denominated it, against their late Emperor; for to this length -his doctrine, as avowed in one passage in this volume, would fairly go. How little or how much reason soever it may be thought there is for giving the prelate credit for genuine zeal in behalf of religion, we have been several times, in passing through this volume, gratified at the sight of the courageous austerity with which he was sure and prompt to take vindictive notice of any sign of irreligious levity in the noble assembly. He maintained a peculiar and intimidating boldness, with the utmost possible explicitness, and, as it were, breadth of expression, when he made any reference to Christianity or the Bible. The Bible was to be referred to in the debate on the Slave Trade; and it seems some noble Lord was pleased to laugh when the Bishop began to quote one of St. Paul's Epistles to Timothy. There have been many ecclesiastics who would have let this pass; but not so Bishop Horsley. I affirm that the New Testament contains an express reprobation in terms, an express prohibition of the slave-trade by name, as sinful in a very high degree. The apostle St. Paul, my Lords, in the first of his Epistle to St. Timothy My Lords, the Bible is to be treated in this House, with reverence. If I find occasion, in argument upon a subject like the present, to quote particular texts, any noble Lord who may think proper to receive such quotations with a laugh, must expect that I call him to order.-I was saying, my Lords, that St. Paul, in the first of his Epistles to St. Timothy, having spoken of persons that were lawless and disobedient,' &c. We were equally gratified by the magisterial and contemptuous tone in which he reprimanded another laugh emitted by some noble Lords, while he was quoting from Mr. Park's Travels a description, a perfectly simple and serious one, of the kind and sympathetic manners of the women in one part of Africa, as experienced by him when in great distress. We are extremely gratified too by the noble arrogance, if we may so call it, with which he fights and spurns the advocates of the Slave Trade; and nothing can be more amusing than the sarcastic compliments, and mock-respectful references, to a noble Earl who had quoted the Bible in defence of perpetual slavery. In this instance the galling humour is considerably prolonged, and returns with a lucky bite when the Earl must have thought it was fairly past. The speech ends with a most solemn and commanding admonition of the Day of Judgement. These speeches are preceded by a Dedication, signed by the Bishop's son, who appears to take the full responsibility of editor. [69] Art. V. The Missionary. A Poem, crown octavo, pp. 136, price 78. London, Murray, 1813. NARRATIVE Poetry, including dramatic under that general name *, has ever been found the most popular. We attribute this preference to the display which it affords of human * We use the expression dramatic poetry,' because it is only as poetry, (though perhaps of the highest order,) that dramatic composition has any claim on our attention. We feel it unnecessary in this place, to repeat our firm conviction of the pernicious tendency of theatrical exhibitions, as there is, we hope, no danger of our being misunderstood on this point. We confess, that we are desirous of rescuing from its unhallowed association with the stage, that peculiar species of drama, if it must be called drama, which, under the denomination of tragedy, comprises some of the best poetry in all languages. It is obvious that it has no necessary connexion with the histrionic art. A tragedy is, strictly speaking, a poem; a play is not a poem either necessarily or usually. We will go further, and will venture to-assert, that a tragedy, in proportion as it conforms to the severe rules which genuine criticism has applied to this class of composition, and the more nearly it approaches the standard of ideal excellence, becomes less adapted for theatric representation. We are persuaded that a man of cultivated poetical taste, would as little think of going to the theatre to enjoy the beauties of dramatic poetry as he would resort to an oratorio for the gratification or the excitement of devotional feeling. Whatever amusement results from theatrical exhibition, is drawn from a quite different source. It is afforded by the powers of the actor, the imitative display of the passions, combined with the pomp of scenic representation. We do not deny that in the form of a tragedy, (such, for instance, as Shakspear's King John, or Miss Baillie's De Montford,) a perception of the intrinsic merits of the composition, may accompany, and mingle with, an attention to the performance; but this forms a subordinate part of the amusement, ́and has always been found in itself insufficient to attract or interest the frequenters of the theatre. It is, in fact, not to hear Shakspeare, but to see Kemble, that an audience is collected and to see Kemble, is pretty nearly the same kind of amusement as to see D'Egville.-We know that in reply to arguments brought forward against the stage, the unexceptionable morality of some plays, and the poetical merits of others, have been urged as a pretext (flimsy indeed) for attending their exhibition, as if that were the only or the best means of appreciating them as works of genius, and of entering into the design of the poet We call it a flimsy pretext, because those who urge it, either sadly impose on themselves, or seek to deceive others by assign ing such a reason as the motive which leads them to the theatre The mind which is occupied with the gorgeous spectacle, or the quick suc cession of objects there presented to the sensitive faculties, is not at leisure to receive the finer impressions of poetical beauty, or to indulge in the calm luxury of imaginative pleasures. The attention is too character and of human passions. Every body loves to know how a fellow-creature feels and acts in a particular situation: loves to see different tempers brought into contrast; and to judge of the propriety of the sentiments which the poet attributes to them. Besides, it is among the strong feelings of the -soul that faney finds work: it is on the sustaining atmosphere of passion that the imagination mounts and soars. What would appear the very madness of rant to a reader altogether unprepared for it, is to one, whose feelings have been properly wrought upon by a sympathy with the imaginary personages before him, perfectly congenial. The mind, like the body, has its fevers, and, in the