are in the degree which constitutes genius, 
 is one morbidly predisposed to intense emotion. 
 Such a mind is possessed of an appetite for pro- 
 found feeling, a yearning after those situations of 
 the heart which involve directly and decisively its 
 nearest and its dearest interests ; and which pre- 
 sent the alternatives of life and death, as it were, 
 to its immediate option. The moral cravings of a 
 mind of this cast must be satisfied ; it feeds no 
 doubt on bitter fruits, but these in time become 
 
25 
 
 to be its nutriment. And, like the Pontic King 
 whose daily food consisted of poisonous herbs, a 
 mind thus constituted will not only convert the 
 most wholesome food into actual poison, but will 
 in turn subsist upon it. This morbid temperament 
 of mind, we say, is not easily administered to ; 
 while, at the same time, it is forever reaching after 
 extremes in feeling and situation. And, like a 
 moral Procrustes, it proceeds always to adjust 
 these extremes by a forced action, whereby they 
 are accommodated to its desires and suited to its 
 dimensions. These extremes in feeling and situa- 
 tion arc not to be found in ordinary life ; least of 
 all are they objects of desire to a mind that has 
 been sobered down by habits of practical exer- 
 tion. The man of morbid temperament therefore, 
 must either feign or create them for himself. He 
 does in fact both the one and the other — as is im- 
 plied, first, in the force of his passive impressions, 
 and next, in the rejection as it were, of those im- 
 pressions when they were attempted to be sub- 
 mitted in practice to the world. We say, he both 
 feigns and creates these fatal extremes — first, he 
 feigns them, when previous to the confirmation of 
 his passive impressions these extremes may be 
 said to figure in the imagination as mere fictions of 
 feeling, but fictions at the same time which, like 
 those of Imaginary History, " accommodate the 
 shows of things to the desires of the mind." — And 
 next, he creates them, when, after the formation 
 of his Active Principles, having made an effort, of 
 which he is seldom conscious, to put these princi- 
 ples into practice, but finding to his cost that their 
 tendency is not practical, he sets about to retahate 
 the injustice which he conceives himself to have 
 
 4 
 
26 
 
 sustained in the rejection of these principles by 
 the practical part of the world, the only portion of 
 it to which they can prove offensive. We repeat, he 
 creates these extremes when he sets about to re- 
 taliate the injustice he conceives himself to have 
 sustained, because this retaliation can be effected 
 only in one way — not in requiting Society for the 
 evil it has done him with good to that Society, but 
 with evil to himself This, as we have said before, 
 is no doubt a melancholy mode of retaliation ;(/) 
 and " sweet revenge grows bitter" in the end. 
 But still it is sweet, while obtaining, and even for 
 some time after it is obtained, to the person who 
 conceives himself injured and who theretbre seeks 
 and desires it. Thus is the man of morbid consti- 
 tution abandoned to the wing of fiery instincts 
 which hurry him into excesses that seem to com- 
 pensate by their intensity for the want of that more 
 rational thougli somewhat dull and uniform enjoy- 
 ment that would have resulted from the early and 
 steady exercise of the Active Principles of our 
 nature. Although in a case of this kind the party 
 who suffers most is undoubtedly the Individual, 
 yet, as we have said before. Society is also a suf- 
 ferer in its moral interests, and to a greater degree 
 perhaps than, is generally supposed. It may be 
 objected to this theory that it is too abstract; 
 perhaps it is, we know not however whether it be 
 wholly so. The chief admission we take for 
 granted — that the constitution of certain minds is 
 precisely such as we have been supposing. The 
 main argument which ensues from this admission 
 as to the effects resulting from such a constitution 
 of mind, may have been carried too far — this how- 
 ever remains to be shown. It maybe retorted upon 
 
27 
 
 us, if a man bring with him into Society fantastic 
 and far-fetched notions upon points of vital interest 
 to that Society, if he presume to set up a standard of 
 his own as the sok^ and ultimate criterion of right 
 and wrong and the infallible test of the moral 
 worth of those around him, is it either strange or 
 unjust that Society should reject such notions and 
 lalong with them the person himself whose conduct 
 is perhaps but a bad illustration of a worse theory ? 
 This however, would be to suppose what never 
 yet has happened nor can happen. No man we 
 apprehend, was ever guilty of the preposterous 
 error of believing himself capable of making a 
 convert of Society to his own individual notions of 
 any kind. On the contrary, what perhaps inspires 
 his disgust and gives him offence is the discovery 
 that Society is not only disposed and even pre- 
 pared to make a convert of him even to " the bitter 
 better," but that it is apt to resort to violent mea- 
 sures in the attempt and to redonble that violence 
 where the attempt ha« iailed. The language which 
 Society addresses to him is neither calculated to 
 convince his Reason nor to conciliate his Pride — 
 it is this — " your ways are bad — mend them or you 
 shall suffer for them." We endeavoured upon a 
 former occasion, to point out the difference be- 
 tween the imaginative and all otlier minds.(m) We 
 attempted to show that the tendencies of the poeti- 
 cal mind were less practical than those of any 
 other. The poetical mind is of a temperament 
 morbidly pre-disposed. A morbidly pre-disposed 
 mind is one generally addicted to those extremes 
 in feeling and situation which commonly result in 
 that moral emasculation which incapacitates the 
 individual for pursuing those practical ends the 
 
28 
 
 proper efforts at attaining which Society pre-sup- 
 poses in its very formation — and in the actual at- 
 tainment of which its well-being is involved. The 
 individual thus incapacitated for the practical 
 purposes of Society is scarcely recognized as one 
 of its members — he is in a great measure discon- 
 nected with the Social Contract — his interests .are, 
 of course not involved in the general interest — nor 
 are they the interests of those immediately around 
 him — he has therefore comparatively nothing at 
 stake. What life-guards of conduct can such an 
 individual be supposed to possess ? And it is in a 
 case of this kind and in all similar cases that the 
 strength of passive impressions is so destructive of 
 moral Virtue. Passive impressions thus confirmed 
 incapacitate the individual for the practical ends 
 of Society, while Society turns its back upon him 
 for not pursuing these ends. The moment he is 
 found holding himself aloof from Society, Society 
 conceives a doubt of his character — and " once to 
 be in doubt is once to be rpsolvpd, and on the 
 proof" — which Society is very ingenious in furnish- 
 ing "no more but this," — he is banished by sentence 
 of a moral ostracism. The man who has thus 
 become a sentimental outlaw, who has been thus 
 ejected beyond the pale of the moral virtues, is 
 " let down the wind to prey at fortune ;" and if he 
 becomes by consequence addicted to extremes and 
 excesses of conduct, is it at all to be wondered 
 at ?(ji) The application of these remarks to the 
 life and character of Lord Byron will be acknow- 
 ledged we apprehend upon mature reflection. 
 We trust too, that their tendency to point out and 
 to maintain that moral balance which may be said 
 to subsist between Society and its Members— be- 
 
29 
 
 tween the institutions of Society on the one hand, 
 and the moral failings and at the same time the 
 moral accountability of its Members on the other, 
 will also be admitted. We are induced to believe 
 therefore that, in the application of these remarks 
 to the character of Lord Byron, the ingenuous 
 Reader who may be imbued with a love of Genius 
 even to a forgiveness of its frailties, will have per- 
 ceived the extenuation which we trust they carry 
 with them of the moral failings of one who com- 
 bined in an extraordinary degree tliat genius with 
 those frailties. What remains to be said of the 
 Writings of Lord Byron, (and who can touch upon 
 his character, without at least a passing tribute to hir< 
 genius?) will have, we are aware, but little of novel- 
 ty to recommend it. For upwards of thirteen years 
 he has been continually before the public the most 
 distinguished and successful candidate for literary 
 fame. It would have been extraordinary there- 
 fore if his merits as a Poet had not been repeatedly 
 and thoroughly investigated. But while all have 
 united in admiring his Genius, few perhaps com- 
 paratively are familiar with its more interesting 
 and profounder traits or possessed of that thorough 
 acquaintance with his writings which must always 
 generate a deeper love for them and secure to 
 them, if we mistake not, the applause of other 
 minds in other times. From a few general remarks 
 upon the nature and the tendency of Poetical Com- 
 position, we will pass therefore to a brief consi- 
 deration of those extraordinary Productions which 
 have delighted and astonished the age, and which 
 compose a body of the most singular and original 
 Poetry perhaps in the language. The distinction 
 which obtains, according to the elder Schelgel. 
 
30 
 
 between the ancient and modern or classical and 
 romantic Drama, may be applied to modern Poetry 
 in general as distinguished from that of the an- 
 cients. The poetry of the latter was the poetry 
 of the Imagination, but the Moderns may be said to 
 have invented and to have appropriated to them- 
 selves the poetry of the Passions. With regard 
 to the nature and the tendency of poetry, the sub- 
 ject has been so repeatedly handled that we feel 
 great reluctance in entering upon it here. Lord 
 Bacon's celebrated remark in relation to poetry, 
 that it seeks to " accommodate the shows of things 
 to the desires of the mind," appears to us to explain 
 in a few words its nature and its tendency. The 
 Sage applied this observation, as is well known, to 
 " imaginary History" or Fiction. Under this general 
 head however are included a great many works 
 which are at the same time widely different in 
 themselves — and comparatively wanting in that 
 deeper interest and those more passionate and 
 universal associations which characterise the 
 higher productions of the poet. It is perhaps not 
 unworthy of remark that while Lord Bacon with 
 a depth of feeling and a spirit of philosophy rarely 
 combined, has afforded to the mind in a few words 
 perhaps the deepest insight it can acquire into the 
 true nature and tendency of poetry, he should at 
 the same time have been so far misled by general 
 terms and the ideas commonly annexed to them 
 as to have comfounded it with " imaginary Histo- 
 ry" or Fiction. Were we to overlook fact and 
 to regard the history of Robinson Crusoe as a fic- 
 tion, it is one of those fictions which to a certain 
 degree " accommodate the shows of things to the 
 desires of the mind" — and yet it is not poetry. 
 
