The illustrious writers of this period are numerous; a few only must be mentioned:-Johnson, Robertson, Hume, Gibbon, Melmoth, Burke, Paley, Southey, Washington Irving, Walter Scott, and Robert Hall.

To this list may be justly appended the well-known periodicals, the Quarterly and Edinburgh Reviews, as having contributed much to the revival of an energetic Style of Writing.

2. The frequent Practice of Composition.

1. From what has been already said, it must be obvious, that excellence in Composition, as in every other art, can be the result only of much practice, careful correction, and the study of good models. The pupil should, therefore, compose frequently and with care. Not a week should be allowed to elapse without making some effort; for, when the attempts are few, and made at long intervals, the mind loses all relish for the art.

2. Not only is frequent and regular practice in composition necessary, but, also, care that the efforts be welldirected. The first object of attention should be, to acquire a distinct and well-matured view of the subject, what moral is intended to be enforced, or what particular truths and facts to be explained and illustrated. By this means, a degree of interest will be excited in the subject, and the words and expressions which offer themselves to the excited mind, in conveying what it distinctly sees, will generally be the best. Inaccuracies and violations of Rules will, no doubt, occur in the efforts of the young writer, but these can be removed in a revisal.

3. In revising our Composition, we must be cautious, lest by attempting to refine and polish, we destroy the force and originality of the expressions. It is much better, as a general Rule, merely to correct inaccuracies, and leave a higher degree of polish to be attained by an improvement of the taste, resulting from the study of good models.

The efforts of the young writer for improvement must, therefore, be directed, in the first place, to the attainment of distinct views of his subject, to the selection of the most suitable arguments bearing on his subject, and the clear and forcible conveyance of his ideas to others. The ornaments of style must form a secondary consideration.

4. When a good style has been attained, it is still of importance, if we wish to preserve it, to compose occasionally

with care and attention. For style, like every other acquisition, when it has ceased to be cultivated, will deteriorate.

In addition to the preceding remarks, the young student may derive advantage by attending to the following hints on this subject;

1. One means, not only of strengthening the memory, but of improving the expression is, occasionally to commit to memory, and repeat, in the most accurate manner, select portions from the best writers.

2. The practice of translating from some foreign language, not only increases our vocabulary and the power of nice discrimination in the use of words, but also of properly arranging and constructing our sentences. It is, therefore, recommended, that much time be devoted to this practice.

3. Occasionally writing down what we recollect of a sermon or lecture, will also be very advantageous.

4. Let a portion of some author be read very carefully over two or three times, till the facts are well impressed on the memory; then, lay aside the book, and try to reproduce the passage from recollection, and afterwards, make a comparison between your own composition and that of the original. This exercise will improve your style as well as increase your vocabulary.

5. During the act of composition, let not the current of your thoughts be interrupted from want of a proper word or phrase, but either leave a blank, or take any word that presents itself, and mark it to be afterwards corrected. When you have done, lay the composition aside for a few days, that your particular attachment for it may subside; afterwards, correct every violation of grammar or of style, and make such alterations as a critical examination may suggest.

223

POETRY.

Its Nature. Poetry may be defined to be, "Vivid feelings and conceptions clothed in harmonious language, generally

in metre."

Poetry is produced by various powers common to most persons, but more especially by those which are almost peculiar to the poet, namely, Fancy, and the crowning spirit-Imagination. This last is the first moving or creating principle of the mind, which fashions, out of materials previously existing, new conceptions and original truths, not absolutely justifiable by the ordinary rules of logic, but quite intelligible to the mind when duly elevated-intelligible through our sympathies and our sensibility.

The distinction between Imagination and Fancy is, that the former altogether changes and remodels the original idea, impregnating it with something extraneous; -the other leaves it undisturbed, but associates it with things to which, in some view or other, it bears a resemblance.

