nothing-the sunshine, and the dew, and the blessed air of heavenall nothing? Is there but one excellence in writing-power ?—but one object in poetry-horror ?-but one feature in the universe of God -the terrible and strong? Ay-but you "must have your antitheses." "It is dull to praise always." You "must damn an author now and then for variety." Your "Review must live!" And so, to spice an article-to amuse the idle hour of a reader-the hopes of a deserving writer are crushed, and his heart broken!

We do not mean to say that Henry Neele's poetry was unexceptionable, or that fault should not have been found with it in criticism. We object to nothing that is true, be it ever so severe. But we would have had his taste admitted-his perceptions of beauty admitted-his purity and refinement and tenderness admitted. And then-if his peculiar walk in poetry was not to the taste of the critic-if it was too spiritual, too quiet, too exclusively beautiful-I would have him say so, candidly and fairly, and not freeze the unhappy writer with faint praise for qualities he did not possess, and neglect, wholly, the excellencies at which he alone aimed.

We are as much an enemy to the sentimentality of writing as any one. We have been as much annoyed by boarding school poetry, and lack-a-daisical prettyisms. But we dislike equally the morbid depravity of taste, which craves only a constant and unnatural excitement. One of two things must be true :-the reviewers of the day are, as a class, men of impure taste or reviewing, to be palatable to periodical readers, must be reckless and extravagant. If the former is true, there should be a remedy in public opinion, and if the latter, it is high time that the tone was changed, and the best feelings of our race were secured from outrage. There can be no objection to fair criticism. A manly and respectful disapprobation never awoke resentment in the breast of a sensible writer. It is the injustice, the misapprehension, the malice of criticism that rankles.

But we are dwelling too long upon this. It may be for the health of literature that reviewers should exist, but we cannot but feel while so many instances have come to our knowledge of fine spirits crushed and embittered—while, even in our own time, Keats and Neele have probably died, and Byron and Shelley have been estranged from their best tendencies by insulting and unjust criticism—that there should be, upon so much and so arbitrary power, a restraint sufficient to keep it wholesome and humane.

The work before us is a considerable volume, containing principally those literary remains of Henry Neele, which have not been before

collected in a formal book. A brief but interesting biographical sketch is placed at the beginning, of which the following extracted passages will give a hasty outline.

"The late Henry Neele was the second son of a highly respectable map and heraldic engraver in the Strand, where he was born January 29th, 1798; and upon his father's removing to Kentish Town, was there sent to school, as a daily boarder, and continued at the same seminary until his education was completed. At this academy, though he became an excellent French scholar, yet he acquired little Latin, and less Greek; and, in fact, displayed no very devoted application to, or even talent for, study of any sort: with the exception of poetry.'

"Having made choice of the profession of law, he was, upon leaving school, articled to a respectable attorney; and, after the usual period of probationary experience, was admitted to practice, and commenced business as solicitor.

"It was during the progress of his clerkship, in Jan. 1817, that Henry Neele made his first appearance as an author, by publishing a volume of Poems; its contents were principally lyrical, and the ill fated Collins was, avowedly, his chief model.

"In July, 1820, Mr. Neele printed a new edition of his Odes, &c., with considerable additions; and in March, 1823, published a second volume of dramatic and miscellaneous Poetry, dedicated by permission to Miss Joanna Baillie.

"Ardent and enthusiastic in all his undertakings, Mr Neele's literary industry was now amply evinced by his frequent contributions to the Monthly Magazine and other periodicals; as well as to the Forget-Me-Not, and several contemporary annuals. Having been long engaged in studying the poets of the olden time, particularly the great masters of the drama of the age of Queen Elizabeth, for all of whom, but more especially for Shakspeare, he felt the most enthusiastic veneration, he was well qualified for the composition of a series of Lectures on English Poetry, from the days of Chaucer down to those of Cowper, which he completed in the winter of 1826; and delivered, first at the Russell, and subsequently at the Western Literary Institution in the spring of 1827. These Lectures were most decidedly successful; and both public and private opinion coincided in describing them as displaying a high tone of poetical feeling in the Lecturer, and an intimate acquaintance with the beauties and blemishes of his criticism.'