31 
 
 The Arabian Nights are a series of beautiful fic- 
 tions, and as such, as mere "imaginary history 
 they accommodate the shows of things to the de- 
 sires of the mind" — while at the same time they do 
 not constitute a body of poetry — which notwith- 
 standing, is capable of effecting nothing beyond a 
 similar accommodation. The higher kinds of poet- 
 ry, whether Epic or Dramatic, cannot when phi- 
 losophically considered be termed fictions, al- 
 though their whole merit will be found to resolve 
 itself into this very accommodation which they af- 
 ford of "the shows of things to the desires of the 
 mind." This may appear contradictory, but we 
 should be sorry if it did not admit of an explana- 
 tion sufficiently satisfactory. The tragic Drama 
 and all poetry of the higher class, have their foun- 
 dation in those deeper passions of which human 
 nature is essentially compounded — which are the 
 immediate and inexhaustible source of all its hopes 
 and affections, in short of its happiness and mise- 
 ry. The associations which belong to these pas- 
 sions are universal, and, though slightly modified 
 in a few instances, are upon the whole every where 
 the same. If these passions be admitted to enter 
 into the composition of all poetry properly con- 
 sidered, and in fact to constitute the basis of all 
 the more serious creations of the Muse, the distinc- 
 tion between poetry and mere imaginary history 
 and the reason why the one should atchieve and 
 affect more and rank infinitely higher than the 
 other, will appear we think sufficiently obvious. 
 They both "accommodate the shows of things to 
 the desires of the mind," but this accommodation is 
 widely different in the one case from what it is in 
 the otlier. In the first place, mere fiction or im- 
 
32 
 
 aginary history addresses itself to the fancy and 
 to the fancy alone. ^^ hereas poetry, such as we 
 have been considering it, appeals to a deeper and 
 more universal source of emotion — the heart, 
 which it has been well observed "judges more 
 nicely than the imagination." There are certain- 
 ly many poems which address themselves rather 
 to the tancy than the feelings and some that ap- 
 peal exclusively to the fancy, but they are for that 
 very reason the less interesting and we cannot but 
 think inferior to those works which either blend 
 the creations of the fancy with the emotions of pas- 
 sion, or which turn upon some event that in con- 
 nection with human character attaches and rivits 
 human sympathy. Hamlet and Othello we appre- 
 hend to be greater efforts of genius than the Or- 
 lando or the Fairy Queen ; and in point of human 
 interest no one will deny that they are infinitely 
 superiour. The merit of the latter poems, as works 
 of imagination replete with the beauties of fancy 
 and the energies of thought, remains undeminish- 
 ed at the same time. The cold abstractions of 
 Lycidas and Comus fatigue and deaden on the 
 attention. There is a brilliant but frigid vein of 
 imagination pervading these poems which reminds 
 us of those beautiful masses of Frostwork which 
 attract the eye while they repel the approach. We 
 do not know that wp could select a more striking 
 instance in order to prove that the works which 
 most truly and forcibly "accommodate the shows of 
 things to the desires of the mind" are not those the 
 most replete with the " airy nothings" of the im- 
 agination, than the Masque of Comus. Dr. Johnson 
 tells us that it was founded upon some events 
 wliich actually occurred in the family of the Earl 
 
33 
 
 Bridge water, with whom Milton was personally 
 acquainted. And what was the nature of these 
 events? Precisely such as a Young Gentleman of 
 spirit would esteem most fortunate as affording 
 him an opportunity for the display of his gallantry. 
 If there be any accommodation, such as Bacon 
 speaks of, to be met with in this poem, it is but 
 limited, and at best, of an inferiour kind. And 
 herein it is, that the distinction obtains between 
 poetry properly considered, and mere fiction or 
 imaginary history — that although, as we have just 
 remarked, they both aim at " accommodating the 
 shows of tilings to the desire of the mind," yet that 
 there is so wide a difference in the degree and 
 manner in which this accommodation is afforded 
 in the one from what it is in the other, that to com- 
 pare poetry with fiction or imaginary history, un- 
 derstanding these terms as we have endeavoured 
 to explain them, would be to compare two things 
 almost totally dissimilar. The Geometer partici- 
 pates with the Poet in that quality which is com- 
 monly regarded as peculiarly characteristic of the 
 the latter. Imagination — but no one at the same 
 time, we apprehend, would think of comparing 
 the two minds on that account. It is in the force 
 of this "accommodation of the shows of things to the 
 desires of the mind," that the merit of all poetry 
 consists, in a greater or lesser degree, according 
 to circumstances. We cannot expect this accom- 
 modation in all its fullness, in a poem like the 
 Paradise Lost, or in any poem that is not replete 
 with human agency. Even in such poems howev- 
 er, this accommodation is effected to a certain de- 
 gree. That it should not be so complete as it is 
 in the Drama, is in no way surprising when we 
 
 5 
 
34 
 
 come to reflect that its fullness and perfection de- 
 pend upon the agency of passions and affections, 
 which are almost wholy excluded from such po- 
 ems. The very little of human agency employed 
 in the Paradise Lost, is incapable of affording this 
 accommodation beyond a very slight degree, from 
 the circumstance of this agency, inconsiderable as 
 it is, being of the most simple and uninteresting 
 kind. What interest can the mind possibly take 
 in two such amiable and inoffensive mortals as 
 Adam and Eve ? Or at least, is there any portion 
 of that passionate and dramatic interest infused 
 into the mind by the contemptible uxoriousness of 
 the one, or the equally contemptible vanity of the 
 other, which invests the character and fortunes 
 of those "Beings of the mind," who live and are 
 destined to live forever in the cherishing love and 
 devotion of the heart ? We repeat, that the " ac- 
 commodation of the shows of things to the desires 
 of the mind," can never be as full and perfect as 
 when it is afforded through the medium of human 
 passions and affections giving rise to, and after- 
 wards confirming human character.(o) If this be ad- 
 mitted as incontrovertible, it will not be difficult to 
 account for the very extraordinary impression which 
 the- poetry of Lord Byron is known to have pro- 
 duced upon the public mind. Many critics have 
 been disposed to attribute a portion of that effect 
 to the universal sympathy which seems to have 
 been consecrated to his melancholy fortunes. 
 That there should have been a degree of personal 
 interest attaching to all and every thing the most 
 remotely connected with the history and charac- 
 ter of so impassioned, so elevated, and so eloquent 
 a Being, was not perhaps to be wondered at ; nor 
 
35 
 
 was it by any means discreditable either to the 
 heads or hearts of those who entertained the feel- 
 ing divested of the levity of the weak, and the cal- 
 culating curiosity of the malignant. Butthat the par- 
 tial decline of this feeling (for we cannot think that 
 it is destined wholy to pass away, as long as the heart 
 retains the sympathies of its better nature) with the 
 death of the extraordinary Individual in whom it was 
 centred, will be in the slightest degree calculated, 
 as it has been contended, to lessen the popularity 
 of his works, or to weaken the force of that more 
 mysterious attraction which weds them to the 
 heart, is what we are by no means prepared to ad- 
 mit. On the contrary, if there be a mournful love 
 which bends us to the dead, if there be a feeling 
 of deep and eternal regret connected with the me- 
 mory of what they were, and were perhaps to us — 
 and if there live within the heart a strong and bit- 
 ter sense of indignation at the wrongs they may have 
 suffered — and a silent sleepless sorrow which em- 
 balms in its tears the recollection of their misfor- 
 tunes — and if there survive those whom we loved, 
 the offspring whom they loved, in whose pale and 
 bereaved countenances we trace the living fea- 
 tures of those who have ceased to live — and if we 
 are forever listening from their lips the tale of all 
 they thought and felt, and loved and suffered — 
 their days and nights of anguish — the faithless 
 hope — the blighted love — the pride bowed and 
 wounded—the calumny which hoarded its venom 
 like the Adder to poison truth and wither happi- 
 ness — in short, the utter distitution of feelings with- 
 out a hope to soothe or an object to confide in — if 
 these be the ties which bound us to the living, and 
 such the interest which their hves inspired, we can- 
 
36 
 
 not but think that both these ties and this interest, 
 po far from loosing, are hkely to acquire addition- 
 al force when death has torn the object from our 
 hearts, and the grave has closed forever between 
 Eternity and Time. Such are the feelings inspir- 
 ed by the writings of Lord Byron, and such are 
 the feelings, we apprehend, w hich they are des- 
 tined to inspire in the minds of the posterity of a 
 thousand centuries. Who can believe for a mo- 
 ment, that time or circumstance will ever have 
 any effect in lessening the surpassing splendours 
 of Childe Harold ? We know not whether there 
 be any poetry in any language, which so wonder- 
 fully combines the Sublime w itli the Beautiful — the 
 Awful and the Grand w ith the Tender and Pathe- 
 tic, as that w hich burns and breathes in^very page 
 of that splendid production — without a parallel in 
 modern Poetry. For where shall we look for a 
 similar union of the terrible graces of poetry with 
 its softer and more conciliating features? Where 
 shall we lind the immortal Genius of classic Anti- 
 quity worshiped with such fervour of devotion, or 
 celebrated with such eloquence of language and 
 such energy of thought, as characterize the de- 
 scriptions of the Apollo, the Laocoon, and the Dy- 
 ing Gladiator.'* Where shall we find the form and 
 face of nature depicted with such " traits of truth," 
 as in the description of Evening on the shores of 
 Lake Leman in the III, and of Sunset on the banks 
 of the Brenta in the IV, Canto of the Pilgrimage ? 
 It is hardly possible to say that the one description 
 excells the other — but the former is so true to na- 
 ture, and to that deep and ineffable feeling which 
 the heart imbibes from being continually in her 
 presence, that we think we shall be pardoned for 
 
37 
 
 quoting it here, familiar as it we presume it must 
 be to most of our readers. Standing upon the 
 banks of the Lake after Sunset, the congenial 
 mind of the melancholy Childe is thus led to com- 
 mune with the Spirit of the place; 
 
 It is the hush of night, and all between 
 
 Thy margin and the mountain's dusk, yet clear, 
 Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen, 
 
 Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear 
 
 Precipitously steep ; and drawing near. 
 There breathes a livinfc fragrance from the shore, 
 
 Ofjlowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
 Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
 Or chirps the grasshopper one good nigh carol more. 
 
 He is an evening reveller, who makes 
 
 His life an infancy, andsyjgs his fill ; 
 At intervals, some bird from out the brakes, 
 
 Starts into voice a moment, then is still. 
 
 There seems a floating whisper on the hill, 
 But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 
 
 All silently their tears of love instil. 
 Weeping themselves away, till they infuse 
 Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues. 
 
 The above Stanzas are the overflowing of a mind 
 familiar beyond example with the delightful mys- 
 teries of solitude, and imbued with a deep and 
 ineflfable love of its endearing sights and sounds. 
 They afford a striking refutation of Lord Byron'tf 
 own remark in relation to descriptive poetry, that 
 " it is the lowest branch of the art." There are 
 four lines succeeding this exquisite description, 
 which are more beautifully illustrative of Mr. 
 Campbell's profound remark in relation to the ge- 
 nius of Shakespear, that "his mutability., like the 
 precauriousness of human lilie, often deepens the 
 
3» 
 
 impressions which he creates," than any thing we 
 know of in all poetry — unless it be that of the 
 great Bard himself to whom the remark original- 
 ly applied. The lines to which we allude, Ibrm 
 the commencement of the XCVIII. Stanza of the 
 same Canto (III.) 
 
 The morn is up again, the dewy morn, 
 With breath all incense, and with cheek all bloom, 
 Laughing the clouds away with playful scorn, 
 /^ And living as if earth contain'd no tomb ! 
 
 The idea in the last line is at once sublime and 
 /iafFecting. The thought at the same time is alto- 
 gether original, though it may hot appear so at 
 first. It has no analogy whatever to the common 
 place remark that thq, generality of men live as 
 though they forgot they were to die. It is a beau- 
 tiful and pathetic comment upon the want of sym- 
 pathy between the moral and the natural world — 
 or rather the total want of feeling which the latter 
 evinces in the fortunes of the former — and the cold 
 majestic indifference with which she looks down 
 upon all that either gladdens or afflicts the heart. 
 Man, by the inscrutable impulses of his being, 
 is led to sympathise with the viscissitudes of Na- 
 ture. He rejoices with the Spring, saddens with 
 the Autumn, and sorrows with the Winter of the 
 year. But Nature holds her course aloof from the 
 concerns of man, uninfluenced by his " petty griefs 
 and evils of a day" — and even at the moment 
 when his heart is bursting over its bereavements. 
 She comes forth 
 
 With breath all incense, and witl) cheeks all bloom. 
 And living as if earth contained no tomb ! 
 