Were we required to give examples of authors whose works are conspicuous for these qualities, we should adduce Milton for Imagination, and Sir Walter Scott for Fancy. The Imagination of Milton peoples the elements with fantastic forms, and fills the earth with unearthly heroism, intellect, and beauty. It is an intense and burning power, a concentration of the intellect, gathering together its wandering faculties, and bursting forth in a flood of thought, that staggers the apprehension which would pursue it. On the other hand, Sir Walter Scott usually delineates those objects with which he is perfectly familiar, and, with an accuracy and minuteness of discrimination, which we are not accustomed to expect from verbal description. "The rocks, the ravines, and the torrents, which he exhibits," observes a writer in the Quarterly Review, "are not the imperfect sketches of a hurried traveller, but the finished studies of a resident artist, deliberately drawn from different points of view; each has its true shape and position; it is a portrait; it has its name by which the spectator is invited to examine the exactness of the resemblance. The figures which are combined with the landscape are painted with the same fidelity. Like those of Salvator Rosa, they are perfectly appropriate to the spot on which they stand. The boldness of feature, the lightness and compactness of form, the wildness of air, and the careless ease of attitude, of these mountaineers, are as congenial to their native Highlands, as the birch and the pine which darken their glens, the sedge which fringes their lakes, or the heath which waves over their moors."

Another quality of poetry is imagery, by which even abstract ideas and indefinite objects are generally moulded into shape. It is thus, that certain virtues and qualities of the mind are brought visibly before us. Inanimate matter, also, is raised to life, or its essence extracted for some poetical purpose. Thus, the moon becomes a vestal, and the night is clothed in a starry train; the sea is a monster or a god; the winds and the streams are populous with spirits; and the sun is a giant rejoicing in his strength. Though poetry consists much in imagery, its excellence, of course, must vary in proportion as those images are appropriate and perfect.

The Subjects of Poetry. Poetry, with the exception of Satire, deals with the grand, the terrible, the beautiful; but seldom, or never, with the mean. Its principle is elevation, and not depression or degradation. It is true, that in tragedy or narrative, characters and images of the lowest cast are sometimes admitted; but, for the purposes of contrast only, or to "point a moral." Under this view, the stream, the valley, the time-wasted ruin and the mossy cell, the riotous waves and the golden sky, the stars, the storm,

and the mad winds, ocean, and the mountain which kisses heaven-Love, Beauty, Despair, Ambition, and Revenge, in short, all the objects of the external and internal world, the face of nature, the vicissitudes of fortune, and all the pas sions of man, which lift his thoughts from the dust and stir him to madness-almost every thing which has in it a strong principle of impulse or elevation, belongs to the province of poetry.

The meaner things of life, its tameness and mediocrity, its selfishness, envy, and repining, though subdued occasionally to the use of poetry-are too base for an alliance with it; and creep on, from age to age, recorded, indeed, and immortalized, but for the sake of example only, and trampled under the feet of the Muse.

As the object of poetry is not to diminish and make mean, but to magnify and aggrandize, it never dwarfs the great statures of nature, nor reduces the spirit to the contemplation of humble objects. Its standards are above, and not below, mortality. In its choice of subjects, art will be preferred to science, and nature, to both.

Occasionally, the poorest things have, indeed, been exalted and placed on a level with the loftiest, but we shall find, on close examination, that most, if not all of these instances, are unavailable; that the things spoken of derive their importance, not from themselves, but from the relation which they bear with matters of higher

moment.

The Language of Poetry. In Poetry, the language, except when we intend to degrade, should not be technical, common, or colloquial, because sounds which we hear on common occasions, do not usually make strong impressions or convey delightful images; while words, to which we are nearly strangers, whenever they occur, draw that attention to themselves which they should convey to things. A certain strength and nobleness of style, particularly in the higher departments of poetry, are so essential, that a poem, which has both invention and enthusiasm in the highest degree, would be ridiculous, if the language were cold and feeble.

The Intention of Poetry. Poetry is calculated to instruct and reprove, as well as to please and persuade.

It has been asserted, that the object of poetry is, to please; and certainly, this is one, though by no means the sole object of the art. It has also been said, that although, in moral poetry, improvement may be blended with amusement, the latter is, nevertheless, the object. This opinion, however, we consider to be erroneous. In the case of didactic poetry, such as, "The Essay on Man," or, "The Art of Preserving Health," the aim is instruction, and verse is but the medium or the attraction which the poet employs. In satire, the object is not to please a friend, but to sting an enemy; the prophecies, also, of the Bible must be admitted to have had an object beyond pleasure. The war-songs of the ancients were to stimulate the soldier; and their laments were to soothe regret. Poetry contains a strong stimulant; and, although, a feeling of pleasure may blend with other emotions, it does not follow, that the attempts of poetry are not directed to objects different from those of merely

"pleasing." It is, therefore, as we have stated, calculated to instruct and reprove, as well as to please and persuade.