"In the early part of 1827, Mr. Neele published a new edition of all his Poems, collected into two volumes; and in the course of the same year produced his last and greatest work, the Romance of English History,' which was dedicated, by permission, to his majesty; and though extending to three volumes, and, from its very nature, requiring much antiquarian research, was completed in little more than six months. Flattering as was the general eulogium which attended this publication, yet the voice of praise was mingled with the warnings of approaching evil; and, like the lightning which melts the sword within its scabbard, it is but too certain that the incessant labor and anxiety of mind attending its completion, were the chief sources of that fearful malady which so speedily destroyed

him.

"With the mention of a new edition of Shakspeare's Plays, under the superintendence of Mr. Neele as editor, for which his enthusiastic reverence for the poet of all time' peculiarly fitted him, but which, for the want of patronage, terminated after the publication of a very few numbers, closes the record of his literary labors, and hastens the narration of that last scene of all,' which laid him in an untimely grave. Henry Neele fell by his own hand; the victim of an overwrought imagination. On the morning of Thursday, Feb. 7th, 1828, when he had scarcely passed his thirtieth birth day, he was found dead in his bed, with but too positive evidences of self-destruction. The unhesitating verdict of the coroner's inquest was insanity, as he had exhibited unquestionable symptoms of derangement on the day preceding.

"In person, Mr. Neele was considerably below the middle stature; but his features were singularly expressive, and his brilliant eyes betokened ardent feeling and vivid imagination. Happily, as it has now proved, though his disposition was

in the highest degree kind, sociable, and affectionate, he was not married. His short life passed, indeed, almost without events; it was one of those obscure but humble streams which have scarcely a name in the mass of existence, and which the traveller passes by without inquiring either its source or its direction. His retiring manners kept him comparatively unnoticed and unknown, excepting by those with whom he was most intimate; and from their grateful recollection his memory will never be effaced. He was an excellent son; a tender brother; a sincere friend. He was beloved most by those who knew him best; and at his death, left not one enemy in the world."

Mr. Neele's last and principal work, The Romance of History,' has been republished in this country, and generally read and noticed. We will not stop to speak of it at length, for we presume most of our readers have pronounced for themselves upon its excellence. His 'Lectures upon English Poetry,' however, which are published for the first time in the work before us, are less known, and a few extracts (all we have room to give,) may be found interesting.

In his Introductory Analysis he remarks:

"I am constrained to confess that poetry is a mere superfluity and ornament. As Falstaff said of honor, it cannot set a leg, or an arm, or heal the grief of a wound; it has no skill in surgery.' Still within the mind of man there exists a craving after intellectual beauty and sublimity. There is a mental appetite, which it is as necessary to satisfy as the corporeal one.

There are maladies of

mind, which are even more destructive than those of the body; and which, as the sound of the sweet harp of David drove the demon out of Saul, have been known to yield to the soothing influence of poetry."

After speaking of the earliest English poetry, the Monkish Rhymes, the Troubadour Poems, the Metrical Romances of Thomas the Rhymer, Piers Plowman and others, and giving a more extended criticism of Chaucer and his immediate followers, he makes the following interesting remarks upon the Shaksperian age :