39 
 
 But incomparably the finest perhaps of those sub- 
 lime descriptions of Nature and of Art with which 
 the Pilgrimage abounds, is that of the celebrated 
 Falls of the Vehno. It is perhaps the sublimest 
 description of a natural object, that ever kindled 
 into words. The concluding Stanza we have often 
 regarded as in a remarkable degree applicable to 
 the character of the whole Poem itself. It is more 
 finely and justly descriptive of those alternations 
 of gloom and of gladness, of hope and despair, and 
 of that struggle so conspicious throughout, and so 
 fearfully sustained between the darker suggestions 
 and the better feelings of a great and noble nature, 
 than the most laboured exposition of it could possi- 
 bly be. 
 
 Horrribly beautiful ! but on the verge, 
 From side to side, beneath the glittering morn, 
 
 An Iris sits, amidst the infernal surge. 
 Like Hope upon a death-bed, and, unworn 
 
 Its steady dyes, while all around is torn 
 By the distracted waters, bears serene 
 
 Its brilliant hues with all their beams unshorn ; 
 Resembling 'mid the torture of the scene, ^ 
 
 Love watching Madness with unalterable mien. 
 
 The impression made upon the mind, and the 
 image of grandeur and of power presented to it in I 
 this wonderful description, are likely however to \ 
 give place to other and more affecting feelings 
 forced upon us in certain succeeding Stanzas of 
 the same Canto. If there be any one thing in 
 this Canto, not finer, but more touching and more 
 terrible than another, and which is perhaps alone 
 sufficient to rank it infinitely beyond the others, it 
 is the awful and appalling Imprecation which an 
 
40 
 
 injured and indignant Mortal, standing in the Grove 
 of the Furies, and under the terrible inspirations 
 of the place, invokes upon the heads of those w ho 
 
 From mighty wrong's to petty perfidy, 
 
 had exhausted the vile ingenuity of their natures 
 in attempts at poisoning his peace and throwing a 
 moral gloom around his fame. The Critic vrho 
 will undertake to tell us that the instances of sub- 
 lime description to which we have alluded, are in 
 the smallest degree indebted for any portion of 
 their intrinsic effect to that sympathy which the 
 well known fortunes of the noble writer were emi- 
 minently calculated to inspire, may indeed advance 
 a plausible opinion, but it will be at the expense of 
 his judgment. To tell us further, that the conse- 
 quence of the Poet's having infused so much of his 
 own character into all that he has written will be, 
 that when this character shall have ceased to in- 
 spire a living interest, (as in the course of time it 
 must do, when the writer shall have shared the com- 
 mon lot of mortality) that much of the merit of his 
 writings, dependent as it was upon this personal sym- 
 pathy, will be lost, or will at least fail of a portion of 
 its original effect, is to assume a position which, as 
 we have before remarked, is warranted neither by 
 philosophy, nor a correct knowledge of human 
 nature. For, in the first place, we deny, upon the 
 ground of those sympathies which are deeply and 
 immutably seated in the nature of man, that this 
 principle of Self which may be said to pervade the 
 writings of Lord Byron, can ever cease wholly to 
 operate even upon the minds of those who shall 
 remain forever ignorant of what were either his 
 
41 
 
 errors or his misfortunes. It will be of little im- 
 portance for them to know where the noble sufferer 
 was born, 
 
 To whom related or by whom begot ; /^ 
 
 What were the nature of the wrongs he bore, or 
 what manner they were inflicted ; it will be suffi- 
 cient for them to know that he was a sufferer, and 
 had wrongs to be forgiven — 
 
 Hopes sapped — name blighted — life's life lied away. / 
 
 It will be enough for them to feel and know this,, 
 in order to sympathise profoundly with those emo- 
 tions of the soul which have thrown a melancholy > 
 gloom around the sublimest inspirations of the 
 Bard. And in the next place, even admitting that 
 this personal interest should be lost upon the minds 
 of another generation, yet will the passions and 
 the principles which pervade his writings remain 
 the same. For these principles and these passion^ 
 are essentially those of human nature — but human 
 nature elevated to that standard which is at once 
 the limit and the test of poetical invention. Mr. 
 Campbell has very justly remarked of poetry, that 
 it " has a right to the highest possible virtues of 
 human character." It has an equal right, we ap- 
 prehend, to the highest possible vices of character. 
 Probability and Possibility however, are very dif- 
 ferent degrees of contingency ; and it will be seen 
 that Mr. Campbell, a Poet himself, and the most 
 enlightened of Critics, assigns an almost impalpable 
 limit to the Poet's conceptions of human nature, 
 when he gives them the boundless range of possi- 
 bility. But who will undertake to say that he is 
 wrong } Wha will attempt to fathom the depths of 
 Space, or ascertain its hmits } But^it may be said, 
 
 6 
 
42 
 
 we give up our old position, that the merit of poet- 
 ical invention is to be tested according to its ap- 
 proach to or departure from this standard of pro- 
 bability, or possibihty if you please, and assume 
 another, vt^hich cannot be objected to because it is 
 perfectly natural. It is perfectly natural that we 
 should like that which is agreeable, and dislike 
 that which is otherAvise. It is perfectly natural 
 that we should estimate that which is accordant to 
 our feelings, beyond that which is repugnant to 
 them. It is perfectly natural that we should be 
 partial to virtuous and averse from vicious charac- 
 ters — that we should love virtue and abhor vice. 
 'If these be admitted as moral axioms, it will not 
 be difficult to account for the general preference 
 which mankind have always evinced for those wri- 
 tings Avhich inculcate sentiments congenial with 
 Virtue, and which present us with characters in 
 whose fortunes we can sympathize, because they 
 are beings constituted like ourselves, over those 
 which do violence to our nature by representing 
 it as subject to the basest influences — a wretched 
 compound of all that is unprincipled and unfeel- 
 ing. The truth of this reasoning however lies 
 rather in appearance than in reality. It is not 
 true even when applied to actual and every day 
 life. The most amiable persons are not always 
 the most agreeable ; nor are the most moral always 
 the most interesting. The virtues of such persons 
 are generally of the negative kind ; and even 
 where they are of a positive nature, they are still 
 of the simple and familiar class— and XVill com- 
 monly be found to consist in the very absence of 
 those qualities which impart to higher characters 
 the interest and as frequently the love which they 
 
43 
 
 inspire. We do not design by these remarks any 
 disparagement to the gentler Virtues and Cliarities 
 of life. On the contrary, no one can respect them 
 more sincerely than ourselves, when they are under 
 the direction of a liberal and enlightened mind. 
 All that we mean to say is, that these Virtues are 
 not of that high and impassioned nature which 
 confers upon character a marked individuality — 
 and that we would not unwillingly forego a .por- 
 tion of the former, for a little of the inspiration of 
 the latter. If this be admitted in relation to actual 
 life, how much more true is it in reference to 
 poetry, which aims at " accommodating the shows 
 of things to the desires of the mind,'*" These 
 desires, at the same time, are far from being as 
 humble and as limited as in many cases tl^y are 
 supposed to be. Of this " every man," asJBurke 
 would say, " ought to be the best judge in his own 
 forum" — but the fact seems to be that every man 
 is not capable of tracing the sources of his own 
 emotions, or of analysing these emotions when felt. 
 The gratification which we receive from represen- 
 tations of life and character as surrounded by 
 circumstances and assailed by events the most 
 afflicting, is by no means the immediate result of 
 such representations in themselves ; but may be 
 accounted for in the circumstance of their appeal- 
 ing to those sympathies of our nature which delight 
 in, or rather subsist upon intense emotion — in 
 short, from the accommodation which they afford 
 •' of the shows of things to the desires of the mind." 
 The stronger the impression made the more per- 
 manent it becomes, and there is always a call for 
 such appeals to our sympathies. It is these chiefly 
 which sustain existence, and render us sensibly 
 
44 
 
 alive to ft. There is a natural propensity in our 
 natures to awaken and indulge in strong sensation 
 — an appetite for intense feeling, more general 
 perhaps than we are either aware of, or willing to 
 allow. Nor is this very extraordinary. Upon at- 
 tending to the nature of our own emotions, it will 
 be found that there is a character in suffering which 
 absorbs the mental energies to an intensity that 
 rewards itself. This holds true at least of those 
 representations of suffering which, while they do 
 not present us with pictures drawn too nearly to 
 the life, or marked by circumstances at which the 
 mind revolts, afford a soothing melancholy exer- 
 cise to the powers of our moral being.(^) 
 
 ) 
 
 All suffering doth destroy or is destroyed 
 Even by tlie sufferer. 
 
 'Down right agony, like darkness, although it be 
 characterized by traits of great sublimity, is too 
 strong a privation to be sought after by the mind ; 
 there is nothing sufficiently definite in it to afford 
 repose or relaxation to the feelings. While those 
 exhibitions, and the sensations arising from them 
 of pain, that are tempered by certain alleviating 
 circumstances, are in the highest degree pro- 
 ductive of that moral enthusiasm which is at once 
 the distinction and the privilege of our nature. 
 They may be said to resemble that dubious Twilight 
 which lingers after Sunset, and which is one of the 
 most powerful sources of the sublime. Who that 
 ever studied the two Faces in that divine produc- 
 tion of Romney, representing the Bard of Avon 
 nursed by the Tragic and the Comic Muse, but must 
 have felt and owned the truth and energy, the 
 
45 
 
 depth and fulness of expression pourtrayed in the 
 countenance of the Tragic Muse, which told that 
 her devotions were not of this world, and that her 
 aspirations were fixed upon the immensity and 
 sublimity of Heaven ? It is upon this ground, upon 
 the ground of those passions which are universal 
 and eternal, that Lord Byron's claims to the re- 
 membrance and admiration of posterity must be 
 admitted to rest. He appears to us to stand unri- 
 valled and alone in his conception and expression 
 of Passion. By passion, we would be understood 
 here to mean that peculiar and intense sensibility 
 to the impressions of Female beauty, which per- 
 vades every page of his writings. The generality 
 of Poets, Shakespeare himself not excepted, des- 
 cribe Beauty with the cold precision of the Con- 
 noisseur in art, who from having his mind early 
 chilled and crampt by the formality of a certain 
 set of rules and pre-conceived opinions, is most 
 sensibly alive to the perception of blemishes, and 
 who can see no beauty where there is the slightest 
 departure from these rules. Burk distinguishes 
 very nicely " between a clear expression and a 
 strong expression ;" " these," he observes, " are 
 frequently confounded with each other, though they 
 are in reality extremely different — the former re- 
 gards the understanding — the latter belongs to 
 the passions — the one describes a thing as it is, the 
 other as it is felt." Precisely such, we appre- 
 hend, is the distinction which obtains between the 
 genius of the Poet and the Artist. The latter 
 feels, the former understands — the one admires, 
 the other loves that which is beautiful. The 
 beauty of expression is rarely admitted by the Art- 
 ist, while it carries a deep and ineffable feeling to 
 
46 
 
 the heart of the Poet. To the latter, there are a 
 thousand associations gathering around a beau- 
 tiful object, which affect, independent of its beauty. 
 The Artist sees nothing beyond the mere dead let- 
 ter^ as it were, of visual or physical beauty. It 
 would be almost endless ib quote from the writings 
 of Lord Byron, passages illustrative of that deep 
 feeling for the beautiful and passionate, which was 
 perhaps the characteristic of his wonderful mind. 
 But we cannot refrain from citing two instances, 
 one from the Corsair, and the other from Parasina, 
 which have always appeared to us to carry the 
 most powerful and affecting appeal to the sympa- 
 thy and sensibility of the reader. Describing the 
 grief of Medora in the parting scene between 
 Conrad and herself, the Poet has presented us 
 with the most passionate and affecting picture of 
 that " brokenness of heart" occasioned by the loss 
 of those we love, that is to be met with perhaps in 
 all poetry — the description of the parting between 
 Hector and Andromache cannot compare with it 
 in tenderness and pathos, which is all that we 
 look for in such descriptions. 
 
