VOLTAIRE. 37 



ments admirable for their truth, their liberality, their 

 humanity, its tendency is to make fanaticism hateful, 

 oppression despicable, injustice unbearable ; but it is 

 the grand work of a philosopher and a rhetorician, 

 more than the inspiration of a poet. No one ever 

 ventured upon a comparison of this -epic with the 

 ' Iliad ' or the ' Odyssey ;' the f ^Eneid' has been reckoned 

 to present more facilities of approach, but at how great 

 a distance does it leave the l Henriade ! ' Even Lucan, 

 if less tender, is far more majestic ; Tasso has, in every 

 one essential quality, immeasurably surpassed Vol- 

 taire ; with Milton he will not bear to be named, 

 far less compared ; and Dante, little epic as he is, has 

 more touches of the poetic fire, more inimitable pic- 

 tures drawn with a single stroke, more appeals to our 

 feelings of horror, wonder, and even pity, in a single 

 canto, than can be found in the whole ten of the ' Hen- 

 riade.' There abounds in the poem fine writing, 

 smooth versification, noble ideas, admirable sentiments 

 but poetry is wanting. The objection made by 

 all, or nearly all critics, that the plot is so clumsily 

 framed as to make the hero a subordinate person for 

 nearly the first half, and to place over his head as his 

 sovereign and master one of the most despicable and 

 even disgusting voluptuaries that ever reigned in mo- 

 dern times, is perhaps not altogether well grounded, 

 though it has some foundation. Although the 

 first in rank, Valois (Henry III.) is a cipher, while 

 his successor is the person actively employed in the 

 conduct of affairs ; and were the last a sort of mayor of 

 the palace, the objection would lose its whole force : 

 but Valois is not at all a roi faineant; we are called 



