1832.] [ 383 ] 



A WINTER EVENING WITH THE POETS. 



WE have been anxiously looking forward to the delight of passing 

 one of these long winter evenings in the contemplation of our immortal 

 poets ; to creep away for a brief season from the tumultuous clamour 

 and the hateful passions of tory despotism and democratical phrenzy, 

 into the cool and ever verdant umbrage surrounding the fountain of our 

 early poetry. How grateful and refreshing to the mental eye, dazzled 

 by the gilded luxury of modern days, are the beautiful colours still 

 floating over the rural pictures of old Chaucer ; and with what a balmy 

 and restoring influence does the divine air of Milton's " Paradise" steal 

 upon our senses as we gradually ascend into the pure atmosphere of his 

 holy imagination. The cry has gone forth that the age of poetry is past. 

 We grant the truth of the conclusion, but dissent from the premises. 

 Poetry has not departed from our minstrels, but taste and feeling from 

 the public. The supply has diminished in proportion to the demand. 

 The fact of a MS. volume of poems by the late George Crabbe, having 

 remained in the hands of Mr. Murray for several years unpublished, is an 

 authentication of our assertion. We believe, that if a poet were to arise, 

 uniting in his own person the fancy of Spenser to the learning of Milton, 

 his fame would nevertheless be confined to his own immediate coterie 

 or school. 



We see nothing singular in this state of the national mind. The 

 literary history of every people affords an evidence in confirmation. 

 The growth of refinement, after it has reached a certain stage, is 

 always accompanied by the decay of invention. We behold this very 

 clearly in the productions of the Athenian dramatists. The imagination 

 which arose wild and sublime in ^Eschylus, was softened into beauty 

 and elegance in Sophocles, and diluted into sentimental pathos in Euri- 

 pides. The progress of science has likewise been found generally to 

 have involved the ruin of the purer spirit of poetry. The Greeks 

 thought Anaxagoras endowed by some Aca/^v because having foreseen 

 rain in the morning, he took the precaution of attending the Olympic 

 Games in a strong outer garment. Yet Anaxagoras had Pericles and 

 Euripides for his pupils, and the Athenian theatre was ennobled by the 

 tragedies of Sophocles. Egypt, the most enthusiastically devoted to 

 science of the ancient nations, was at all periods totally destitute of 

 a school of poets. We are not aware of any available instance. The 

 poets who wrote under the Ptolemean dynasty were Greeks. But we 

 must not spend our " Winter Evening," in discussion upon the Pagan 

 ages : we have made these brief allusions, because the facts referred to, 

 form an interesting commentary upon the state of poetry. 



We would not have it supposed, that, because we profess ourselves 

 enthusiasts in our love of the older English poets, we are blind to their 

 defects, or deaf to the charming of the modern. We hope to award 

 them all the merit they deserve. The Excursion, and Thalaba, and the 

 Ancient Mariner, are not Lays to be spoken of lightly, or estimated care- 

 lessly. What would we have given for one lecture of Aristotle upon 

 the rich fancy of Southey, and one comment of Plato upon the philoso- 

 phy of Wordsworth ! 



The history of our poetry commences with Chaucer. Snatches of 

 beautiful thought, and sentiments of love and tenderness, had indeed 



