176 



POETRY AND POETS. 



thrown over prospects so late the 

 most unsullied and exhilarating; 

 and the favourite of fortune sank 

 to rise no more. 



" Gloom and perplexities in quick 

 succession oppressed the Bristol 

 milkwoman, and her fall became 

 more rapid than her ascent. The 

 eldest of her sons, William Cro- 

 martie Yearsley, who had bidden 

 fair to be the prop of her age, 

 and whom she had apprenticed to 

 an eminent engraver, with a pre- 

 mium of one hundred guineas, pre- 

 maturely died ; and his surviving 

 brother soon followed him to the 

 grave. Ann Yearsley, now a child- 

 less and desolate widow, retired, 

 heart-broken, from the world, on 

 the produce of her library, and 

 died many years after, in a state 

 of almost total seclusion, at Melk- 

 sham. An inhabitant of the town 

 lately informed me that she was 

 never seen, except when she took 

 her solitary walk in the dusk of 

 the evening. She lies buried in 

 Clifton Church-yard." 



WRITING FOR THE PRESENT THOMAS 

 CARLYLE. 



The editor of the London Monthly 

 Magazine relates an anecdote cha- 

 racteristic of Carlyle, and from 

 which others may take a useful 

 hint. " We recollect," says the edi- 

 tor, "walking with Mr. Thomas 

 Carlyle down Regent Street, when 

 he remarked, that we poets had all 

 of us mistaken the argument that 

 we should treat. 



" The past," he said, " is too cool 

 for this age of progress. Look at 

 this throng of carriages, this multi- 

 tude of men and horses, of women 

 and children. Every one of these 

 had a reason for going this way, 

 rather than that. If we could pene- 

 trate their minds, and ascertain 

 their motives, an epic poem would 

 present itself, exhibiting the busi- 

 ness of life as.it is, with all its pas- 

 sions and interests, hopes and fears. 



A poem, whether in verse or prose, 

 conceived in this spirit, and impar- 

 tially written, would be the epic of 

 the age." And in this spirit it was 

 that he conceived the plan of his 

 own French Revolution, a History. 



POPE'S " ESSAY ON MAN." 



"In a rough attack upon War- 

 burton," says D'lsraeli, "respecting 

 Pope's privately printing fifteen 

 hundred copies of the Patriot King 

 of Bolingbroke, which I conceive to 

 have been written by Mallet, I find 

 a particular account of the manner 

 in which the Essay on Man was 

 written, over which Johnson seems 

 to throw great doubts. 



" The writer of this angry epistle, 

 in addressing Warburton, says, ' If 

 you were as intimate with Pope as 

 you pretend, you must know the 

 truth of a fact which several others, 

 as well as I, who never had the 

 honour of a personal acquaintance 

 with Lord Bolingbroke or Mr. Pope, 

 have heard. The fact was related 

 to me by a certain senior fellow of 

 one of our universities, who was 

 very intimate with Mr. Pope. 



" ' He started some objections one 

 day, at Mr. Pope's house, to the 

 doctrine contained in the ethic 

 Epistles ; upon which Mr. Pope told 

 him that he would soon convince 

 him of the truth of it, by laying the 

 argument at large before him ; for 

 which purpose he gave him a largo 

 prose manuscript to peruse, telling 

 him, at the same time, the author's 

 name. From this .perusal, whatever 

 other conviction the doctor might 

 receive, he collected at least this 

 that Mr. Pope had from his friend 

 not only the doctrine, but even the 

 finest and strongest ornaments of his 

 ethics. 



" 'Now, if this fact be true, as T 

 question not but you know it to be 

 so, I believe no man of candour 

 will attribute such merit to Mr. 

 Pope as you would insinuate, for 

 acknowledging the wisdom and the 



