even this glimmering of knowledge is confounded by Milton, who represents them as sensible beings, whereas, "the dark glass" of faith, represents them as unembodied essences. It is true, that Milton could not have represented them otherwise, but then he should not have undertaken to represent or describe them at all. This is the true reason why the “Paradise Lost is one of those books, which," as Dr. Johnson justly observes, "the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take it up again. None ever wished it longer than it is. Its perusal is a duty rather than a pleasure. We read Milton for instruction, retire harrassed and over-burdened, and look elsewhere for recreation. We desert our master, and seek for companions." Dr. Johnson, indeed, is generally accused of severity and illiberality in his criticisms; but I doubt whether those who make the charge, have not laid it down as a principle, that unmerited commendation is preferable to censure, even when it is just, and consequently more liberal. To this creed I cannot subscribe, and I believe it may be safely said of Dr. Johnson, what he himself says of Boileau, that he will be seldom found in error. If, however, he has been ever wrong, and who is always right, I suspect he is so in the cause which he assigns for the want of interest in the "Paradise Lost." "The truths which it contains," he says to be new; they have been taught to our infancy; they have mingled with our solitary thoughts and familiar conversations, and are habitually interwoven with the whole texture of life. Being therefore not new, they raise no unaccustomed emotion in the mind; what we know before, we cannot learn, what is not expected cannot surprize." This criticism appears to me, entirely erroneous. Whatever is true in it, is inapplicable to the " Paradise Lost," and whatever is applicable to it, is not true. I agree with him, that important truths are seldom new, because, whatever is of real importance to us, is generally made known to us in our early years, and "mingle with our solitary thoughts;" but I deny his conclusion, that "being not new, they raise no unaccustomed emotion in the mind," because it is far from being true, that every thing new raises an emotion of pleasure, or that every thing "not new" is incapable of exciting this emotion. If, as Solomon observes, there be "nothing new under the sun," there cannot consequently be any thing to excite emotions, but admitting that every day presents us with something new, it is still certain, that mere novelty is no cause of pleasure at any time, ago, will please us now as much as and that what pleased us forty years susceptibility of enjoyment. ever, provided we still retain the same pleasures are more delightful, than What those which pleased us in our earlier frequently imparts a more tender and years? Even the recollection of them impassioned delight, than we can acquire from most of the novel objects through the general occurrences of which we are accustomed to meet with life. Why the cold urn of her, whom long he loved, "Ask the faithful youth' So often fills his arms, so often draws Should never seduce his bosom to forego Of care and envy, sweet remembrance soothes, With virtue's kindest looks, his aching breast, "are too important And turns his tears to rapture." Akenside. please for ever; What once pleased us then, will please us, simply because it is novel; nor will any thing for if it have nothing to recommend it pleasing us, create disgust, or perhaps, to us but its novelty, it may, instead of excite no attention at all. I have eisewhere observed, that velty," (it has been considered a sense the sense of noby all writers on taste,)is a sense which we do not possess. ject is presented to us, it is the object When a new obitself that affects us, and not the abstract idea of novelty; for if we were ject, all new objects would affect us moved only by the novelty of the obobject affects us by its own distinct alike. This is never the case. qualities, and therefore, we experience a very different emotion when we first see a tyger or an elephant, from what Every we felt when we first gazed upon a dove or a butterfly. Our feelings are entirely engrossed by the appearance of the object itself, not by the reflection that we have never seen it before. This reflection may not occur to us at all, and therefore, it does not necessarily enter into the sensation of the moment; whereas, the sensation produced by the object itself, is irresistible, and always determined by its proper nature. The reflection that we never saw it before, is not a feeling or sensation, but an act of the understanding; whereas the impression made by the object, is not an act but a passion. A novel object then, is pleasing or disagreeable, on the same principle with objects with which we are acquainted. It is obvious, then, that the want of interest in the "Paradise Lost" does not arise from the truths which it contains being "taught in our infancy," but because its descriptions are not calculated to please us at any time; and if they could be made at all interesting, nothing could make them more : so, than their being taught to us in our infancy. When Dr. Johnson says, that "what we knew before we cannot learn; what is not expected cannot surprise," he tells us what is very true, but what is still nothing to the purpose; because it is not what we learn, that confers an interest upon poetry, but what affects and if surprise be one of the charms that give interest to poetry, it is certain that few poems contain more of the marvellous and surprising than "Paradise Lost." The fact is, that the evil results from its being too surprising to be credited even by the most credulous, and therefore the readers of it are not carried away by that passion and enthusiasm which is felt in reading what we believe to be true, or at least, what carries no glaring evidence along with it of being otherwise; for the moment we find ourselves cheated, we withhold our sympathy. Impossibility, and possibility produce very different impressions on the readers of poetry. (To be continued.) * Critical Dissertation on the Nature and Principles of Taste by M. Mc. Dermot, pp. 376, 377. LOVE.