the soul with the intensity of its feeling; which, as we have before expressed ourselves, inspires us with genuine emotions of tenderness, power, and beauty. This is not the character of Pope's poetry. If we except the Epistle to Abelard, and some of the lines to an unfortunate lady, he has written nothing pathetic, and the Epistle to Abelard must be considered somewhat indebted for its admirable contradiction of passions, to the original letter of Eloisa. As to sublimity, we hardly know where to look for it, unless it be in the Ode of the dying Christian to his soul,' 'the prologue to Cato,' and in some of the illustrations and images in the Essay on Man. The Messiah, in this respect, must be considered only as a version. Now these few instances are not enough to establish the poet's character for grandeur or pathos. The truth is, it was not his character, and he perfectly understood it. He wisely confined himself to those themes to which he was best fitted by nature. He wandered once into an imitation of the Ode of St Cecilia, and he is universally acknowledged to have failed. He wrote about criticism, and no one was better qualified for it, and essays on the vices and follies in social life, of which he was an acute observer. The Rape of the Lock is founded on these; and its machinery, although faultless, has obviously nothing in it grand or affecting the subject would not admit of it. The Essay on Man, notwithstanding it is embellished with beautiful and sublime imagery, is throughout a treatise upon metaphysical morality, and for this reason, whatever may be the merit of its versification or of its doctrines, is in the very essence of its topics ill adapted to the higher flights of poetry. The same remarks apply to his satirical pieces. His Windsor Forest and his Pastorals, beautifully finished as they are, rarely show that delicate sensibility to the secret charms of nature, which led Thomson to point out to us what till then we had never before noticed, and Cowper to invest every known object with some moral grace that made it still new. He paints nature from the eye and not from the heart; deals more in general than in minute description, is sometimes pedantic and often cold. It is not by an indiscriminate commendation of Pope, that we may hope to preserve his poetical character from the unmerited contempt, into which it has fallen of late years; chiefly occasioned by the example of a few captivating but lawless writers. We must meet him on his own ground, which 1821.J is surely acknowle credited as a pers and fancy remarked du sublin mais fait l'autre ; mend hin in powerf discourag recomme dreamy, I first objec still more feeling sp sadly mist One wo should not his poetry Lord Byr people are is the onl proach. and that h and obviou cision, with each indivi it be of an the quantity in the selec ture of his s argumentati which, poin additional k Shackled as respect it re any other, variety of seems to h is distributed New Seri is surely too high to demand the aid of extravagant eulogium; acknowledge his deficiencies, that we may be more readily credited in speaking of his merits; hold him up to imitation as a perspicuous, elegant, and correct writer, abounding in wit and fancy but not sublime; natural but not tender; as Voltaire remarked of one of his own countrymen, incapable peut-être du sublime, qui eleve l'ame, et du sentiment, qui attendrit, mais fait pour éclaircir ceux à qui la nature accorde l'un et l'autre ; enfin le poête de la raison.' We would not commend him as first in the order of poetry, as one who abounds in powerful or pathetic sentiment, lest so cold a model should discourage genuine poetical fervor; but we would strenuously recommend his example to those, who are captivated by that dreamy, mystic, indirect mode of thinking, which defeats the first object of a good writer, that of being understood; and still more to that tribe of 'naturals,' who with some poetical feeling spoil all by a silly 'babble of green fields,' which they sadly mistake for simplicity and nature. One word respecting the versification of Pope, (indeed we should not have uttered so many truisms on the character of his poetry, had it not been for the indiscriminate eulogium of Lord Byron,) and we have done. His Lordship remarks that people are tired of hearing Pope called the 'just,' and that he is the only poet whose faultlessness has been made his reproach. We think there is good ground for such reproach, and that his faultlessness, paradoxical as it may seem, is a great and obvious defect, or in other words, that the extreme precision, with which he has adjusted every pause, and balanced each individual couplet, makes the whole poem, especially if it be of any length, monotonous and fatiguing. Considering the quantity he has written, we should think him unfortunate in the selection of his verse, did we not also consider the nature of his subjects. These being for the most part satirical or argumentative, were no doubt better managed in rhyme, which, pointed, antithetical, sententious in its structure, gave additional keenness to his raillery and force to his argument. Shackled as this kind of verse is, by its own laws, in which respect it resembles the French monotony in wire' more than any other, we still think Pope has not relieved it, by all the variety of which it is susceptible. Every line with him seems to hang self-balanced on its own centre,' every pause is distributed by one uniform rule; every couplet shuts up New Series, No. 8. 61 its own sentence. This is artificial, not natural harmony, and the ear becomes soon wearied with such a regular recurrence of sounds and pauses. Pope has been styled the father of English versification. But we really think the perfection of melody, (to say nothing of Shakspeare,) was to be found long before him in Milton, who in this respect carried the language to a higher pitch than any of his successors; than all the 'sweetness of Waller,' the majesty of Dryden,' or the uniform harmony of Pope. Pope's example was more easily imitated, as his versification was artificial, and required very little natural ear. It was, therefore, more generally copied by his followers, and had no doubt a great influence in polishing the language. Milton's soul seems to have been attuned to melody. Take indifferently any of his pieces, great or small, and after all fair allowance for the jargon of a pedantic age, we find a perpetual flow of 'Words, that, with grace divine Imbued, bring to their sweetness no satiety.' No one of his successors