 She rose — she sprung— she clung to his embrace, 
 Till his heart heaved beneath her hidden face. 
 He dared not raise to hjs that deep, blue eye, 
 Which downcast droop'd in tearless agony. 
 Scarce beat that bosom where his image dwelt. 
 So {v\\—that feeling seemed almost unfelt ! • 
 Again — again — her form he madly press'd, 
 Which mutely clasp'd, imploringly caress'd I 
 O'er every feature of that still, pale face, 
 Had sorrow fix'djjwhat time can ne'er erase : 
 The tender blue of that large loving eye 
 Grew frozen with its gaze on vacancy. 
 Till — Oh, how far — it caught a glimpse of him, 
 
47 
 
 And then it flow'd — and phrenszed scem'd to swim 
 Thro' those long, dark, and glistening^ lashes dew'd 
 With drops of sadness oft to be renew'd. 
 " He's gone !" — against her heart that hand is driven, 
 Convulsed and quick— then gently raised to heaverj ; 
 Shelook'd and saw the heaving of the main - 
 
 The white sale set— she dared not look again — 
 But turn'd with sickening soul within the gate, 
 " It is no dream— and I am desolate !" 
 
 In the above description, the form, the face, the 
 attitude, but above all, the imploring eye of the 
 beautiful and forsaken Medora, are pictured to 
 the fancy in all the eloquence of truth, and the sad 
 reality of life. The other example is to be found 
 in Parasina, who is represented after the detection 
 of her guilt, as bound and fettered by the side of 
 Hugo, her youthful Paramour 
 
 Of that false Son, and daring lover ! 
 
 In expectation of the sentence which an in- 
 jured Husband was about to pass upon their guilty 
 loves. 
 
 The minion of his father's Bride,^^ 
 He too is fettered by her side ; 
 Nor sees her swoln and full eye swim 
 Less for her own despair than him; 
 Those lids o'er which the violet vein, 
 Wandering, leaves a tender stain, 
 Shining thro' the smoothest white 
 
 That e'er did softest kiss invite — 
 
 Now seem'd with hot and livid glow 
 To press, not shade the orbs below ; 
 Which glance so heavily, and fill. 
 
 As tear on tear grows gathering still. 
 
 She stood, I said, all pale and still, 
 
 The living cause of Hugo's ill, 
 
 Her eyes unmov'd, but full and wide. 
 
 Not once had tum'd to either side — 
 
 Nor once did those sweet eye-lids close, 
 
48 
 
 Or shade the glance o'er which they rose, 
 But round their orbs of deepest blue, 
 The circling white dilated grew — 
 
 And there with glassy gaze she stood 
 
 As ice were in her curdled blood, 
 But every now and then a tear 
 So large and slowly gather'd slid 
 
 From the dark fringe of that fair lid, 
 
 It was a thing to see, not hear ! 
 
 And they who saw it did surprise. 
 
 Such drops could fallfrom human eyes. 
 
 Words are too weak, we think, to express the 
 fuhiess of the feeling conveyed in these lines — but 
 we never saw Grief and Passion so deeply, so elo- 
 quently blended in any human face, as in that of 
 Parasina, young, beautiful, and lost ! One more 
 instance occurs to our recollection, in the follow- 
 ing Stanza from the First Canto of Don Juan. 
 Julia's fondness for Juan, is depicted in a few lines 
 which convey the tenderness, the melancholy, and 
 the dubiousness of early Passion, with a truth and 
 beauty which is without a parallel in Modern Po- 
 etry. 
 
 And if she met him, though she smil'd no more, 
 
 She look'd a sadness sweeter than her smile, 
 And if her heart had deeper thoughts in store 
 She must not own, but cherish'd more the while, 
 For that compression in its burning core ; 
 Even innocence itself has many a wile, 
 
 And will not dare to trust itself with truth, 
 
 And love is taught hypocrisy from youth. 
 
 There is a deep and plaintive beauty in these 
 lines which has always had an inexpressible charm 
 for our feelings. That the Being in whose soul 
 dwelt such conceptions and such forms of beauty — 
 
49 
 
 such passionate desires, forever reaching after the 
 iinattainahlc and the indefinite, and seeking rehef 
 in disappointment by wreaking his whole being 
 upon the expression of that disappointment — that 
 such a Being should Iiave been unhappy, and even 
 incapacitated for the free exercise of the humbler 
 duties and practical purposes of life, is only what 
 might have been predicated of the peculiar con- 
 stitution of his character. Whatever may have 
 been the errors of Lord Byron's life, they were 
 evidently those of a great and uncontroulable 
 Mind. His Heart, we are persuaded, never con- 
 ceived one ungenerous thought, or prompted to 
 one ignoble action. It was the Mind, the burning 
 restless Mind, that o'er informed his feelings. His 
 heart appeared to weep over the frailties it never 
 gave birth to, and could not controul.* There was 
 an eternal action and reaction going on between 
 his feelings and his understanding. But, unhap- 
 pily for his peace, the latter always maintained the 
 ascendency they liad early acquired over the for- 
 mer. Setting aside all consideration of the effects 
 which are supposed to result from a neglected 
 education, and early habits — 
 
 those false links that bind 
 
 At times the loftiest to the meanest mind — 
 
 — we are tempted to think that Lord Byron's ge- 
 nius was of that intense and peculiar temperament 
 which admits of no other modification than that 
 which the gradual confirmation of an original 
 and powerful but unhappy bias, is calculated to ef- 
 fect. And as there is nothing which acquires 
 strength so much from indulgence as that morbid 
 
 7 
 
sensibility which is peculiar to Genius, there is 
 nothing so difficult to oppose — and yet so destruc- 
 tive of happiness for the want of disipline. We 
 will not permit ourselves to dwell upon the private 
 life and conduct of Lord Byron. We will not, 
 however we might, anticipate the ever equitable 
 verdict of Posterity, or even of the present age, 
 when it shall bring itself to sit, dispationately, in 
 judgement upon what may have been the moral 
 failings of so extraordinary a character — a charac- 
 ter so liable to be misunderstood. 'Tis sacred 
 ground at best, and peculiarly such at present. 
 His awful ashes have not had time to grow cold, 
 and his wounded and insulted Spirit scarcely yet 
 reposes from the indignities and the afflictions 
 Avhich it bore in life. • We may be permitted to re- 
 mark however, in relation to the unhappy occur- 
 rences of his domestic life, that the many harsh 
 judgements which have been passed upon his con- 
 duct, argue both a want of feeling and of sense. 
 There is something so sacred in the privacy of do- 
 mestic life, that, even at this distance of time and 
 place, it is with the greatest reluctance that we 
 permit ourselves to allude, to the unhappy circum- 
 stances which occasioned the seperation of Lord 
 Byron from his family ; and which embittered eve- 
 ry hour of his short but eventful life. That priva- 
 cy however, has been broken in upon and viola- 
 ted — and we should be wanting in the deep love 
 we entertain for his memory, did we not express 
 our unqualified contempt for the base calumnies 
 which the vulgar, the unfeeling, and the designing- 
 have propagated against his fame ; and which Im- 
 pudence, " ever ready to hitch itself into notorie- 
 ty," has laboured to perpetuate. We can never 
 
 
51 
 
 believe that lie was the criminal Being he is re- 
 presented to have been, because no proof, except 
 such as has been furnished by those who were his 
 avowed and bitter enemies, has been adduced in 
 support of the charges which have been preferred 
 against his hfe. It is the characteristic of a weak 
 mind to misconstrue that which it cannot compre- 
 hend, and of a bad heart to visit upon others the 
 obloquy which it knows attaches to itself It is 
 mortifying and almost discouraging to reflect, how 
 much the loftiest mind is at the mercy of the mean- 
 est. It is the supreme consolation of Dulness to 
 volunteer its strictures upon Genius ; and to ar- 
 raign it at the tribunal of its own narrow concep- 
 tions and unenlightened humanity, in all the exclu- 
 sive inveteracy of ignorance, and in all the despo- 
 tism of a partial and bigoted prepossession. We 
 cannot disguise the firm connection we have al- 
 ways entertained, that Lord Byron was not alone 
 responsable for the unhappy rupture which has 
 given rise to so many unfeeling and impertinent 
 speculations. It rarely happens that one only of 
 any two parties to a question, whether at civil or 
 at moral law, is convicted of having been so much 
 in error as he is represented to have been. This 
 may be called a weak argument, but are there any 
 fads in existence calculated to refute it } If there 
 are not, then the presumption is in favour of the 
 innocence of the accused, until his guilt shall have 
 been established. The peace and security of do- 
 mestic life depend so much upon contingencies 
 which it is impossible either to anticipate or to 
 avert, that an honourable mind will seldom permit 
 itself to form a positive judgment in any case of 
 social differences. Without affection and the faith 
 
. 5^ 
 
 which it inspires, without the most unbounded mu- 
 tual confidence among those who are members of 
 the same family, the happiness and quiet of the 
 domestic circle is liable to momentary and final 
 interruption. From all that has transpired, it 
 would appear that there reigned but little of this 
 spirit of amity in the family of Lord Byron. On 
 the contrary, a deliberate system of domestic espi- 
 onage seems to have been set on foot, which, what- 
 ever may have snggestpd it or been its views, had 
 no other effect than that of confirming the errors 
 it may have been designed to correct, by offending 
 the pride it was by no means calculated to concili- 
 ate. Nothing has the effect of wounding so deep- 
 ly as the appearance of distrust in those who 
 should either love or know us better than to doubt 
 us. But — 
 
 ^ " ■ ' Constantly lives in realms above. 
 
 The heart is strongly tempered, and will not un- 
 frequently wound where it loves most. In the deep 
 pathos of the following Stanza from Don Juan, we 
 trace what had been the feelings and reflections 
 of Lord Byron, upon the memorable and melancho- 
 ly occasion to which they evidently have refer- 
 ence. 
 
 What e'er had been his worthlessness or worth. 
 Poor fellow ! he had many things to wound him 
 Let's own, since it can do no good on earth ; 
 It was a trying moment that which found him 
 Standing alone beside his desolate hearth, 
 Where all his house-hold goods lay shiver'd round him I 
 Jfo choice was left kis feeling or his pride. 
 
