under the pretence of analysing it; for the thoughts and sound come to us simultaneously. There may be circumstances in the delight which verse yields us too impalpable to be discriminated. But we are sensible that it excites our perception of order, which is always pleasing. We feel also that harmonious language is consentaneous with the full and voluble sensations of poetry, which have nothing that falters with doubt or diffidence. At the same time, whilst we sympathize with the poet's torrent of feelings, we are sensible that our own powers of language could not throw them into the channel of musical expression, though it appears, when found, to be their natural bed. In addition to this sympathy with his triumph, his numbers assist our memory. Their utility to that effect is experienced in pages much less interesting than those of the Muse. And if verse can strengthen our retention of a dry and dreary muster-roll of words, how much more delightfully important must it be in fixing the fleetest and sweetest traits of imagination in the mind! Verse materially promotes distinct conception, by pointing the antithesis of words, and by making their grammatical relations more distinct.-It must, therefore, help the understanding: an important circumstance in an art which is bound to inform that faculty with the slightest possible fatigue.

It has accordingly been resorted to in language ever since human beings, arising above the mere animal sense of existence, had bursts of tenderness to utter on the past, or of public zeal upon the present, or of religious anticipation on the future. It is older than prose as a studied form of composition. And poetry was the original record not only of human feelings, but of all belief, when history and religion were shrouded in fable. No doubt, it might tend to perpetuate superstition, but it preserved also feelings and thoughts that deserved not to perish, and indirectly prepared man for philosophical pursuits, whilst it sweetened and protracted the morning dreams of his intellectual day.

When the more diffuse use of writing led to the cultivation of prose, subjects of business and science were withdrawn from verse, and only those of imagination were left to it. But after men were either satiated with verse, or became too indolent to employ it, tales of fiction also were endited in prose. It need not be denied that fiction can thus come closer to life by the humility of speaking prose in the drama, and of imitating biography and history in her narrative style. But illusion itself is not an unconditional charm to the imagination; and the possibility of language losing agreeable effect by the strict imitation of life, is certainly exemplified in one species of composition, namely, in the graver Drama. The effect of prose tragedies, I think, will

generally be confessed to bring the pathos and terror of life too familiarly near us, by withdrawing that medium of language which interposes romantic and softening associations. No doubt, the stage is the mode of exhibiting nature, which requires the most reconciling art to soften her painful aspect, and prose fiction may be found more engaging in narrative than in tragedy. It is accordingly there, namely, in narrative fiction, that we find the great works of imagination which compel us to extend our view of poetry from its popular to its philosophical meaning. Under the latter acceptation we comprehend all works of original and delightful fancy; and under the former those which not only "Fill the impassion'd heart, but win the harmonious ear." The comparative magic of ideal nature will, no doubt, be differently estimated by men's different sensibility to the power of numbers. But the common usage of language gives the title of poet only to him who gives his art its crowning ornament; and we think of Milton more emphatically as a poet than even Cervantes.

Language does not give us this associated idea of preference without some reason. The prose writer of fiction drops at his outset the form of language most congenial with determinate or poetical emotion. Exceptions may exist, but generally speaking, even the great and high order of prose fiction fulfils this token. It gives consummate inventions of character to the imagination, and these are poetical and ideal whether they be grave or gay. But, on the one hand, when prose fiction is serious, it aims at a less sustained elevation of the fancy, and stoops designedly from pathos and sublimity to views of life, which may refresh and amuse us, but are not poetry. Again, if prose has ever rivalled verse in ideal fiction, it is in the comic; and our sense of the comic, though it comes strictly within the powers of the imagination, stands confessedly the lowest among them. The primary object of ridicule is incongruity; and the laughing writer must therefore seek his materials, not merely in the humble, for these are often the most poetical, but in the HUMILIATING circumstances of existence. It is therefore in comedy that verse and prose appear to present their claims of possession on the most debateable ground. Comedy indeed must, I think, on the whole, be called poetical in its nature; and, as verse always heightens the expressiveness of language, as it wings the shaft of wit, and gives elasticity to the figures of fancy, it surely were better retained by the Comic Muse. But still her gaiety may compensate for her dishabille, and she makes no important sacrifice of her dignity in descending to the dialect of ordinary life. It is with the tender luxury of the mind, or with its loftier enthusiasm, that harmonious numbers have their most congenial alliance. Those feelings have an abstracted and unworldly cha

racter, which belongs not to the sense of ridicule. They are drawn from conceptions of nature undisturbed by the discord of contempt; and as their luxury to the mind is full and pure, they naturally claim to be expressed in the language of harmony. Verse assuredly is neither a certain token nor guarantee of inspiration; but it tends at least constantly to remind the true poet of his high calling, to make his thoughts music to the mind as well as the ear-whilst the use of a prose style insensibly leads to prosaic views and sensations of life. Accordingly, prose fiction, collectively speaking, adopts not only the matter of fact air, but the spirit also, of biography and history. It feigns events indeed, but makes them appear no more poetically ideal than the literal transcripts of reality. I allude not to the highest rank of novels, which exhibit a mighty idealism in the picture of nature, though it may be interspersed with shades of common-place. Nor do I intend expressing disrespect for a meritorious and useful, though secondary class of such writings, which gradually diverge from this character. I only mean that the great mass of prose fictions deserve not to be called works of imagination, though they relate feigned events. The bulk of its writers pursue, not a minor path of poetry, but a totally different track. Their intention, and the desire of their readers, is avowedly commonplace. They have no purpose to give a heightened or select image of life, but its flat likeness; and to ensure its resemblance, they sometimes conscientiously throw in all its ennui to the bargain. Even when common-place novel-writing leaves this safe insipidity, and tampers with the passions, it does not on that account, approach nearer to the character of a poem. For the enjoyment of the imagination, in a poetical sense, is as little allied to sensuality as to dulness; and as productions of art, the immoral poisons of such fiction are as unsavoury as its moral drugs. It is true that the whole host of novels, to judge by their popularity, answer in one respect to Lord Bacon's definition of Poetry, that "they accommodate the shews of things to the desires of the mind." But to what sort of desires? In how many instances to the love of scandal and personality! In how few, to more than a petty curiosity in the irritations and embarrassments of life! This dissipation of the fancy stands exactly in the same relation to poetry as to algebra.

TO THE RAINBOW.

BY T. CAMPBELL.

Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky
When storms prepare to part,
I ask not proud philosophy

To teach me what thou art

Still seem as to my childhood's sight
A midway station given

For happy spirits to alight

Betwixt the earth and heaven.

Can all that optics teach, unfold
Thy form to please me so,
As when I dreamt of gems and gold
Hid in thy radiant bow ?

When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws.

And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.

When o'er the green undeluged earth
Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
How came the world's grey fathers forth
To watch thy sacred sign.

And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod,
Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.

Methinks, thy jubilee to keep,
The first-made anthem rang,
On earth deliver'd from the deep,
And the first poet sang.

Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam:
Theme of primeval prophecy,
Be still the poet's theme.

The earth to thee its incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When glittering in the freshen'd fields
The snowy mushroom springs.

How glorious is thy girdle cast
O'er mountain, tower, and town,
Or mirror'd in the ocean vast
A thousand fathoms down.

As fresh in yon horizon dark,
As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark
First sported in thy beam.

For faithful to its sacred page,
Heaven still rebuilds thy span,
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.

THE LOVER TO HIS MISTRESS ON HER BIRTH-DAY; A SONG TRANSLATED FROM THE BOHEMIAN.