Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

of the poet, the true sublime may be found among passages of exquisite beauty in the Voyage of Columbus. A brief example may be adduced. Describing the flight of Merion, the guardian angel of America, the poet characteristically says, he

Rose like the condor, and at tow'ring height,

In pomp of plumage sail'd, deep'ning the shades of night, Roc of the west, to him all empire given,

Who bears Axalua's * dragon folds to heaven:

His flight a whirlwind, &c.

The commencement of Canto the Second, alluding to the submersion of the Atlantis of Plato and Solon, or rather of the Egyptian priests, might be referred to as another example; and the conclusion of the passage, which describes armed shapes' of godlike stature, slowly passing along the red battlement of the evening sky

Streaming a baleful light that was not of the sun,

is radiant with sublime splendour, and imbued with mysterious excitement. The most striking feature of this epic sketch, and with the notice of which I shall conclude, is 'germane to the matter' of this pamphlet. I mean the graphic power of its occasional descriptions -a sure test of an excited imagination, and therefore, of the highest order of poetry. It is curious, that here, and here only, in direct opposition to his usual style,

* The resemblance of the theology of Mexico to the Egyptian, Chinese, and Scandinavian, cannot here fail to strike the antiquarian. Her chronology and astronomy were Chinese.

Rogers resorts to those pictural words and phrases which have been noticed as the chief beauty and peculiar distinction of Montgomery. For example;

And from his wings of gold shook drops of liquid light.

Oh whence as wafted from Elysium, whence Those perfumes, strangers to the raptured sense? Those boughs of gold and fruits of heavenly hue, Tinging with vermeil light the waters blue? But

Whose cunning carved this vegetable bowl?

does not express the vivid image of P. Martyr: Ex ligno lucido confectum, et arte mira laboratum.

Again

Where many a fire-fly shooting thro' the glade

Spangled the locks of many a lovely maid,

Who now danced forth to strew our path with flowers.

There guavas blush'd as in the vales of light.

The episode of the Fount of Youth-a beautiful Mexican fable, sung by the humming-bird—

Gem full of life, the fairy king of flowers—

is exquisitely vivid; of the mystic fount he says,

It met the sun in many a rainbow shower
Murmuring delight: its living waters roll'd
'Mid branching palms and amaranths of gold.

While instituting the preceding comparison of affinities suggested by a review of the Omnipresence, I may

not inappropriately adduce the following passages, bearing out my view of the resemblance of Montgomery's style in Satan to Cowper, Young and Akenside. They are less faultless than the first, but not so tame on the other hand, they are more faultless and free from conceits and wordy amplification than the two last. The subjoined resembles Cowper's passages, For wealth too grasping,' and 'Ambition, avarice,' Task, Book III*. I am sorry my space will only allow me to refer to, not to quote the kindred passages, in the three above-named authors.

To eyes,

Where avarice hath raised a blinding film

That flatters, while it bounds the view, her scenes
Array'd, and glowing with commercial pomp,
More costly than the sun-enchanted skies
Appear. Triumphantly outspreads the show
Of Trade, of Traffic, and their sumptuous world!
See! from yon ports what merchant-vessels spread,
Daunting the winds, and dancing o'er the waves,
Rich wares and living burden, while the breeze
Toys with the flag, and fills the panting sail.
Others, from many a tempest-haunted track
Return'd, in thunder beat their homeward way,
And send their spirit wreathing on the gales!
Then hark! amid this wilderness of domes,

Dark lanes, and smoke-roof'd streets,-what mingled
roar,

* These lines of observing and cold irony on selfish snugness may be quoted as a happy specimen of analogy to the polished antitheses of Cowper

Too mean for virtue, too polite for vice,

The happy medium which their spirits keep

Is fully toned to temporal joys.-Satan, p. 146

While Commerce, in her thousand shapes and moods,
With eager hand and greedy eye, pursues

Her round of wonders, and of gain.

*

*

*

*

*

Yet here, methinks, had not one hideous thirst
For lucre parch'd all pity from the mind,

The hollow cheeks, and livid brow of Toil,
That, lean, and yellow'd by infectious gloom,
Droops o'er his hateful task,-might pang the heart
Of Selfishness, in her most griping hour.
Here, too, amid the pestilential glow

Of heated chambers, where in sad revenge
Art flourishes o'er fading life,—are pent

The infant young, and friendless orphan poor ;

They who should gambol on the lusty meads,

While gamesome blood danced beauty through their

cheeks,

Thus doom'd to languish in degenerate toils!

Why, what a hell-slave will this Commerce prove,

When life and feeling perish for her cause!

[blocks in formation]

Already hath an evil spell begun;

*

Though a proud empire will not see, her heart

Is fever'd with a fest'ring mass of thought,—

A lust of gain, that rankles into lies,

O'er fraudful means, or knavish arts; while Truth,

Integrity, and Honour, are diseased,

And die away in avaricious dreams.

The next extract will remind the reader of a favou

rite cognate passage in Akenside

Yet who the summer, that bright season-queen,

Hath hail'd, beheld the march of midnight worlds,

The sun in glory, or his skiey realm,

When thunder-demons are abroad again,
And riding on the chariot roll of clouds!
Who that hath seen the ocean-terrors swell,
Or moonshine rippling o'er the rocking waves

In smiles of beauty,-all this living might,
And motion, grace, and majesty of things,-
Nor caught some impulse that believing heart
Might share, and crown it with a creed sublime?

Again, Akenside's admirers will not fail to be pleased with the subjoined extract, on the score of diction and imagery

Such will not ever be: thy death-gloom pierced,
And awful on the unimprison'd soul

Will blaze a sun-burst of revealing truth!
Wherein these mysteries of sight and sense
Shall all unravell'd lie.-The wizard Night
In cavern darkness robed; the lone sweet star,
Oft worshipp'd for a beatific orb

Where bright Immortals dwell; the moon's romance,
The sun's enchantment, when he wakes to smile
The day abroad, or paint departing Life
By his deep setting; with the spirit-tone
Of winds, the ocean's ever mutt'ring choir
Of billows, weaving her mysterious spell,-
And all that thus predominantly awes
Or saddens feeling, shall itself resolve
In spiritual completion. Then, thy tear
Ecstatic, radiant with adoring thought;
The rapture, thrilling like a viewless chain

From Heaven let down, and link'd around the soul,
Shall be translated by unbodied mind.—

This subjoined short sentence is strikingly like Young

By Day the present, but at Night the past
Prevails.

Again,―

When this world dies, the next begins to live.

« ZurückWeiter »