 It is impossible to read these lines without the 
 deep and grateful conviction, that the heart from 
 
53 
 
 which they flowed must have been replete with 
 the finest and the noblest feelings. We can well 
 imagine the bitter and indignant emotions with 
 which such a heart must have regarded the many 
 efforts that were made to poison its peace, and the 
 unfounded but pointed calumnies which were 
 leveled at its fame. We forbear noticing the 
 common place and comtemptible charges which, 
 among others, have been preferred against the 
 character of Lord Byron, of having deserted his 
 country, and of having promulgated sentiments 
 inimical to virtue, further than to remark, that 
 such charges, the poor resort in general of the 
 malevolent, afford, in the present instance, strong 
 evidence of that littleness of feeling and that low 
 malice which seem to be inherent in the nature 
 of many minds. In relation to the stale charge of 
 Infidelity, it is not borne out by any evidence af- 
 forded either by his writings or his life. On the 
 contrary, there are many passages in his works, 
 which tend directly to refute it. With regard to 
 that of having deserted his country, we do not 
 know that the quarter form Avhich it has emanated, 
 carries with it sufficient weight either of charac- 
 ter or of talent, to intitle this charge to our notice, 
 even w ere not the weakest and the most contemp- 
 tible alternative to which Impudence and Malevo- 
 lence were ever driven, in their unremitting efforts 
 to defame and to disparage all that is worthy 
 either of love or admiration. What has been al- 
 ledged of the immorality of Don Juan, merits per- 
 haps a brief consideration. It is not because the 
 million have condemned this extraordinary pro- 
 duction in all that exclusiveness of narrow minds 
 which confounds good with evil, and right with 
 
 
54 
 
 wrong, that we are led to notice it. It is because 
 we consider it the most remarkable record of hu- 
 man feelings and human frailties, that Genius ever 
 prepared for the moral instruction of mankind. 
 We cannot but regard this Poem in the light of a 
 great and luminous Moral, inculcated and enfor- 
 ced by all the eloquence of one of the most in- 
 spired minds that ever descended upon mortal. 
 Those who maintain the contrary, would do well, 
 instead of indulging in vague declamation about 
 virtues which they themselves in all probability 
 never possessed, to point out by what process it is 
 that this work is calculated to produce the mis- 
 chievous consequences they affect to apprehend 
 from it. Dr. Johnson, who was both a good Chris- 
 tian and a sound Moralist, entertained a very dif- 
 ferent opinion of the tendency of such works. To 
 maintain that the mind which is so familiar with 
 scenes of licentiousness as to depict them in all the 
 fidelity of living truth, must be itself contaminated, 
 is an argument long since exploded as carrying 
 with it not the slightest degree of conviction. 
 Even admitting however, that the heart may be 
 acquainted with vice under all its disguises, the 
 Mind is forever above the grossness of the Senses ; 
 and hovers aloof, never an impassive spectator of 
 the progress of the feelings, but the sternest and 
 the most enlightened Censor of their ways. And 
 thus it is, that a man of Genius is never a gross 
 Voluptuary, whose ideas extend not beyond the 
 gratification of his passions — but has his " bane 
 and antidote" continually before him. We know 
 not whether there be a more effectual mode of vi- 
 siting reprehension upon vice, then that of select- 
 ing, as it were, a living example of the miseries 
 
i)0 
 
 which finally result from yielding with too great 
 a facility to its seductive allurements. In all such 
 represensations, if grossness of language and of 
 sentiment be avoided, the effect will be, at least 
 with minds that have been properly educated, to 
 confirm and not to shake the principles of Virtue. 
 In Don Juan there is a total freedom from this 
 grossness of sentiment and of language. There 
 is, at the same time, so much fine reflection and 
 fine poetry scattered throughout the work, that, if 
 there be any poison in its pages, they must be 
 admitted to carry with them not the least effectual 
 of antitodes. Upon a question of Morals however, 
 every individual has undoubtedly the right of judg- 
 ing for himself. What therefore may be the final 
 decision of this or another age upon the subject 
 of the moral tendency of this remarkable produc- 
 tion, we will not pretend to anticipate. For our- 
 selves however, we are far from thinking that it 
 merits the reprehension which has been visited 
 ■upon it — and this for the reasons we have ventur- 
 ed to assign. There is a vein of profound moral 
 reflection pervading the whole work, which, in 
 the midst of what appears to be the grossest li- 
 centiousness, ever and anon recalls the mind from 
 the allurements of the Passions, to ponder upon 
 the vanity of human life and its enjoyments ; and 
 with a stern and rigid impartiality to ask itself the 
 melancholy question, whether the very means 
 which we adopt for promoting our happiness, be 
 not those precisely calculated to defeat it, and to 
 ensure misery in its stead ? Such, we acknow- 
 ledge, is the painful doubt with which we have 
 always been inspired upon closing the pages of 
 this affecting and eloquent production. That it 
 
5& 
 
 was conceived under a deep and solemn convic- 
 tion — the result not so much of the original con- 
 clusions of a powerful mind, as of a profound 
 moral experience — that the pleasures of this life 
 end in the bitterest privations, and that happiness 
 is at once an empty and a fatal purchase, those 
 who are familiar with what was the intense and 
 peculiar moral and intellectual temperament of 
 the writer, will not permit themselves to doubt. 
 The conjecture which has been hazarded by 
 some Newspaper Editors in this country, that had 
 Lord Byron lived, he would probably have de- 
 teriorated as a writer, reminds us of the assiduity 
 of the Cruscan Critics who endeavoured to per- 
 suade Alphonso that Tasso had lost his fire, and 
 that it would be well for him to remain in idle- 
 ness and obscurity for the rest of his days ! The 
 supposition is perfectly gratuitous, but the insinua- 
 tion is utterly base. And yet what can be ex- 
 pected from men who permitted themselves to 
 throw a slur even upon the noble exertions which 
 the Patriot Genius of the immortal Bard, with a 
 fervour and a zeal characteristic of his mighty 
 Spirit, had devoted to the cause of freedom and 
 mankind ? We had been almost tempted to think 
 that if ever there was one being more than ano- 
 ther, who could have claimed an exemption from 
 the common doom of.mortality — who, as was said 
 of Augustus Csesar, " should never have been born, 
 or should never have died," — that Lord Byron 
 was that being. But upon further reflection, it 
 appears to us that his death, occurring at the time 
 and place it did, is rather to be envied than la- 
 mented — " and though he died in his prime," to 
 borrow Die beautiful idea, and equally beautiful 
 
67 
 
 language of a friend and relative, " to fall from 
 the meridian is to fall in the midst of glory." One 
 more topic we shall briefly touch upon, and our 
 grateful task is done. We shall have borne our 
 humble tribute to the Worth which we loved, and 
 to the Genius Avhich we admired. We shall have 
 lifted our voice, however feebly, in vindication of 
 the Fame which we have held, and shall alwa.ys 
 hold sacred — the only legacy which Genius be- 
 queathes to those whom it leaves behind to deplore 
 its loss, and to despair of ever attaining to that 
 high eminence from which they have been accus- 
 tomed to behold and adore it — but which evil 
 tongues have sought to sully and to wound. " If 
 the Spirit of Byron," (to borrow again from one 
 whose sentiments do honour to human Nature.) 
 " can suffer a pang in another world, it must be at 
 having his memory insulted by those who had 
 rendered his life unhappy ; and that through the 
 unworthiness, if not the treachery of a friend." 
 This remark alludes to the base and contemptible 
 conduct of Moore, to whom Lord Byron, in the 
 unsuspecting confidence of friendship, consigned 
 the Manuscript Memoirs of his Life. Incapable 
 of appreciating either the honour or the favour 
 which had been conferred (for it will be remem- 
 bered that the Manuscript was given to Moore, 
 with the generous view of relieving him, by the 
 proceeds of the sale, from the pecuniary embar- 
 rassments under which he then laboured) he 
 treacherously delivered it into the hands of per- 
 sons, who had a double motive for pursuing the 
 dishonourable course, to which an instinctive re- 
 gard for reputation, however worthless, will some- 
 times prompt the meanest — that of consigning the 
 
 8 
 
53 
 
 Manuscript to the flames. We do not know that 
 this Man, who presumed to style himself the friend 
 of Lord Byron, can be called to a sufficiently se- 
 vere account for such conduct — dastardly in itself, 
 and in the last degree insulting to the Memory of the 
 illustrious Dead whose character has been already 
 but too much violated — as far as Baseness can 
 pervert, or Dullness can defame. How it was that 
 Lord Byron should have been so lost to the moral 
 turpitude of that gross and contemptible fabrica- 
 tor of " Lascivious Lyrics," we are utterly unable 
 to imagine. What else than Treachery and 
 Falsehood could have been expected of a man 
 who had no sooner turned his back upon this 
 country, where he had been received and treated 
 with the utmost courtesy and kindness, than he 
 conceived the vile purpose to traduce it, and 
 belied the very persons whose hospitality had 
 welcomed him to our shores ? Should these 
 pages ever meet his eyes, he will learn that, among 
 the thousands who have vindicated and applauded 
 his conduct, there exists one who, however hum- 
 ble he may be, presumes to entertain and to ex- 
 press the most profound contempt for his charac- 
 ter. With regard to the great and gallant Spirit 
 whose confidence he has betrayed, and whose 
 memory he has insulted, the most remarkable man 
 of the times, his Writings will afford to Posterity 
 the chief illustration of the age in which he lived. 
 When the errors of his life, which, whatever they 
 were, were those rather of the head than of the 
 heart, shall have been forgotten, when even the 
 sympathy which has been consecrated to his " li- 
 ving agonies" shall be no more, the pure light of 
 his Genius will emerge from darkness into day, a 
 brighter Luminary in a world more happy. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 [a) Of this species o( fanfaronades, M. De. Stael, among'others, is 
 guilty when she observes, iiioneof her eloquent and passionate Letters 
 upon the Life and Writingsjof Rousseau, ''It is perhaps at the expense 
 ty of happiness that great talents are conferred. Nature, as if exhausted 
 by these magnificent presents, often refuses to great men the qualities 
 which might render them happy." 
 
 ' (6) North American Review, July 1822. 
 
 (c) This doctrine, which seems to have originated with M. De. Stael, 
 or was at all events supported by her with considerable ingenuity and 
 more zeal, has been ridiculed by some and reprobated by others, as 
 frivolous and presumptious ; but without having received that degree 
 of attention which, as a topic at least of interestingspeculation, it seems 
 to merit. Addison, it is well known, has deduced a strong hypotheti- 
 cal argument in favour of the doctrine of the Soul's Immortality, from 
 the circumstance of its continually progressing towards Perfection 
 without ever attaining to it. Johnson likewise, seems to treat the 
 notion as fantastic and vissionar}', when he observes, in the Preface 
 to his Dictionary, " to pursue Perfection is to chase the Sun, which, 
 when we reach the hill where he seems to set, is still behind at the 
 same distance from us. " This however, is to evade and not to investi- 
 gate the subject. We trust we shall not be accused of an ignorantia 
 eclenchi when we remark that, of such a state of being we cannot be 
 said to have any just notions, because we are unable to determine, 
 first, what are the various components, their quaUties and the degrees 
 of those qualities, which would be constitutive of such a state. Per- 
 fectionj even relatively considered, admits of no definition, and of that 
 which cannot be defined, we can have no just idea. Perfection, more- 
 over, is strictly a condition, and not a quality. To speak of it there- 
 fore, as an attribute of the Deitj^, is to confound a state of Being with 
 those qualities, or any one of them, of which that state is originally 
 compounded — which are adherent to it — and which it necessarily 
 presupposes. Were, we to allow ourselves to express in a few words, 
 the only notion we can have of Perfection, as derived from the de- 
 scription of the moral Eden of our first Pai-ents, ere Sin had entered 
 the Garden, we should describe this state as a positive negation — and 
 this without involving a paradox. Such it certainly was as it existed 
 in Paradise; although we are by no means prepared to say that such 
 is Perfection, as we would understand the term — ^whether the moral 
 
11 
 
 perfection of a Socrates, or the intellectual perfection of a Newton- 
 yet such was the perfection of Adam and Eve, Milton represents the 
 former propounding various questions to Raphael, which implied a de- 
 gree of ignorance which, while it may be said to have constituted the 
 test of his obedience, would have been incompatable with a state of 
 absolute perfection. Adam, ere he had committed Sin, knew not what 
 it was, or that he was capable of it— for the very cautions of the Angel 
 were calculated to confirm him, in the belief of his positive exemp- 
 tion from all frailty. His having been free from Sin therefore, pre- 
 vious to his eating of the Apple, implied no positive moral virtue. 
 His Innocence was the.result, not of a perception of, and consequent 
 adherence to virtue — it was the necessary consequence of his igno- 
 rance of evil — and in so far, it was a mere absence from it. Adam 
 was forbidden the Tree of Knowledge, he could therefore have known 
 nothing — and knowing nothing, he was ignorant — and being ignorant, 
 this ignorance implied his innocence. 
 