"The reign of Queen Elizabeth is the most illustrious period in the literary history of modern Europe. Much has been said of the ages of Leo the tenth, of Louis the fourteenth, and of Queen Anne, but we are prepared to shew that the literary trophies of the first mentioned period are more splendid and important, than those of all the other three united. We are not alluding merely to what passed in our own country. The superiority of the literary efforts of that age to all the productions of English genius before or since, is too trite a truism to need our advocacy. But it is not so generally known that during the same period the other nations of Europe produced their master spirits; and that Tasso, Camoens, and Cervantes, were contemporary with Shakspeare. Weigh these four names against those of all who have ever written since the revival of learning, to the present time, and the latter will be found to be but as dust in the balance. But, though we have named only the four master spirits of that period, yet there is a troop behind, more numerous than those which were shewn in Banquo's glass. Spenser, Ben Jonson, Fletcher, Massinger, Lope de Vega, Calderon, Marino, these are bright names, which cannot be lost, even in the overwhelming splendor of those which we have already mentioned. In Spain and England, literature, and especially dramatic literature, flourished simultaneously; and a similarity of taste and genius appears to have pervaded both nations. Spain appears to be our more natural ally in literature; and, it is a curious fact, that, after the poetry of both nations had for a long period been sunk in tameness and mediocrity, it should at the same time, suddenly spring into pristine vigor and beauty, both in the Island

and in the Peninsula; for Melandez, Quintana and Gonzalez are the worthy contemporaries of Byron, Wordsworth, Scott and Moore. Two great authors of each nation, have also exhibited some curious coincidences, both in the structure of their minds, and in the accidents of their lives. Ben Jonson fought in the English army against the Spaniards in the Netherlands, and Lope de Vega accompanied the Spanish Armada for the invasion of England. Shakspeare and Cervantes, the profoundest masters of the human heart which the modern world has produced, were neither of them mere scholars shut up in the seclusion of a study; both were busily engaged in active life, although one merely trod the mimic stage, and the other acted a part in the world's great theatre; both were afflicted with a bodily infirmity; Shakspeare was lame, and Cervantes had lost a hand; and, still a stranger coincidence remains, for both died upon the same day."

In the second Lecture occur the following remarks, which are a little original, and shew the nice discrimination of the writer :

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"Before I proceed farther, it will be requisite to state the sense in which I shall use two words which will necessarily occur very frequently in the course of these Lectures-namely, Genius and Taste. Genius, I should say, is the power of production; Taste is the power of appreciation. Genius is creation; Taste is selection. Horace Walpole was a man of great taste, without an atom of genius. Nathaniel Lee was a man of genius, without taste. Dryden had more genius than Pope. Pope had more taste than Dryden. Many instances may be adduced of obesity of taste in men of genius; especially with reference to their own works. Milton, who had genius enough to produce Paradise Lost,' had not taste enough to perceive its superiority over Paradise Regained.' Rowe, who produced so many successful tragedies, all of which-although I am no violent admirer of them-possessed a certain degree of merit, valued himself most upon the wretched ribaldry in his comedy of the Biter.' Dr. Johnson was proud of his Dictionary, and looked upon the Rambler as a trifle of which he ought almost to be ashamed. The timidity and hesitation with which many juvenile authors have ventured to lay their works before the public, and their surprise when public opinion has stamped them as works of high merit, have been attributed to humility and bashfulness. The fact, however, is often otherwise; it is not humility, but want of taste. Genius, or the power of producing such works, is not accompanied by taste or the power of appreciating them. Taste is of a later growth in the mind than genius; and the reason, I think, is obvious. Genius is innate; a part and portion of the mind; born with it; while taste is the result of observation, and inquiry, and experience. However the folly and vanity of ignorance and presumption may have deluged the public with worthless productions, there can be no doubt that the deficiency of taste in men of genius, has deprived the world of many a work of merit and originality. Genius is often startled at the boldness of her own ideas; while

'Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.'"

