at twenty-three addreffed an epistle to R. Lloyd*, equal at leaft to any fimilar compofition of that author; and at twentyeight lent his name, as well as two of his compofitions, to adorn the Horatian compilation of the Duncombes. The peculiari ties of his character and conflitution fufficiently account for these facts; and, while they intereft us the more for the individual, make us figh for human nature, which, with its most enviable talents, has frequently no lefs demand upon our pity and regret. Mr. Hayley has laboured to illuftrate the amiableness of his friend's character, and we think with good fuccefs; but there are a few Letters in the early part of the compilation which judicious readers in general wifh omitted. They are full of that enthufiaftic Calvinifm which caufed the chief wretchedness of the poet's life. In a gleam of religious hope, he could write thus to his coufin, Mrs. Cowper. "I am glad you are acquainted fo particularly with all the circumftances of my story," (evidently, from collateral paffages, a ftory of fome fuppofed converfion and fanciful experiences,) for I know that your fecrecy and discretion may be trufted with any thing. A thread of mercy ran through all the intricate maze of thofe afflictive Providences, fo myflerious to myfelf at the time, and which must ever remain fo to all who will not fee what was the great defign of them. At the judgment-feat of Chrift the whole fhall be laid open. How is the rod of iron changed into a fceptre of love!" But when a conflitutional melancholy reverted to thefe ideas, the unhappy poet faw nothing but the rod of iron; and, after living a life of hermit-like fimplicity and innocence, fancied himself irreverfibly condemned. A fronger warning againft a religion acting by enthusiasm, and operating primarily on the imagination, cannot eafily be given; but in this light the biographer has not at all difplayed it. The Life of Cowper, as a picture of events, lies in a very narrow compass. He was born Nov. 26, 1731; was educated at Weftminfter School, which he left in 1749, was three years in the house of an attorney, and then twelve in chambers in the Inner Temple; whence, after two vain attempts to bring him into public life, in fituations of parliamentary business, he retired into the country, first for the fake of recovery, then as a fixed refidence, f at Huntingdon, then at Olney, thirdly at the village of Wefton, near Olney, and laftly in a melancholy removal, made neceffary by the ftate of his health, but never completely fuccefsful in its object. The principal * Here printed, vol. i. p. 15. events of his latter years were, the publication of his two volumes of Poems, and of his tranflation of Homer; and he died on the 25th of April, 1800, at the age of 69. The general outline of his life is depicted by himfelf, with agreeable humour, in a paffage from a Letter to Mr. Park*. "From the age of twenty to thirty-three, I was occupied, or ought to have been, in the ftudy of the law; from thirty-three to fixty, I have spent my life in the country, where my reading has been only an apology for idleness; and where, when I had not either a Magazine or a Review, I was fometimes a carpenter, at others a bird cagemaker, or a gardener, or a drawer of landfcapes. At fifty years of age I commenced an author. It is a whim that has ferved me longest and beft, and will probably be my laft." P. 19. The extenfion of this fmall outline, to two volumes in quarto, is effected by the infertion of many Letters and fome Poems, the former not always of much intereft, but serving in general to illuftrate the character of the writer. Cowper, in his Tirocinium, has declared against public fchools, a ftrange herefy for a Weftminster man; but he who was the intimate of Colman, Thornton, and Lloyd, wrote for them and with them, and imbibed, in the fame ftudies, that tafte which made the chief comfort and all the glory of his life, aught not to have been infenfible to the advantages of that education; without the aid of which, the morbid fenfibility of his mind would doubtless have depreffed him more completely, and prevented all attempts towards exertion. Mr. Hayley has partly owned this, in an early part of the volumes (p. 10,) and it feems to us as certain, as any pofition depending upon an untried experiment can be. Cowper's first volume of Poems was publifhed, if we miftake not, early in 1782; for it is rather fingular, that the pre-" fent Life leaves that circumftance doubtful. We find him correcting the prefs in 1781 (p. 107) but have no further information on the fubject. "The immediate fuccefs of his first volume," fays his biographer, "was very far from being equal to its extraordinary merit." We have never felt that this volume was likely of itself to excite much of public attention to the author; and though, now his fame is established, it is easy to triumph over the unlucky critic (whoever he was) who reprefented the author as "a good devout gentleman, with a particle of true poetical genius," we cannot 66 Mr. Thomas Park, bred an engraver, but fince known as a man of literary pursuits, the friend of poetry and poets, himself poffeffed of good talents, and no less esteemed for amiable manners, think that the decifion was very erroneous, fo far as his heroic couplets are concerned. It required fuch an effort as the Taík, a poem full of harmony, variety, and almoft every kind of beauty, to prove to the public the real capacity of the author. With the higheft admiration of that production, and a confequent affection for the writer, which it is highly formed to excite, we have frequently endeavoured, but in vain, to read through the Poems which occupy the firfl three hundred pages of the prior volume. It has proved almoft impoffible; and we know that the fame has been felt by other readers of the most decided poetical tafte, judgment, and even genius. The conflruction of the lines is frequently feeble, carelefs, and inharmonious; and the proofs of peetic power, which occafionally appear, are too few in number to compenfate for the labour of