 The tree of Knowledge is not that of Life. 
 
 Adam experienced this truth to liis cost. He ceased to Lc mnocent 
 the moment he partook of Knowledge. Would the perfection of the 
 intellectual imply that of the moral powers ? Or would the perfection 
 of any one intellectual, imply that of any one moral power? And fur- 
 ther, would the perfection of the moral powers imply perfect happi- 
 ness ? There is perhaps a moral answer to tlicse questions, not altoge- 
 ther unsatisfactory. In the first place, the fundamental doctrine of jN at- 
 ural Law, that man should be allowed to pursue his own liappiness in 
 his own way, would, in the case of a perfect Moral Agent, need no in- 
 culcation, because perfect happiness would be implied in such a case. 
 In the next place, Perfection, in this world, would be entirely out of its 
 element ; and the opposition and reviling that would most inevitably 
 attend it here, would evince that it was regarded as an intrusive visi- 
 tation upon human Nature — a sarcastic comment upon its wretched 
 frailties. In other words. Perfection would be incompatible with the 
 melancholy conditions upon which we hold the tenure of life ; and in 
 the ultimate fulfillment of which, the Covenant betwixt God and his 
 Creatures remains to be redeemed by the latter. That " special Pro- 
 vidence" which, we are told, is made manifest " even in the fall of a 
 sparrow," would, in the case of a perfect moral Being, be induced 
 (from its own high Moral Sense, which necessarily prompts to a justifi- 
 cation of its ways to man,) to suspend the operation of those " acciden- 
 tal possibilities," as well as those positive evils, which are incidental to 
 time and human nature. M. De Stael defines Perfection in Writing 
 to consist, " ratlier in measure than diffuseness — in that which an Au- 
 thor always is, than in that which he shows himself sometimes to be — 
 in a word, Peifection gives the idea of proportion rather than gran- 
 deur." This is, perhaps, the perfection of the Arts and Sciences. And 
 it maj- be the perfection to which the human Mind is supposed capable 
 of attaining. But if it be, we fear that Mind must be admitted to have 
 declined from, rather than approximated to, the standard here prescrib- 
 ed, since the days of Homer and of Sophocles, of Socrates and De- 
 mosthenes — and though last, not least, of those immortal Artists whose 
 works have survived their names through a long lapse of ages. The 
 Homeric Poems seem to be regarded as the very perfection of the Epic 
 
 \ 
 
Ill 
 
 Fable. The Drama of ^schylus and Sophocles is characterised by a 
 simplicity of parts, and a unity and sing-leness of purpose, which, with 
 a few exceptions, we look for in vain in the modern Theatre. Demos- 
 thenes is equally a model, we are assured, to which nothing has ap- 
 proached in the Senate of succeeding nations ; and the Statues and 
 Architectural Remains of early Greece, have been alike the admira- 
 tion and the despair of modern times. Whether the inference be ad- 
 missible, that the Mind which produced these Models, must necessari- 
 ly have been perfect, would never perhaps liave been a question, had 
 we been able to determine whether the perfection of these Models was 
 of a positive and abstract nature, or only relative. But to have deter- 
 mined this point, would have been in itself an evidence of this very 
 perfection. 
 
 [d) Hence, we have always regarded as gratuitous and as unfounded 
 in fact or philosophy, the common observation, that many minds of the 
 highest order have been lost to the literai'y world, from having been ac- 
 cidentally diverted from the pursuits of Literature to those of Politics, 
 War, or some one of the learned Professions. We have had occasion 
 to notice this opinion as broached by Dr. Cunie, among others, in his 
 Biography of Robert Burns. The writer, in dwelling upon what he 
 terms the universality of the Poetical Mind, remarks, that the same 
 Mind which composed the Homeric Poems, might, underdiffereut disci- 
 pline, have led armies to the field, or elevated its possessor to the 
 highest honors of the Forum. Now, of all others, the Poetical Mind 
 is perhaps the leaef ductile ; and is more immediately and powerfully 
 influenced by that constiiutiond bias, which we have supposed to give 
 direction to all minds of an higher order And it is only of such Minds 
 that we would be understood to speak. If o>x cannot make a Race- 
 Horse of a Mule, but the Mule may be put to any labor, and may be 
 beat to the performance of any drudgery. Dean Swift, Lad he been 
 disposed to avail himself of the influence which he exercised over the 
 minds of Harley and St. John, might probably have obtained a seat in 
 the Cabinet ; but the direction and tendency of his mind was original- 
 ly and irrevocably averse from politics. He occasionally embarked 
 in those of his time, it is true, but only as a writer. Milton was ap- 
 pointed Latin Secretary under Cromwell, by whom he was liberally 
 patronised ; but the Poet predominated over the Politician in his con- 
 stitution ; and the immortal Bard was more congenially employed in 
 composing the Paradise Lost, than the Populo Anglicano Defensio. 
 But setting fact aside, philosophy will be admitted to bear us out upon 
 this point. .Dr. Johnson defines Genius to be " a Mind of enlarged 
 general powers, accidentally turned to some particular pursuit." We 
 have never regarded this definition of Genius as being strictly correct. 
 Who can believe for a moment, that the mind of Napoleon Bonaparte 
 was destined to atchieve any other exploits than those which have im- 
 mortalized his name .' Or that the genius of Lord Byron was destined 
 to eminence in any other pursuit, than the one in which it has so often 
 "felt with the ardour, and debated with the eloquence of heaven .^" 
 We liave no objection to suppose the mind of a man of genius to be one 
 of general powers, but to suppose these powers to be at the mercy of 
 any bias that 'accident may impart, is to suppose one of those " acci- 
 
IV 
 
 dental possibility," which have been long sijice regarded as eitlieir 
 above the comprehension, or below the serious attention of the philoso- 
 pher. But to suppose the mind of a man of genius to be one merely of 
 general powers, is not to distinguish it from other minds of an high or- 
 der. Shakespear's mind was one of general powers, so was Lord Ba- 
 con's; but the quality or attribute of genius which properly discrimi- 
 nates between the two minds is, that vis vivida or intellectual enthusi- 
 asm, which transported the universal Bard beyond the bounds of Time, 
 and made him almost familiar with Eternity. And this is the quality 
 which, while it is perhaps the characteristic of every mind whose pow- 
 ers lie within the department of the Fine Arts, is "more particularly 
 the emblem and inspiration of the Poetical. And it is in such minds 
 chiefly, that the constitutional bias we have been speaking of, is to be 
 met with in all the force of an original principle. The mind of every 
 man of genius is one of general powers, and such a mind, although de- 
 stined for some particular pursuit congenial with its powers, and cal- 
 culated therefore, to elicit them in all their force, will necessarily dis- 
 tinguish itself in any department of human pursuit to ^diich its atten- 
 tion may be called for a time. It is upon this ground that we are dis- 
 posed to deny the claims that have been set up for Lord Wellington as 
 a man of genius. As a great Military Commander he is second only 
 to Bonaparte himself ; but upon the score of original powers of mind, 
 pure mind in the abstract, we ap])rehend that not even the warmest 
 admirers of the Englishman, would dream of comparing him with the 
 wonderful Corsican. Between the two minds, how immeasurable, 
 how infinite the distance ! Bonaparte was perhaps as conspicuous in 
 the Cabinet, as in the Field. But Lord Wellineri^o") whether debating 
 in the House of Lords, or negociating- ^^itii the Allied Sovereigns at 
 Vienna, presents the somewhat dWkward and humiliating spectacle of 
 a man, placed in a situation involving a degreeof responsibility beyond 
 his powers of tnJnd to sustain. The general superiority of Bonaparte's 
 mind over that of Lord Wellington, can only be accounted for, there- 
 fore, in the original superiority of his genius, or the general powei-s of 
 his mind. The stronger the original bias given to the mind, the more 
 inevitable seems to be its tendency to some particular sphere of exer- 
 tion, to which that bias may incline. And although this bias will be 
 found to characterise eveiy mind whose powers are in the degree 
 which constitues genius, it is, as we have already observed, more im- 
 mediately the distinction, and, perhaps, the Conservator of those minds 
 whose powers lie in the department of the Fine Arts. The minds of 
 such men as Bacon and Locke, although they were Minds of the high- 
 est order, were not characterized by that intensity of. the intellectual 
 temperament, which is the distinguisliing trait in the poetical mind. 
 Bacon, at the same time.was a man of more sensibility Ihan Locke. His 
 celebrate dremark in relation to Poetry, that it seeks to " accommodate 
 the shows of things to the desires of the mind," evinces, as Mr. Camp- 
 bell has observed, ." a sensibility in the Sage, as deep as his wisdom." 
 But, at the same time, we can more easily believe, that both Bacon 
 and Locke might have been Statesmen instead of Philosophers, than 
 that Shakspeare and Milton might have been Philosophers instead of 
 Poets. But, while this acuteness of the intellectual temperament is at 
 once the distinction and the inspiration of the poetical mind, it is, at 
 the same time, the profound and inexhaustible source of those not fie- 
 
liiious woes which, while they seem to impart a fervour and elasticity 
 to the wing-, carry not unfrequently to the heart of Genius, the damp- 
 ness of Death, and even the darkness of Despair. And, — to bor- 
 row the beautiful idea of Lord Byron— as the pinion which sus- 
 tains the Eagle in his flight, not unfrequently affords its own fea- 
 ther to the shaft which stretches him upon the plain, so, those pow- 
 ers of the poetical mind which constitute its greatness, and ensure its 
 immortality, appear to be incompatible with its happiness — and wound 
 the heart while they prompt and inspire the understanding. This is 
 perhaps a melancholy truth, and one of which, the extraordinary Indi- 
 vidual who forms the subject of this Inquiry, affords a still more melan- 
 choly illustration. 
 
 (/) We are sensible that in arguing as we propose to do. upon the 
 words of Bishop Buttler quoted above, we subject ourselves to the 
 charge of having grossly perverted their meaning and tendency. If 
 we have done so, still we think the distinction between the "actions and 
 the nature and capacities of the Agent," a happy one, and greatly to 
 our purpose. The Bishop, we sliall be told, designed to say in fewer 
 and plainer words, that the more enlightened the Agent, the freer he 
 should be from all frailty. But, however plausible and rational this 
 may sound, we must remember that there is a wide diffei'ence between 
 that which we are, and that which we should be. And, however true 
 in the abstract it may be, that in proportion to our wisdom should be 
 our virtue,- fact and observation refute the idea notwithstanding. 
 But, it will be said again, we know this, and so much the worse — but 
 still we maintain our position. The fact of a man's being vicious, af- 
 fords no argument against the position that he should be virtuous. 
 But, morally and not philosophically speaking, it appears to us that 
 the existence of vice is no weak argument against the possibility of 
 virtue. And we cannot but regard the contraiy argument urged 
 against us, as resolving itself into a begging' of the question. It is, per- 
 haps, nothing more than a fine abstraction, or Bemt Ideal of thought. 
 If it be admitted, ^nd we do not think it will be denied, that great 
 virtue has frequently been united to but little wisdom, and the greatest 
 wisdom to but little virtue, — and further, if it be shown, as we shall 
 attempt to show, how it is that the greatest mind may be the least vir- 
 tuous, understanding this term with certain restrictions, we do not 
 think we shall be ameanable to criticism, for having perverted^or mis- 
 construed the woi'ds of Bishop Buttler quoted in the text. 
 