is to be named with him in this respect, excepting Lord Byron. He too seems to have a delicate ear united to a soul of equal sensibility. Thoughts that voluntary move harmonious numbers ;' although frequently abrupt from negligence, or unintelligible from an indefinite and circuitous expression of what he does not very clearly comprehend himself. We hope his Lordship will imitate in this respect the poet he so justly admires, and purge from his compositions the mistiness, which too frequently hangs over the finest thoughts. us. Before we part with him, we must thank him for the pleasure this elegant trifle we have been examining, has afforded It is too witty, spirited, and eloquent not to amuse all who take it up; it will then be laid on the shelf and forgotten. We feel something like regret, that a genius like Lord Byron's should mix in controversies of temporary interest, where he must meet men better informed and more accustomed to the warfare than himself. In the letter before us, we think he will amuse more than he will convince; his wit plays very nimbly, but Mr Bowles has nothing to fear from it, for unless pointed with more argument, it will hardly leave a scar. should esteem it arrogance to point out to Lord Byron any We new subje say better ART. XX praxis Pp. 38 constant c cept that c ing constar some of th destined fo together in tion in the literature. In the ea seem, that with the He ledge with to a few ot cultivated to vision was m Cambridge, 1722 down new subject for his powers; we have seen this done by other critics, and when the hint has been taken, a failure has generally been the consequence of it. But we had rather his Lordship would confine himself to the high walk, in which he has no living rival. Many men can write prose as well, not to say better than himself, none can come near to him in poetry; and for ourselves we are free to confess, that high as we rate the genius of Pope, and much as we prize his compositions, we think there is more of the impetus sacer', a more exquisite and loftier tone of poetic feeling in Childe Harold and Manfred, than in all that Pope has ever written. ART. XXIV. A Hebrew Grammar, with a copious syntax and praxis. By Moses Stuart, Prof. of Sacred Literature in Theol. Sem. at Andover. Andover, Flagg & Gould, 8vo, pp. 386. 1821. THIS grammar bodes well to the cause of oriental learning, in the great theological school with which its author is connected. While our students in theology were scattered over the country, attending to their professional pursuits singly, under the direction, it might be, of very sensible and judicious clergymen, but whose learning was worse for years spent in a constant circle of parochial duty, all appropriate learning, except that of the cut and thrust of polemic divinity, was tending constantly to languish and decay. We have already seen some of the benefits of withdrawing our young men, who are destined for the church, from solitary study, and bringing them together in schools, where provision is made for their instruction in the original languages of the scriptures and in biblical literature. In the earliest period of the New England church, it would seem, that some of the greatest divines were well acquainted with the Hebrew language. Some of them brought this knowledge with them from the parent country, which they imparted to a few others. But we have no reason to think it was long cultivated to any great extent, and we do not find that any provision was made for instruction in Hebrew, in the university at Cambridge, till nearly a century after its foundation. From 1722 down to the period of the establishment of the theologi cal school in Harvard college, the Hebrew was a voluntary study for the most part; a short period was allotted to it in the academic course, and so little of what had been learned was retained, when the student received his degree, that, in a great majority of cases, among students in theology, if they had learned any thing of the language, it was abandoned for other studies, which appeared more indispensable as a preparation for their public functions. Few, it may well be supposed, among those who obtained a parochial charge, if they should find time, would maintain or acquire that ardor in study, which is necessary to begin with the very elements of a language, so unlike any with which they had been conversant, or recommence its study, when almost every trace of their former, scanty knowledge had become obliterated. Hence it was, not long since, that a good Hebrew scholar was a prodigy in the church. But meagre as had become the amount of learning in this language, among our divines, this deficiency did not constitute the whole evil. From defective examination, from indolence, and a consequent reliance on authority, favoring the love of ease, our scholars had gone over to those French and English grammarians and philologists, who, under the pretence of facilitating the learning of Hebrew, left nothing of it but the skeleton. The bare consonants, which did well enough for those who first spoke and wrote the language, when arrayed before a European, appear to belong to a dead language indeed. For all the purposes of sound and pronunciation, he might as well be deaf and dumb; and the reading is so arbitrary and imperfect, that nothing abides in the memory, and nothing is thoroughly understood. Professor Stuart has, with great industry, examined the copious Hebrew grammars of the greatest oriental scholars among the Germans, and has followed in a great degree the latest and the best, namely, that of Gesenius. We cannot better explain the manner in which his grammar is conducted, than by giving his own account. 'He flatters himself that nothing very important will be found wanting; as the substance of Gesenius' great work is incorporated in it. In regard to the plan of the work, he does not profess to be a mere translator of Gesenius, whose grammar is too large for common use; but he has adopted the general method of this writer, as his model. He has made a diligent use of him for the purpose of information. In some cases he has seen reason, as he believes, but not i to compa what full are treat manner f lation of work of mars, he learner, to which more com will be fo hibits the spect to a Gesenius, tated, and rendered to metho of rules, compariso We do own labo If we th ward us which th what goo be enoug work. In giv vowels, w senius, in rians had tribution long vowe the Germ continent, them and and intelli riety; and nity to lea with the I guage, the |