He pays a beautiful and just tribute to Spenser

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"When we open the volumes of Spenser, we leave this working day world,' as Rosalind calls it, behind us. We are no longer in it, nor of it. We are introduced to a new creation, new scenes, new manners, new characters. The laws of nature are suspended or revised. The possible, the probable, and the practicable, all these are thrown behind us. The mighty wizard, whose spell is upon us, waves but his wand, and a new world starts into existence, inhabited by nothing but the marvellous and the wild. Spenser is the very antipodes of Shakspeare. The latter is of the earth, earthly. His most etherial fancies have some touch of mortality about them. His wildest and most visionary characters savor of humanity. Whatever notes he draws forth from his harp, it is the strings of the human heart that he touches. Spenser's hero is always honor, truth, valor, and courtesy, but it is not man. His heroine is meekness, chastity, constancy, beauty, but it is not woman. His landscapes are fertility, magnificence, verdure, splendor, but they are not nature. His pictures have no relief; they are all light,

or all shadow; they are all wonder, but no truth. Still do I not complain of them; nor would I have them other than what they are. They are delightful and matchless in their way. They are dreams; glorious, soul entrancing dreams. They are audacious, but magnificent falsehoods. They are like the palaces built in the clouds; the domes, the turrets, the towers, the long drawn terraces, the serial battlements, who does not know that they have no stable existence? But who does not sigh when they pass away?"

His remarks upon Pope are just and somewhat original:

"Of Pope, it is scarcely too much to say, that there is not a rough or discordant line in all that he has written. His thoughts, so often brilliant and original, sparkle more brightly by reason of the elegant and flowing rhymes in which they are expressed; and even when the idea is feeble or common-place, the music of the versification almost atones for it; the ear is satisfied although the mind is disappointed. Still, it must be confessed, that Pope carries his refinement too far; his sweetness clogs at last; his music wants the introduction of discords to give full effect to the harmony. The unpleasant effect produced upon the ear by the frequently running of the sense of one line with another, and especially of continuing the sentence from the last line of one couplet to the first line of the next, Pope felt and judiciously avoided. Still, for the sense always to find a pause with the couplet, and often with the rhyme, will necessarily produce something like tedium and sameness. Succeeding authors have been conscious of this fault in Pope's versification, and have, in some measure, reverted to the practice of his predecessors. Lord Byron, especially, by pauses in the middle of the line, and by occasionally, but with judgment and caution, running one line into another -enormities at which the poet of whom we are now speaking would have been stricken with horror-has frequently produced effects of which the well tuned, but somewhat fettered lyre of Pope was utterly incapable."

In his notice of Milton we find the following sensible observations on descriptive writing :

"There are indeed few things by which a writer of real genius is more easily known, than by his descriptions. This is the most difficult, and the most delightful chord of the poet's harp; and there is, perhaps, nothing in the whole range of poetry which gives such unmixed pleasure, as that descriptive of natural objects; while at the same time, in nothing is a depraved taste, or a defect of genius, sooner discovered, or more intolerable. A great fault into which descriptive writers too commonly fall, is the vagueness and indistinctness of their pictures: they have no specific likeness. Everything is described in generals. No new ideas are conveyed to the mind; but a dim and shadowy phantom seems to haunt the brain of the writer. This arises, either from ignorance of the objects described, or from a want of taste to seize and appropriate their characteristic features. Whoever enjoys but faint and imperfect conceptions himself, must fail in presenting any very vivid or striking pictures to others."

His appreciation of Ossian is very characteristic:

"Ossian's most labored efforts do not strike me as his best. It is in a casual expression, in a single simple incident, that he often startles us by the originality and force of his ideas. What a picture of desolation does he force upon our imagination when describing the ruins of Balclutha by that one unlabored but powerful incident: The fox looked out from the window.' The ghost of Crugal, the dim and shadowy visitant from another world is also painted by a single stroke of the pencil:-The stars dim twinkled through his form:' and the early death of Cormac is prophesied in a simile as original as it is powerful:- Death stands dim behind thee, like the darkened half of the moon behind its glowing light.' The grand characteristic of Ossian is pathos, as that of Homer is invention, and that of Milton sublimity. Whether he describes scenery, or delineates character, or narrates events, tenderness is the predominating feeling excited in the