 (g) The following observations from Part V. of the Inquiry mto the 
 Sublime and Beautiful, appear to us to coincide with what has been 
 said above, and tend to throw considerable light upon the subject. 
 " Mr Locke," says Burk, "has somewhei'e observed, with his usual 
 sagacity, that most general words, those belonging to virtue and vice, 
 good and evil, especially, are taught before the particular modes of 
 action, to which they belong, are presented to the mind ; and with them 
 the love of the one and the abhorrence of tlie other — when, aftei'- 
 wards, the several occurrences of life come to be applied to these 
 words, and that which is pleasant often appears under the name of evil, 
 and what is disagreeable to nature, is called good and virtuous, a 
 
VI 
 
 strange confusion of ideas and affections arrises in the minds of many, 
 and an appearance of no small contradiction between their notions and 
 their actions. There are many who love virtue and who detest vice, 
 and this not from hypocrisy or affectation, who notwithstanding', very 
 frequently act ill and wickedly in particulars, without the least re- • 
 morse, because these particular occasions never came into view, when 
 the passions on the side of virtue were so warmly affected by certain 
 words heated originally by the breath of others." These observations 
 are as striking, as they are philosophical and just. The general 
 words here spoken of, are usually acquired at a time of, life when it is 
 impossible that the mind should attach any definite ideas to them. 
 Because the force and clearness of these ideas depend upon an ex- 
 perience, whether personal or acquired, of those occasions and modes 
 of action, to which they relate. And this experience must always, in 
 the course of nature, be subsequent to an acquaintance Avith those 
 general words which, apart, at the same time, from this experience, 
 carry no meaning with them to the mind ; and tend, on that account, 
 to lead it astray. This, therefore, is one of those moral evils which 
 no education can remedy — if it be not, in fact, one of the imperfections 
 of education itself. But the misfortune seems to be, not merely that 
 these words are taught previous to an experience of those occasions 
 to which they apply, but that they have been allowed too wide, and 
 consequently too vague an application. Virtue and Honor, are 
 words which nature seems to have intended to convey the same ideas ; 
 and yet, from early and false associations, we come at length to attach 
 very different meanings to them. That which is often termed virtu- 
 ous, is not always reconcilable to our notions of that which is honora- 
 ble; and that which is esteemed honorable, still more rarely implies 
 that which is virtuous. The word Virtue in I^atin, implies physical as 
 well as moral merit; and in the English its meaning is almost as un- 
 restricted and indeterminate. By what process of analogy or induc- 
 tion it was, that the Romans came to render this word expressive of 
 bodily strength, we do not pretend to determine; but we know that among 
 that warlike people, bodily strength was not unfrequently viewed in 
 the light of that moral quality, to which alone perhaps, the term is 
 applicable. The case appears to be somewhat similar with the word 
 Honor. The celebrated Oration of Mark Anthony over the dead bo- 
 dy of Caesar, may be regarded as a severe comment upon the vague 
 notions generally attached to this word. The noble Triumvir in- 
 veighs in a strain of keen and bitter sarcasm, against the base con- 
 duct of Brutus and tlie rest of the Conspiratoi-s, who 
 
 Stabbed great Csesar ; crying, long live Coesar .' 
 
 And yet, says the Orator, 
 
 " Brutus is an honorable man 
 So are they all, all honorable men f 
 
 It is not merely then, that general words are taught before the occa- 
 sions are known to which they apply, it is that their application is too 
 general and indeterminate. It is not merely that the words Virtue 
 and Honor are acquired as mere sounds, before the mind has any cor- 
 
vu 
 
 respondent notion of the sense they are intended to convey, it is that 
 this sense varies — and soems to be one thing- to-day, and another to- 
 morrow^. The consequence of all this very frequently is, particularly 
 with minds of an ardent temperament, that when such minds come to 
 think and examine for themselves, and have acquired from experience 
 and observation that knowledge of things, which is widely different 
 from a knowledge of words, they are led to detect the errors of 
 early associations ; and the want of that consistency between what they 
 see and what they have been taught, without which, the most fatal mis- 
 apprehension of important truths is likely to prevail. The mind which 
 has been thus duped and led astray by false associations of words, is 
 generally disposed to review and to revise all that it has acquired iu 
 its earlyand impassive state — and the result of this moral retrospection, 
 is as generally the erection of a system of its own, in matters in which 
 it has been thus deceived by the vagueness of general terms. 
 
 {h) This may seem an invidious distinction, but it is one, nevertheless, 
 sanctioned by our actual observation ; and, we doubt not, by that of 
 almost every other man. 
 
 (i) Analogy of Religion. Part I. Chap. V- 
 
 {k) Vice is a monster of so frightful mien. 
 As to be hated needs but to be seen. 
 But seen to oft, familiar with her face, 
 We first endure, then pity, then embrace. Essay on man. 
 
 When the Poet wrote the above lines, he must have designed them to 
 apply exclusively to the man of vicious practical habits ; and they cer- 
 tainly apply with great truth in such a case — although they are not 
 very original as a practical observation, nor very just as a philosophi- 
 cal induction. 
 
 (Z) It is certainly retaliation upon Society in the end, because Socie- 
 ty suffers to a certain degree from the vices of individuals. 
 
 (m) Remarks on the assumed Analogy between Poetry and Painting, 
 published in the National Intelligencer, for October, 1822. 
 
 (n) Lord Bolinbroke is of opinion, that a man will profit by the ex- 
 perience he may acquire in the world, according to the temper and ha- 
 bit of mind which may have been previously unfolded and formed. 
 " The same experience," he obsesves, " which secures the judgment 
 of one man or excites him to virtue, shall lead another into errour, or 
 plunge him into vice."* The truth of this remark has been illustrated, 
 we fear, by the moral failings of many virtuous minds ; and is a circum- 
 stance to be accounted for only in the way in which we have attempted 
 
 *Letter8 on the Study of History. Letter 11. p. 25. 
 
 9 
 
Vlll 
 
 to explain it. Tlie same writer observes, that the chief advantage to 
 be derived from tlie study of History is, that " it prepares us for ex- 
 perience, and guides us in it." This observation however, will by no 
 means admit of an universal application. Were it unexceptionably 
 true, that this study, or any other, is capable of preparing us for an in- 
 tercourse with the world, the very cases we have been supposing, 
 would be the less pardonable, and indeed could scarce possibly occur. 
 Histoi-y, which has been denominated or defined, "Philosophy teaching 
 by example," has certainly its uses ; but, we fear, that the influence 
 of its precepts and examples on the moral character, will never be ac- 
 counted in the number. The topic doubtless, might afford many cu- 
 rious and perhaps useful speculations. Before, however, we could 
 hope to establish the doctrine of the practical uses of History, we 
 should have to encounter the Moral Philosophy of Adam Smith — parti- 
 cularly those parts of his Theory of Moral Sentiments, which treat ot 
 the Nature and Origin of the Principle of Moral Approbation. 
 
 (o) In the V. Part of his Inquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful, 
 Burke remarks, " So little does Poetry depend for its effect upon the 
 power of raising sensible images, that I am convinced it would lose a 
 very considerable part of its energy, if this were the necessary result 
 of all description." And yet, in one of the earlier numbers of the Quar- 
 terly Review, (for 18 10, we believe) we are told that it is this very 
 power of raising sensible images, which constitutes the great merit of 
 Sir Walter Scotts's poetry. When the Reviewer observes, in allusion 
 to his poetry, that it " strikingly illustrates the analogy between poetry 
 and painting," the remark will be admitted, we think, to imply the 
 power of raising sensible images — a power which Burke denies to po- 
 etry. The fact is however, that this power must be conceded to poe- 
 try ; although it by no means implies that botanic accuracy in deline- 
 ating natural objects, which Mr. Bowles contends for, and which is pe- 
 culiar to the descriptive branch of poetry, (the lowest branch of the art, 
 according to Lord Byron) and the distinguishing feature in that of Sir 
 Walter Scott. Poetry may present us with the finest and the most af- 
 fecting pictures or images, without any laboured process of the kind. 
 In fact, this minuteness of detail is destructive of that instantaneous and 
 striking effect which is always produced by fine poetry. It may be 
 said to hunt down the image so completely, that the mind either passes 
 it over altogether, or but indistinctly perceives it. Poetry, in order 
 to raise images of objects, whether animate or inanimate, has only to 
 concentrate those " traits of truth," which are immediately and every 
 where acknowledged. In the following extract from Lord Byron's 
 beautiful Poem called the Dream, we are presented, by a few genuine 
 touches, with an Eastern Picture perhaps more perfect, even in its li- 
 beral form, than Painting could possibly have rendered it. 
 
 He lay 
 
 Reposing from the noontide sultriness, 
 
 Couch'd among fallen columns, in the shade 
 Of ruin'd walls that had survived the names 
 Of those who rear'd them ; by his sleeping side, 
 
IX 
 
 >>ioo(l camels grazing, and some goodly steeds 
 Were fasten'd near a fountain ; and a man 
 Clad in a flowing garb, did watch the while, 
 While many of his tribe slumbfer'd around ; 
 And they were canopied by the blue sky, 
 So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful, 
 That God alone was to be seen in Heaven. 
 
 There is nothing^ of labour or minutenes in this exqtiisite description. 
 The touclies of the wonderful Artist are few but g'raphic — lig'ht but dis- 
 tinct, and vivid yet perfectly clear. Had Burke lived to see theso 
 lines, he would have been forced to acknowledge that they present one 
 of the most beautiful of " sensible images" — and would have been led to 
 form a very different opinion of the powers of Poetry, from the one 
 which he seems to have entertained. That there are many abstrac- 
 tions which poetry is incapable of representing, is no argument against 
 its power of raising or presenting pictures of such objects as our senses 
 are conversant with. Painting itself, is incapable of embodying cer- 
 tain abstract ideas. When Burke tells us therefore, that Virgil's de- 
 scription of the formation of the Thunder under the hammer of the Cy- 
 clops, conveys no image whatever of the thing described, we would ask 
 whether any Painting could present us with an image or picture of a 
 mere effect in nature ? No poetry or painting can embody the Thun- 
 der, because we cannot embody objects of sound. 
 
 (/?) These lines, will probably remind the reader of More's beautiful 
 translation of Anacrean's Ode to this musical little Insect, 
 
 In wisdom mirthful, wise in mirth. 
 