paroxysm, attains a super-human, and, sometimes, frightful energy. Accordingly, the writer who has not the art to interest the reader for the actors in his story, must much distracted to allow of so different an exercise of the intellect. The actor's principal appeal, is made to the simple and universal instinct of curiosity, the indulgence of which, when exercised without a purpose, or on no sufficient object, becomes the amusement of a child, and tends to vitiate and weaken the mind, by precluding, or interfering with, the operation of its nobler faculties. To these, the poet addresses himself; and his object is to surround us with a fair ideal world, in which we ourselves take part as ideal actors, and to awaken within us by the help of the imagination, those indefinite feelings which elevate us above ourselves. The original purpose of the drama, as exhibited in the ancient theatres, was to furnish hints, which the imagination might seize and embody for itself. Before the art of printing was invented, public exhibitions of this kind were not without their use; at least there was a plausible excuse for their establishment. But not only does this plea for their encouragement no longer exist, but the very construction, and the whole arrangement of modern theatricals, are destructive of the effect they were originally designed to answer The perfection of scenic pageantry, though it may better suit the indolent minds of the vulgar, is absolutely fatal to the exercise of the imagination, and proportionally injurious to the intellectual character; to say nothing of its moral evils. This note has already swelled beyond all due limits. We can only thus briefly touch on a subject which is confessedly of great importance in a national point of view, and which has seldom, we think, been considered in this light. Things have been imagined to be similar, or necessarily allied, which are widely dissimilar, and which ought, both on the ground of taste, and on that of morals, to be dissociated, that the one class may not be made to countenance the other. We cannot but think, that a man competent to the task, from a rare combination of moral feeling, critical acumen, and cultivated taste, would render his country a service, by giving an edition of our great dramatic poet, purified from those corruptions, and that gross ribaldry, which, there is good reason to suppose, are additions to the text of Shakspeare, interpolated by the stage-managers, for whom he wrote, to adapt them to the gross taste of the day. sometimes be content to pass for a madman, for passages which, had they been properly introduced and skilfully managed, might have had the finest effect. To these higher beauties, narrative poetry adds the charms of description, and all the graces of diction. Indeed, it is difficult to find any poetical beauty that does not fall within its province. We are glad, therefore, to have our attention so frequently called to poems of this kind. The one before us will not, indeed, bear a comparison with some of the popular productions of the present day it does not possess any thing of those sublimities of passion of which we have been speaking; but it is equable and elegant. The subject of the story is the same as that of Ercilla, the Spanish poet,-Valdivia's attempt to subdue Chili, and his defeat in the valley of Arauco. The poem is apparently the work of one who is accustomed to shorter and lighter compositions; who has all the neatness and prettiness of style necessary in such things; but who knows nothing of the management of a larger and more complicated piece, of the proper arrangement of action, or grouping of figures. The spirit of the Andes twice calls together the spirits of the fire,' but nothing comes of their meetings; and indeed throughout the whole poem we never elsewhere hear of them. One canto, out of the eight, is wholly devoted to the story of the Missionary: it is common-place, and uninteresting, and entirely unconnected with the main subject. The Indian warriors meet round a midnight fire, and some of them speak speeches; but we are never made sufficiently acquainted with them to be able to say which is which. One of them goes to consult a wizard; but nothing ensues from it. In short, half the poem is made up of these detached fragments. But it is proper, perhaps, to give our readers the outline of the story. The commencement of the poem introduces us to the 'rush roof of an aged warrior, chief of the mountain tribes,' situated in a lonely and lovely glen, among the wastes and wilds of the Andes. Two children, brother and sister,' had formerly cheered his solitude: the description of the boy is fanciful and pretty. The boy might seem, as beautiful he stood, For in that season of awak'ning life, When dawning youth and childhood are at strife; A brede of sea-shells on his bosom strung, A small stone hatchet o'er his shoulders slung, He wander'd through the woods, the loveliest Indian boy." p. 10. This boy, Lautaro, had been stolen, from his Llama's skin,' by a band of Spaniards. They conveyed him (as the poet afterwards informs us) to Peru, and sold him for a slave. From that state he is delivered by the Missionary, Anselmo, who educates him, becomes attached to him, and, at length, gives him in marriage his adopted daughter whom he brought with him from Spain. Valdivia, the Spanish chieftain, sees Lautaro, takes him for his page, and, on his expedition into Chili, carries him along with him. Anselmo also goes; but the wife and child of Lautaro are left behind at Lima. Seven years had passed since the mountain-warrior had thus been deprived of his son, when, suddenly, his solitude is disturbed by the shrill notes of a Chilian scout. The starting warrior knew the piercing tones, The signal-call of war, from human bones."What tidings from Arauco's vale?" he cried,---"Tidings of war and blood," the Scout replied; Then the sharp pipe with shriller summons blew, And held the blood-red arrow high in view. Warrior. "Where speed the foes?" Scout. "Along the southern main, "Have pass'd the vultures of accursed Spain." Warrior. "Ruin pursue them on the distant flood, Scout. "And be their deadly portion-blood for blood!" "In Encol's wood, where the great wizard dwells, "To nerve their lifted arm, and curse devoted Spain." Onward along the craggy valley, flew.'-pp, 14, 15. The aged chief obeys the summons, collects his fellow-warriors, and hastens to the place of meeting. Resistance against Valdivia and his Spaniards is there agreed upon, and battle is |