perufing the interncliate parts. Perhaps, however, we should not have faid carelets; for this mode of writing couplet verfe was, in Cowper, the effect of fyftem and defign; and, as the opinion of Cowper on fuch a fubject must be worthy of attention, we shall lay before our readers his own arguments for it. It happened that fome revifer of his MS. had taken the liberty to alter one of his lines, which drew from him the following remonftrance to his bookfeller. I did not write the line, that has been tampered with, haftily' or without due attention to the conftruction of it; and what appeared to me its only mexit is, in its prefent fate, entirely annihilated." "I know that the ears of modern verfe-writers are delicate to an excefs, and their readers are troubled with the fame fqueamishness as themfelves; fo that if a line do not run as fmooth as quickfilver they are offended. A critic of the prefent day ferves a poem as a cook ferves a dead turkey, when the faftens the legs of it to a poft, and draws out all the finews. For this we may thank Pope; but, unless we could imitate him in the clofenefs and compactness of his expreffion, as well as in the smoothness of his numbers, we had better drop the imitation, which ferves no other purpose than to emafculate and weaken all we write. Give me a manly, rough line, with a deal of meaning in it, rather than a whole poem full of musical periods, that have nothing but their oily fweetness to recommend them! "I have faid thus much, as I hinted in the beginning, because I have juft finifhed a much longer poem than the laft, which our common friend will receive by the fame metfenger that has charge of this Lever. In that poem are many lines, which an ear, fo nice as that gentleman's, who made the abovementioned alteration, would undoubtedly condenin; and yet (if I may be permitted to fay it) they cannot be made fmoother without being the worfe for it. There is a roughnefs on a plumb, which nobody that understands fruit would rub off, though the plumb would be much more polished without it. But left I tire you, I will only add, that I with you to guard me for the future from all fuch meddling, affuring you, that I always write as fmoothly fmoothly as I can; but that I never did, never will, facrifice the spirit or fenfe of a paflage to the found of it." Vol. ii. p. 272. There are few pofitions in this argument to which a judicious critic will not affent. The fweetnefs of Pope has enabled thousands of mere verfifiers to conftruct mellifluous lines, void of all strength and meaning. It has led to the monotonous chant of the yet more exaggerated Darwinian dulcification, (which, ftrange to fay, Cowper admired, or at leaft complimented,) than which, the rougheft lines of Churchill, or of Cowper's maternal anceflor, Donne himself, are infinitely more tolerable. But the queftion is, whether the practice of Cowper, founded on thefe fentiments, was judicious. We think not, and fhall give fame reafons for our opinion; paying the more attention to this question, because we know that one of the best poets now living admires the couplets of Cowper, and proceeds frequently, though, to our tafte, with, much more fuccefs, on his plan. If there is danger that our poets fhould fall into mere unmeaning fweetnefs, there is alfo fome, left by avoiding that fault, with too little judgment, they should bring us back to unpolifhed harfhnefs. To Cowper's profaic judgment of Pope, let us add his poetical decifion, and then confider his own practice. "Then Pope, as harmony itfelf exact, In verfe well difciplin'd, complete, compact; That, quite eclipfing pleafure's painted face, Ev'n of the fools that trampled on their laws. So nice his ear, fo delicate his touch) Made poetry a mere mechanic art, And ev'ry warbler has his tune by heart." Table-Talk. It is true," every warbler" (who can warble, for we, alas, meet with many who have no tune)" has his tune by heart,' yet fill it should be a fong, and not a mere fpeech. Now, in this very character of Pope, if we allow that the two first lines, though not fmooth, are better than fmooth, juft, vigorous, and animated, what can we fay to the languid and profaic conftruction of the four next? It is not merely that the fenfe is continued through the four lines, which fome poets fear too much, and Cowper too little; but that there is no contrivance or conftruction in the paffage. Let us take another example from the fame Poem. "But that effeminacy, folly, luft, Enervate and enfeeble, and needs muft, And And that a nation fhamefully debas'd There is a time, and juftice marks the date, Is punish'd, and down comes the thunderbolt." Not to dwell too much on the "needs muft," which furely has no peculiar force or beauty, where can be a more profaic line than the fourth? And even the concluding verse, which ought to be full of vigour, and to wind up the whole with effect, does not, to our apprehenfion, by any means perform its task. We have expatiated the more on this topic, because we feel it important to the interefts of true poetry; and are unwilling that an erroneous practice should be introduced, on fuch an authority as that of Cowper, whofe general title to the claim of poet we fhould be the laft perfons in the world to controvert. We do not indeed think, even of his firft volume, that it fhows the deficiency of genius, which his unfortunate critic alledged; but it difplays, to our feelings, the effect of true genius, carrying a good principle too far; and, therefore, not doing juftice to itself. In turning over the Poem we have now cited, and others with it, we can point out many paffages of genius; but alfo many intervals of heavy matter, not made pleafing by the manner of adorning it. Let us end, however, this part of our difcuffion with a favourable fpecimen, the poet's character of a poet, from the fame Table-Talk. 5. 66 Nature, exerting an unwearied pow'r, Forms, opens, and gives fcent to ev'ry flow'r; With mufic modulating all their notes, And charms the woodland fcenes and wilds unknown, Skill'd in the characters that form mankind; |