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For myself, owiug to the largeness of my subject, I can 

 but express my regret at the imperfection of what I now 

 urge. Without hoping to do justice even to my own belief, 

 I have attempted to record some of my convictions, 

 and can only apologise that they are not more worthy of 

 the subject. 



I look upon the poet as one who wrote, believing him- 

 self immortal ; as one who, in first conceiving the most 

 perfect aspect of feminine loveliness, taught virtue. For to 

 create an image of purity is to teach purity. As one who 

 worked in his master's eye ; as the best translator of the 

 Christian doctrine, — the noblest interpreter of its law, 

 scattering its spirit without reference to sect or party. 

 Offending no scruples, he appealed to all, on the merits of 

 those truths which all men equally agree to hold and 

 honour. On the subjects of Authority, Mercy, Benefi- 

 cence, Female Virtue, Purity, Chastity, Selfishness com- 

 bined with Intellect, the Spirit and the Letter of the Law, 

 Self-denial, Ambition, — on all these texts his sermons are 

 the best extant. 



He shot the clear light of his intellect into those 

 mysterious depths of gloom and melancholy that most try 

 the philosophy of the thinker, and shew that increase of 

 wisdom is indeed increase of sorrow. He was the light 

 of the new reformation, rising resplendent on that old 

 horizon of prelatism and feudal law. He lit all that 

 was excellent in the old chivalry, its splendour and 

 picturesqueness, its love of poetry, and of nature, into 

 new beauty by his beams. The old rule of might was at 

 an end ; and though the progress of the truth was to be 

 slow, its sun had not less arisen. Its light, borrowed from 

 another sphere, was radiated with a warmth and glow 

 suited to the race it was to cheer and cherish. As we 

 feel the glory of the sun, not by looking at the great orb 

 itself, but by the splendour it sheds abroad, the lands it 



