practitioner in poetry himself; and one of his commentators enumerates only four poets as of any account before the time of Cicero; Ennius, Lucilius, Plautus, and Terence.

As to the more northern countries, from what has already been hinted relative to the eastern, it may be inferred, that the faculties in some measure sympathize with the climate; an observation, however, made with all due allowance for the vast possibility of circumstances, the inconceivable, the infinite powers and capacities of nature. In the coldest regions of the north, clouds hover over the mind, and torpor freezes the imagination. The reflecting, comprehensive, persevering intellect, which invents arts and sciences; which carries them to perfection; those lively, easy resemblances, which constitute wit, and delight with their novelty; those pleasing, ornamental analogies, which with a sort of electrical efficiency enliven the fancy, and give to poetry all its variety, its great strength,-these are not to be considered as naturally generated, or as most readily to be superinduced, under the most frigid and most dreary climates. The loftiness of the mountains, the violence of the winds, the terror of the thunders, the severity of the frosts, the inscrutable depth of the shores, the dreadful noises of the caverns, fill the mind with horror, and generate credulity and superstition. Hence the Norway monsters, the Lapland witches, the fairies, the giants, the dæmons of the North.

Credulity and superstition, indeed, by some are supposed to be favourable to poetic fancy: yet is it only in

some cases, and to a certain extent.

Natural causes

may exist, which operate more uniformly, which impress more forcibly. And if, after all, superstitious opinions, forming themselves into mythological systems, like the northern Edda, are favourable to poetic genius, they have produced their full effect rather on those who have contemplated its character at a distance, than on those who have been immediately influenced by its spirit; on those who, at their leisure, have circumscribed their extravagances within the circle of at least poetical probability, than on those who have been hurried away impetuously, as in eccentric vortices, into the boundless regions of magical delusions, non-entities, and chimeras.

It was an Englishman who wrote the Fairy Queen, and a German who wrote Oberon.

Of the Icelandic, as the principal northern poets are called, the most admired remains are the Edda*, and some pieces of Runic poetry †; to both of which I have frequent occasion to refer. In the Nordymra a few scraps of poetry are occasionally interspersed. I am not prepared to detract from the above poems their due praise. To us they possess a novelty, and what we deem their whimsicalities or absurdities are not greater than what appear in the theogonies of other nations. As to the Runic poems, they have some ideas horribly grand, and a few

* Icelandic Poetry, or Edda of Sæmund, by A. S. Cottle.

+ Five Pieces of Runic Poetry published from Bartholinus, by Bishop Percy.

Nordymra, sive Hist. Rerum in Northumbria a Danis Norvegisque gestarum, sec. ix. x. xi. pars prima,

which are calm and pleasing. Ossian is but an Icelandic sprig engrafted on a Scotch fir, somewhat vigorous in appearance, orderly of shape, and of a commanding height; but in variety of foliage defective, and in real strength treacherous. It therefore properly falls under considerations which belong not to this chapter.

The northern Scythians are known for their love of virtue, not for their attachment to the polite arts. Their wisdom consisted in making laws suited to a warlike or virtuous people, and in this principally consists the wisdom of all barbarous nations. One of these, Anacharsis, travelled into Greece, conversed with Solon, and is said by some to have put his laws into verse; he is therefore spoken of as a Scythian poet. Diogenes Laertius* gives him a place among his philosophers. Abaris is also spoken of as a Scythian poet, though some suppose him to have been rather an impostor, than either a philosopher or poet. Doubtless, there were many other Scythian poets; but I am not aware that any thing is known of their poetical attainments.

But at what does all this aim? what is its weight in argument? and to what would it lead in conclusion ?

It does not aim to censure any national poetry as such, nor to set up that of a particular country as an invariable standard of poetical taste. Different nations may have rules of poetical taste somewhat different, -as they have different dresses,--connected with their peculiar manners, rising out of their particular climates, and adapted to feelings of their own. It only aims to maintain, that in the

* De Vitis Philosoph, lib. i.

agitation of mental energies, as in the movements of governments, what is bad often verges upon what is good; and that in our candour and our zeal we sometimes extol what in the more sober exercise of judgement we perhaps could not vindicate; and, in the end, it might lead us, perhaps, somewhat still further, to conclude, with regard to the poetry even of our own country, that what is excellent is often mixed with what is indifferent, and that praise is not always correctly due, even where it may be be liberally bestowed.

For, that " a prophet hath no honour in his own country" is a truth in reference only to times when some popular prejudices rage: as the phrenzy cools, a national spirit returns: men applaud the poetry of their own country, though it were only from national vanity. Poets, at length, find admirers at home, critics and censors among foreign nations. The Italian, French, Portuguese and Spanish, with the German poets, have not been too liberally appretiated in England; and as Homer found a censor in La Motte, so did Shakspeare in Voltaire. But Shakspeare's, after all, was the land of enchantment;

Within that circle none durst move but he:

Dryden.

and I allude to him for no other purpose here than to make one closing observation on poetry, which is, that though numerous blemishes will not destroy the authority of what is greatly excellent, yet great excellence is not a composition of many things moderately good, or free from fault.

CHAPTER V.

WHY ARE THERE SO FEW EXCELLENT POETS?

It is in reference to many that we employ, in the most strict sense, the word excellent. There is a gradation in society,—a scale of comparative merit, which relates to all orders of beings. In Europe there are but few supreme magistrates: in England there is but one king:

that is, "Some are great above others; but that which is ultimate, and crowns all, is in kings: explore no further." So in the sciences and arts. Numerous as are the philosophers in England, and many who excel others, yet there is but one Newton : numerous as painters were in Greece, and no doubt many that were good, yet she could claim but one Apelles: and numerous as were her poets, yet she could boast but one Homer. All who are any way eminent are so many circles, which are drawn from the same centre, but have different circumferences, Those who take the most extended range, would be called the most excellent; those, whose circle is less wide, would be denominated, though they might be good