For let them but once, as they wish-feel their way, lime Might starve with his pathos, while fashion's dull rhyme Is palm'd forth, and thus public feeling debas'd; pages, Will find asses rank on a par with the sages; So affirms wise Sir Noodle; and who dares deny him? If such recreant now lives, I as champion defy him. C THE WRITER TO HIS POETIC BRETHREN. -Mediocribus esse poetis Non Dii, non homines, non concessere columnæ. Horace. With poets mediocrity is not allowable, either by gods, or men, or the pillars which support the shops of the booksellers. My prelude thus ended, I next, by degrees, Then at it, my Pegasus, here's whip and rein, And spurn with thine hoofs sconces all that are hollow; Be justice the symbol that marks thy career, I'faith, I've no rancour, nor mean I to show it; Their labours I've studied, and act from cool reason; Thus folly and sense share due comments in season . The flights of bold fancy shall first claim the stricture, For poets stand foremost on Noodle's grand picture, From high vaunted Scot that has caus'd hue and cry O! To Rickman, self-dubb'd after great Mistress Clio. Southey.(1) Aut insanit homo, aut versus facit. Either the man is mad, or writing verses. Horace. TIME He cautious survey'd stumbling-blocks in his way; (h) This gentleman's voluminous productions seem to have been written with a view to the display of his universal reading, rather than of annexing to his name the title of a great and lasting poet he has been esteemed a follower of Wordsworth's With acumen keen depth of study survey'd, style, without laying claim to the pathos which characterises a variety of that gentleman's productions, notwithstanding his contempt for all the heretofore acknowledged rules of poetical composition. Whensoever Mr. Southey issues from the press, we find him arrayed in a different costume, though one unvarying predeliction for the wonderful runs through the whole series of his poems. His Joan of Arc, hastily composed after the manner of Milton and other epic poets, though possessing merit, is particularly deficient on the score of patriotism, as every Gallic chief is elevated to the rank of an hero, while our fifth Henry, Talbot, &c. are scarcely raised above the common walk of life. Thalaba the Destroyer, after the model of the Arabian Tales, is characterised by some bold but extravagant flights. Madoc, though generally pleasing, on account of the mild sentiments which breathe throughout that production, is nevertheless rendered irksome to the reader, at intervals, from insipidity and tameness of style. Kehama, diversified with the rhapsodies of Thalaba, and the gentleness of the last mentioned poem, claims precedence above the rest; and whatsoever genius this writer. may possess is certainly elicited from the work in question. |