The Edinburgh Review: Or Critical Journal, Volume 11

Front Cover
A. Constable, 1808

From inside the book

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 275 - The poesy of this young lord belongs to the class which neither gods nor men are said to permit. Indeed, we do not recollect to have seen a quantity of verse with so few deviations in either direction from that exact standard. His effusions are spread over a dead flat, and can no more get above or below the level, than if they were so much stagnant water.
Page 278 - ' brown chief" some time, the bards conclude by giving him their advice to " raise his fair locks ;" then to " spread them on the arch of the rainbow;" and «< to smile through the tears of the storm." Of this kind of thing there are no less than nine pages; and we can so far venture an opinion in their favour, that they look very like Macpherson; and we are positive they are pretty nearly as stupid and tiresome. It...
Page 275 - ... given against him, it is highly probable that an exception would be taken, were he to deliver for poetry the contents of this volume. To this he might plead minority ; but as he now makes voluntary tender of the article, he hath no right to sue, on that ground, for the price in good current praise, should the goods be unmarketable.
Page 214 - MY heart leaps up when I behold A Rainbow in the sky : So was it when my life began ; So is it now I am a Man ; So be it when I shall grow old, Or let me die ! The Child is Father of the Man ; And I could wish my days to be Bound each to each by natural piety, TO A BUTTERFLY.
Page 276 - ... upon the fingers. — is not the whole art of poetry. We would entreat him to believe, that a certain portion of liveliness, somewhat of fancy, is necessary to constitute a poem ; and that a poem in the present day, to be read, must contain at least one thought, either in a little degree different from the ideas of former writers, or differently expressed.
Page 212 - As if she had lost her only friend She wept, nor would be pacified. Up to the tavern-door we post; Of Alice and her grief I told; And I gave money to the host, To buy a new cloak for the old. 'And let it be of duffil grey, As warm a cloak as man can sell...
Page 220 - LONDON, 1802. MILTON ! thou should'st be living at this hour : England hath need of thee : she is a fen Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, Have forfeited their ancient English dower Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ; Oh ! raise us up, return to us again ; And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Page 220 - The silence that is in the starry sky, The sleep that is among the lonely hills. In him the savage virtue of the race, Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts were dead Nor did he change ; but kept in lofty place The wisdom which adversity had bred. Glad were the vales, and every cottage hearth ; The shepherd lord was honoured more and more ; And, ages after he was laid in earth, "The good Lord Clifford
Page 277 - However, be this as it may, we fear his translations and imitations are great favourites with Lord Byron. We have them of all kinds, from Anacreon to Ossian ; and, viewing them as school exercises, they may pass. Only, why print them after they have had their day and served their turn ? And why call the thing in p. 79...
Page 279 - But whatever judgment may be passed on the poems of this noble minor, it seems we must take them as we find them, and be content : for they are the last we shall ever have from him. He is at best, he says, but an intruder into the groves of Parnassusi; he never lived in a garret, like thorough-bred poets, and though he once roved a careless mountaineer in the Highlands of Scotland, he has not of late enjoyed this advantage.

Bibliographic information