* LOVE NOT OF THIS EARTH. ON Love, no inhabitant of earth thou art! The mind hath made thee, as it peoples heaven, Ever with its own desiring fantasy; And to a thought such shape and substance given, As haunts the unquenched soul, parch'd, wearied, wrung, and riven. BYRON. In presenting this exquisite bijou to our readers, we deviate from our usual plan of originality. It is a peace-offering to the admirers of Lord Byron's poetical talents for the gratuitous attack upon his Lordship in our last number. Vide Conversazioné. APHORISMS, OPINIONS, AND THOUGHTS ON MORALS. WERE we to trace up to their sources, all the most painful and degrading events of our lives, we should find that most of them originated in our indulgence of the suggestions of vanity. Our duties are so closely linked together that, as the breaking one pearl from a string of pearls hazards the loss of all, so the violation of one duty endangers the safety of every other. Where is the mortal, who can venture to pronounce that his actions are of importance to no one, and that the consequences of his virtues and his vices will be confined to himself alone? Women reason, and men feel, when passing judgment on female beauty; and when a woman declares another to be plain, the chances are that she is right in her opinion; as she cannot, because she is a woman herself, feel that charm, "that something than beauty dearer," which often throws a veil over irregularity of features, and sometimes obtains for even a plain woman, from men at least, the appellation of pretty. A woman is never so likely to be the fool of love, as when it assails her late in life; especially if a lover be as great a novelty to her as the passion itself "Love" it has been wittily observed, "like the small-pox, pits deepest in old subjects." Any connection between the sexes, that is founded on a guilty disregard of sacred and positive institutions, cannot long be productive of happiness; even though the reasonings of perverted intellect, and the persuasions of self-love, have convinced the offending parties that such an union is wise and virtuous. Such offenders, while secluded from society, may fancy themselves happy; but as soon as society resumes, in any way, its power and opportunity of operating on their happiness, that happiness must necessarily vanish; as a dead body, which has been preserved from decay by being entirely excluded from the external air, moulders into dust as soon as ever it is exposed to its influ ence. The wish to say lessening things of those, of whom one hears extravagant commendations, is, I fear, common to almost every one; even where the object praised comes in no competition with oneself. The strongest of all ties is the consciousness of mutual benefit and assist ance. We are all of us too apt to repeat stories to the prejudice of others, even though we do not believe them.-Welt indeed does St. James say, that "the tongue is an unruly member." There are defects in character, which can be known only by means of an intimate connection, and which co-habitation can alone call forth-for inattention to trifles is a general and a most destructive failing, and many a conjugal union, which has never been assailed by the battery of crime, has fallen a victim to the slowly undermining power of petty quarrels, trivial unkindnesses, and thoughtless neglect; like the gallant officer, though after escaping unhurt from the rage of battles both by land and water, tempest, or sea, and earthquake on shore, returns perhaps to his native country, and perishes by the power of a slow fever. Some persons are so deficient in what may be called delivery of mental talk, that they are nearly unconscious of the wounds, which they inflict by “——————The word whose meaning kills, yet told The speaker wonders that you thought it cold." They are unconscious that opportunities of conferring large benefits, like bank bills for £1,000, rarely come into use; but that little attentions, friendly participations, and kindnesses are wanted daily, and, like small change, are necessary to carry on the business of life and happiness. Where the conduct is not founded on religious, and consequently, on immutable principles, we may not err while temptation is absent; but when once we are exposed to its presence, and its power, we are capable of falling even into the very vices the most abhorrent to our nature. It is only too true that wounds however little, which are inflicted on our self-love, are never forgotten or forgiven, and that it is safer to censure the morals of our acquaintance, than To bear and forbear is the grand What a forcible lesson, and what an It is certain, that though the agency A child's education ought to begin almost from the first hours of its existence; and the mother, who understands her task, knows that the circumstances, which every moment calls forth, are the tools with which she is to work, in order to fashion her child's mind and character. How pernicious is an aptitude to call the experience of ages, contemptible prejudices-how dangerous it is to our well-being, to embrace and possess opinions, which tend to destroy our sympathies with general society, and which are likely to make us aliens to the hearts of those amongst whom we live. Whatever may be the ill conduct of a husband, that wife must be deluded indeed, who thinks his culpability an excuse for her's, or seeks to revenge herself on her tormenter by following the bad example which he sets her. She is not wiser than the child, who, to punish the wall against which he has struck his head, dashes his fist against it in the vehemence of his [APRIL vengeance, and is himself the only sufferer from the blow. Natural affection, as it is called, is habit, and a series of care, tenderness, chiefly in human beings the result of mutual kindness, and good offices. There is nothing more dangerous to the virtuous, and to the interests of virtue, than association with the guilty, who possess amiable and attractive qualities for that salutary hatred, which sarily be destroyed by it; and I believe we feel towards vice itself, must necessecurely maintained, only by keeping that our detestation of vice can be ourselves at a degree of distance from the vicious. places. It flies the glaring sunshine of held by a hand that would, but for the Every one has some kind friend who, Ce n'est que le premier pas qui "Recuiel de morceaux detachés." |