grand shadows of that awful and silent antiquity. They applauded when they should have prayed. We do not make these remarks in the way of mere criticism; but to indicate the reason why this young poet failed in reaching the full measure of poetic inspiration which his subject demanded. It was owing to the absence of that deeply reverential feeling, which led Milton to say, "And chiefly Thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer, Before all temples, the upright heart and pure, There was no deep realization of man's littleness, and at the same time of his greatness; and apparently no sufficient acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures. Had he stood in really Christian spirit, amidst the ruins of Thebes, he must have felt the insignificance of man, whose greatest works, if they long outlive him, become sepulchral monuments, for they, as he, return to the earth. He must have noticed that man is ever sinful, either sensual in festivity, or ferocious in battle. He would have asked for a wiser guide and a surer interpreter, than a "lonely woman," and a "guardian goddess." Treading reverently over the burial-place of a nation's dead, "in numbers without number numberless," he would, with yet deeper reverence, have summoned Idumean Job, or his friend the Temanite, or that prophet who spake most of Christ, and of them he would have demanded, What is man? Who hath slain all these? By whom shall these dead men live? Surely, flashing across his memory, there would then have come the recollection of that truth which was imparted in Thebes' young age to an awed and trembling listener-imparted secretly in the stillness of night : "Shall a man be just before God? Shall a mortal be pure before his Maker? What, then, are the dwellers in houses of clay, They are crushed before the moth; They are beaten down from morning to evening; When in the early morn our youthful poet saw dimly gathered around Thebes the warriors of Ilium, he might have mourned over them in thoughts of more beautiful tenderness, had he gone for imagery to the Bible rather than to Homer; for, if a heather moralist could teach him to say, "As are the genera tions of leaves, so also are those of men," the son of Amoz would have told him that "We all do fade as a leaf, Our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away." And when the student-poet, "wandering in amazement," sought an interpretation of the magnificent ruins, how majestically might prophetic utterances have spoken to him of the ruin of Egypt, and of Thebes, as determined in the counsels of the Highest, and as unfolded to the rapt vision of his servants, ages before the accomplishment of the Divine decree! Here then, reader, you may have proof that the strongest and most cultivated intellect is poor in purpose, and inferior in grace and sublimity, if it does not drink deep draughts from the founts of inspiration. "The vision and the faculty divine," are those of a Christian eye, and a Christian mind. There is nothing so great and so noble as the teaching of God's word. But, having said so much about this particular prize poem, it will scarcely be fair to our readers, unless we give them some abridgment of it. We will take care the abridgment shall do full justice to the author. The poet lies in slumber; but in imagination strays through the ancient world. He stands in the halls of Carthage; now he is at Athens, amidst the shrines of Pallas and Apollo, and the gods of Greece. Then, moving with rapid wing, he alights in the Senate which gave laws to the world. Then the dreamer wanders from the seat of iron empire, to the silent Lybian desert, haunts the banks of old Nilus, sees the flashing torrent of its dark blue waters, as they harry seaward-sees them in the beauteous turmoil of the cataract : "Down plunging, lost in clouds of glittering spray, Then, in the distance, the dreamer sees the frowning towers of a mighty and embattled city, rising in solitary grandeur to his view: "And as near I came, Precipitous walls, and clustered palaces, That genii built in old Arabian tale, Rich with the treasures of the land and sea. Of some ill-omened bird, scared from his haunt Lay bound in slumber; through the long blank street To mock the wonder of a later age. And through tall windows, rich with coloured stones The surrounding sculptures are eloquent of war, with all its parade and horrible details. They also picture the scenes of human life, and present its evershifting panorama, torch-lit processions, with festal music, and guest-thronged banquets :— "And other sights were there: the Libyan gods Nor these alone, but men whose deeds of fame Of brotherhood in great and glorious deeds. And former scenes, forgotten to the sense, Were acted o'er again; for so they deemed, What was, had been, and was again to be, In due succession, different, yet the same." But the poet finds it necessary to enlarge the very simple machinery which has hitherto sufficed for the working of his poem. He needs a living voice as an interpreter of these hieroglyphics of the chambers which are solemn and silent as death. He penetrates a dim inner recess. There, amidst gloomy draperies, and sad as if sorrowfully tending some dying couch, in this inner chamber "A lonely woman sat; a single lamp Burned on before her, like a little star Scarce seen through drifting clouds when all the night I stood in silence, loth too soon to wake Some readers may call this too familiar; savouring too much of warm, living humanity, to harmonize with sepulchral ruins, where bygone ages are entombed. But, he is dreaming, this Oxford poet, in the Sheldonian Theatre, be it remembered; and he recites to a vast throng of the youth and beauty of England. Pardon his anachronism of feeling, and listen with him to this lonely woman as she questions the daring young wanderer, who has broken in upon her mysterious seclusion :— |