The Origin and Progress of Poetry. On this part of our subject, we cannot do better than furnish our readers with the graphic detail given by Sir Walter Scott, in his Introductory Remarks on Popular Poetry. "When the organs and faculties of a primitive race have developed themselves, each for its proper and necessary use, there is a natural tendency to employ them in a more refined and regulated manner for purposes of amusement and persuasion. The savage, after proving the activity of his limbs in the chase or the battle, trains them to more measured movements, to dance at the festivals of his tribe, or to perform obeisance before the altars of his deity. From the same impulse, he is disposed to refine the ordinary speech which forms the vehicle of social communication between himself and his brethren, until, by a more ornate diction, modulated by certain rules of rhythm, cadence, assonance of termination, or recurrence of sound or letter, he obtains a dialect more solemn in expression, to record the laws or exploits of his tribe, or more sweet in sound, in which to plead his own cause to the object of his affection.

"It is not probable that, by any researches of modern times, we shall ever reach back to an earlier model of poetry than Homer; but, as there lived heroes before Agamemnon, so, unquestionably, poets existed before the immortal bard who gave the King of kings his fame; and he whom all civilized nations now acknowledge as the Father of Poetry, must have himself looked back to an ancestry of poetical predecessors, and is held original only because we know not from whom he copied. Indeed, though much must be ascribed to the riches of his own individual genius, the poetry of Homer argues a degree of perfection in an art which practice had already rendered regular, and concerning which, his frequent mention of the bards, or chanters, of poetry, indicates plainly, that it was studied by many, and known and admired by all.

"It is, indeed, easily discovered, that the qualities necessary for composing such poems, are not the portion of every man in the tribe; that the bard, to reach excelence in his art, must possess something more than a full command of words and phrases, and the knack of arranging them in such form as ancient examples have fixed upon as the recognized structure of national verse. The tribe speedily become sensible, that besides this degree of mechanical facility, which (like making what are called at school nonsense verses) may be attained by mere memory and practice, much higher qualifications are demanded. A keen and active power of observation, capable of perceiving, at a glance, the leading circumstances from which the incident described derives its character; quick and powerful feelings, to enable the bard to comprehend and delineate those of the actors in his piece; and a command of language, alternately soft and elevated, and suited to express the conceptions which he had formed in his mind, are all necessary to eminence in the poetical art.

"Above all, to attain the highest point of his profession, the poet must have that original power of embodying and detailing circumstances, which can place before the eyes of others a scene which exists only in his own imagination. This last high and creative faculty, namely, that of impressing the mind of the hearers with scenes and sentiments having no existence save through their art, has procured for the bards of Greece the term of Пoinrns, which, as it singularly happens, is literally translated by the Scottish epithet for the same class of persons, whom they termed the Makers. The French phrase of Trouveurs, or Troubadours, namely, the Finders or Inventors, has the same reference to the quality of original conception and invention proper to the poetical art, and without which it can hardly be said to exist to any pleasing or useful purpose.

"The mere arrangement of words into poetical rhythm, or combining them according to a technical rule or measure, is so closely connected with the art of music, that an alliance between these two fine arts is very soon closely formed. It is fruitless to enquire which of them was first invented, since, doubtless, the precedence was accidental; and it signifies little whether the musician adapts verses to a rude tune, or whether the primitive poet, in reciting his productions, falls naturally into a chant or song. With this additional accomplishment, the poet becomes the man of song, and his character is complete when the additional accompaniment of a lute or harp is added to his vocal performance.

"Here, therefore, we have the history of early poetry in all nations. But it is evident that, though poetry seems a plant proper to almost all soils, yet not only is it of various kinds, according to the climate and country in which it has its origin, but the poetry of different nations differs still more widely in the degree of excellence which it attains. This must depend, in some measure, no doubt, on the temper and manners of the people, or their proximity to those spirit-stirring events which are naturally selected as the subject of poetry, and on the more comprehensive or energetic character of the language spoken by the tribe. But the progress of the art is far more dependent upon the rise of some highly-gifted individual, possessing, in