 (q) This objection lies with peculiar force against the Tragedy of 
 ''middling life," asit has been termed by Mr. Campbell. So far from 
 ••' accommodating the shows of things to the desires of the mind," which 
 is' the legitimate end of all poetry, the familiar tragedy tends to bring 
 down these desires to the realities of things — which is directly to defeat 
 that end, and is the very reverse of Bacons celebrated proposition. It 
 is for this reason that Comedy ranks so much below Tragedy — its 
 representations are too familiar to produce any lasting impression. 
 The tragedy of middling life comprises much powerful dramatic talent; 
 and admits, no doubt, of many stricking and affecting situations ; but 
 it rejects the embelishments of poetry and the nobler passions, and is 
 so far essentially inferior to the more dignified tragedy. There are 
 many scenes in George Barnwell well conceived and executed, but 
 the only effect which either the perusal or representation of it ever 
 had with us, was to produce a strong sensation of disgust. It is per- 
 haps upon the same principle, that we may account for the want of 
 interest in the Sentimental Comedy ; and for the mirth rather than 
 the melancholy, which its Poor Gentlemen, its Lieutenant Worthing- 
 tons," full of their Canada crotchets," who "disdain all solicitations," 
 and yet are continually incurring obligations, are calculated to in- 
 spire. There is alwaj's something of the ridiculous (than which no- 
 thing can be more distructive of poetic eiFect) thrown around such 
 
personages by the comments in which the rest of the Dramatis PersoncB 
 usually indulge. So that these unfortunate persons seem brought 
 upon the stage merely for the amusement of the audience; to whom 
 they might very appropriately address the question of Lieutenant 
 Worthington to Frederick, " I cannot think you came here to insult 
 me?" With regard to those representations of poetry which border 
 upon the horrible and disgusting, they fail entirely of the intended ef- 
 fect. Dr. Wharton, in his Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope, 
 has given us a literal prose translation from T)ante, which affords 
 a striking illustration of our remark. The Poet represents a 
 whole family perishing from hunger in a dungeon ! It is a strong 
 conception, characteristic of " the Bard of hell," and forcibly 
 delineated — but we turn with loathing from the picture — ^why ? be- 
 cause it is full of that disgusting minuteness of detail which, while it 
 constitutes the great merit of iLe composition, presents to the fancy 
 images of human suffering too immediately reflected from the life. 
 Who that listened to Burk's celebrated Speech upon the impeachment 
 of Warren Hastings in the House of Commons, but must have felt 
 his blood run cold, and his heart sicken at the horrible fidelity of de- 
 tail, with which the transcendant genius of the indignant Orator de- 
 picted the enormities of a Monster who, with a fastidiousness not un- 
 frequently alUed to crime, had refined upon human cruelty to a de- 
 gree almost inconceiveable to thought. It was a fine effort of Genius, 
 but a disgusting picture — and this for the reason we have just assigned. 
 The celebrated passage from Dante to which we have alluded, is 
 undoubtedly the original of Lord Byron's beautiful and pathetic Tale of 
 the Prisoner of Chillon. But let anj^ one attend to the exquisite 
 and affecting narrative of the English Poet, and he will find that it is 
 totally divested of those disgusting traits which mark its Italian 
 Prototype. 
 
 MONODY, 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF LORD BYRO^. 
 
 Thei'e is a tear that flows for all who die, 
 
 The humblest plaim the tribute of a sigh; 
 
 None fall unhonored, though unknown to fame, . 
 
 Affection loves, affliction mourns each name. 
 
 For still some tie of nature binds the heart. 
 
 And nought can rend it like the words, " we part ! 
 
 That bitter doom whioli all who live must bear, 
 
 Slieds over life the darkness of despair ; 
 
 Bids fond affection mourn the hope it nurst. 
 
 And o'er its blighted feelings spend itself — and burst. 
 
 Th' untutor'd peasant, bondman to the soil 
 
 On which he treads, who knows no life but toil, 
 
 Still leaves some void in some aching breast, 
 
 Some sigh of sorrow when he sinks to rest. 
 
 Such is the common tributary woe 
 
.* 
 
 XI 
 
 Which all who live to all who die must owe, 
 
 But, there's a softer and a tenderer tie, 
 
 A fonder love, a deeper sympathy. 
 
 That links the heart to the immortal Mind, 
 
 The all of life that lingers stiU behind, 
 
 When death and dampness have usurped* the light, 
 
 And laid the form in darkness and in blight. 
 
 And his was of tlie brightest ! such as ne'er 
 
 Sliall shine again through many a rolling year ! 
 
 The moon goes down — the sun and stars decline, 
 
 But rise again, — and set, — and rise to shine : — 
 
 But scarce in twice a thousand j'ears is given 
 
 To flash o'er earth the Meteor light of heaven. 
 
 The awful splendours of that bursting Sun 
 
 Blaze, dazzle, and explode — and all is done. 
 
 Such is the dying glorj', such the gloom 
 
 That marks thy course, Oh Genius ! to the tomb. 
 
 A few brief years of fickle fame blown o'er. 
 
 The hero sinks — the bard is heard no more — 
 
 The wretched bauble of a doubtful name. 
 
 The only legacy bequeathed to fame ; 
 
 That loves to lie when virtue is its theme, 
 
 The madman's phrenzy, or the poet's dream ; — ^ 
 
 But utters stern, inhuman truths, to try 
 
 How much of venom links with Calumny ; 
 
 How the dull fool, the envious, and the vain, 
 
 Will darken truth, and lie from lust of gain — 
 
 Slur o'er the virtues which they cannot shake, 
 
 Pervert, conceal, and damn for falsehood's sake I 
 
 Yes, damn — as far as Dullness can defame, 
 
 That never praises where it cannot blame. 
 
 Witness the coward, whose ignoble aim 
 
 Struck at the early promise of his fame, 
 
 Who left a base and prostituted page. 
 
 The most unblushing libel on the age I 
 
 Whose meaner spirit and plebeian blood, 
 
 Instinctive shrink from all that's great or good. 
 
 Too dull for feeling, callous e'en to shame, 
 
 Inheritor of infamy by name ! 
 
 Too vile for just rebuke, at once to vain ; 
 
 The worst of critics and perhaps of men. 
 
 To live despised, to die without a tear. 
 
 The meet reward of all his actions here. 
 
 Perhaps hereafter doomed himself to feel 
 
 The gentle castigations of that wheel, 
 
 His pious spirit and meek love of truth 
 
 Bade him prepare for genius and for youth. 
 
 But be his last and deadliest thought to know, 
 
 His was the first and the unkindest blow 
 
 That, ere the Eaglet chipped his early shell. 
 
 Aimed at his heart, and aiming struck too well ! 
 
 The noble bird, though wounded, plumed again 
 
 His mighty wing, and soared aloof from men. 
 
Xli 
 
 And though the venom but impelled lus tliglii 
 
 To higher efforts and nobler height, 
 
 The shaft withdrawn, the poison rankled still, 
 
 And never ceased to pain — but could not kill. 
 
 Bear witness thou — but why revert to thee, 
 
 Why tell again thy guilt's dark history. 
 
 Or wake anew the pangs that must perforce 
 
 Feed on tliy heart as V ultures on a corse ? 
 
 If thou has aught of human feeling left. 
 
 Think of the widowed heart thou hast bereft ; 
 
 Think of the ties thy perfidy hath broke. 
 
 Think of the love that withered at the stroke, 
 
 The deadly stroke thy malice coldly dealt, 
 
 And thou wilt feel — if thou hast ever felt — 
 
 Feel — tiU thy heart in its own flames consume, 
 
 Nor even find a refuge in the tomb ! 
 
 But like the victim round lostEblis' throne. 
 
 Condemned to tortures endless and alone, 
 
 Thy life an immortality of pain, 
 
 A heart that never can know peace again. 
 
 Or if at length permitted to expire. 
 
 Die like the Scorpion in the 'midst of fire ! 
 
 But shouldst thou live, and haply live to trace 
 
 The Father's image in that Infant's face, 
 
 As yet unconscious of the bitter woe 
 
 Which springs from loss of those we loved below. 
 
 How will it wrap thy guilty heart in flame 
 
 To hear that infant lisp that father's name ! 
 
 But she, at least, to natui'e's dictates true. 
 
 Will spurn the wretch who tore the links in two. 
 
 That left her lonely ere her morn had fled. 
 
 To mourn, and early orphan ! o'er the dead. 
 
 But, it is past — his injured Spirit ne'er 
 
 Shall sigh again o'er all that wounded here. 
 
 And has tliat awfwl spirit passed away, 
 
 And ceased to animate its haughty clay ? 
 
 The minstrel's hand is cold — the lyre unstrung, 
 
 And hushed the numbers of the prophet's tongue. 
 
 That voice that erst in Albion's Isle arose — 
 
 Dark isle! the source of those domestic woes 
 
 That like a cloud o'erhung his morning ray, 
 
 And veiled the promise of a better day — 
 
 That voice attuned to themes of love and woe, 
 
 With a deep skill each deeper chord to know ; 
 
 That pierced the depths of human life to find 
 
 Subjects congenial with his mighty mind ; 
 
 That o'er the h^re with prophetic burst. 
 
 Poured the deep sorrows tliat his heart had nursl — 
 
 That voice that woke tlie Childe's immortal strain 
 
 Of wars, and woes, and wilds beyond the main ; 
 
 That sung, with touching eloquence imbued. 
 
 The Chieftain's glory, and the Clansman's feud — 
 
 The wreck of love — the loss of peace — the woe 
 
XIll 
 
 Confiding^ hearts are doomed to feel below — 
 
 Such hearts as burst upon the sea-beat shore 
 
 Where sad Medora sunk to rise no more ; 
 
 Such hearts as burned in Parasina's breast, 
 
 Who, where she should not love, yet loved the best, 
 
 With a deep feeling virtue dares not know, 
 
 But with a fondness seldom felt below — 
 
 Such hearts as broke when Love that cheered in vain, 
 
 Saw Hope with Lara sink upon the plain, 
 
 Revealed the truth its fondness sought to hide. 
 
 And in a burst ofphrenzy spent itself — and died! 
 
 But deeper, darker, deadlier still, the heart 
 
 Which drove stern Manfred from man's guilty mart, 
 
 To roam the desert's genial solitude. 
 
 Where no rude cares or harsher griefs intrude. 
 
 Sick of the busy bitterness of life. 
 
 Whose latest scenes are not exempt from strife. 
 
 His wounded spirit sought the home of storms. 
 
 Held dark communion with the mountain's forms. 
 
 Drank deep instruction through the heart and eye, 
 
 And found " 'tis not so difficult to die."* 
 
 The voice is hushed those scenes that chaunted o'er ; 
 
 The minstrel sleeps ,on earth to wake no more ! — 
 
 The Muse laments her favorite's early end. 
 And o'er his tomb is sorrowing seen to bend, 
 While with pale cheek and trembling hand she weaves 
 Her latest wreath for him o'er whom she grieves. 
 In her dark eye the tear grows gathering fast, 
 As o'er his cold remains she looks her last. 
 When at the shrine another Form appears. 
 And blends her sorrows with the Muse's tears. 
 Though veiled in gloom, the glories of her eye. 
 And martial front, proclaimed her Liberty ! 
 From Helle's stream she traced her mournful way, 
 In Hellas' name her tribute here to pay. 
 The silent Goddess stalked round the dead. 
 Closed her sad eye, and drooped her heavy head- 
 Then bared her temples to the Western breeze, 
 \nd sought a refuge o'er Atlantic seas. 
 
 The Lyre is broke — the Muse's heart is riven — 
 And with her favorite Minstrel fled to heaven I 
 
 ^'Old man, 'tis not difficult to die."— Jlfon/rerf. 
 
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