"At last I heard a voice upon the slope And on the glimmering limit, far with- A reply there is; but whether in the affirmative or negative, we do not know. A revelation there is; but whether it be an interference in behalf of the sinner, or a display, in ruddy light, of God's rightdeep uncertainty. Tennyson, like Adeousness in his punishment, is left in dison in his "Vision of Mirza," ventures side of the eternal ocean. not to withdraw the veil from the left He leaves the curtain to be the painting. He permits it dare, shapes of beauty, or forms of fiery the imagination of the reader to figure, if wrath, upon the "awful rose of dawn," as upon a vast background. It is his only to start the thrilling suggestion. And, lighted there, he utters his bitter and blasted feelings in lines reminding After all, we have considerable misgivus, from their fierce irony, their misan- ings about placing Tennyson-for what thropy, their thrice-drugged despair, of he has hitherto done-among our great Swift's "Legion Club;" and—as in that poets. We cheerfully accord him great wicked, wondrous poem-a light sparkle powers; but he is, as yet, guiltless of of contemptuous levity glimmers with a great achievements. His genius is bold, ghastly sheen over the putrid pool of but is waylaid at almost every step by the malice and misery below, and cannot all disguise the workings of that remorse which is not repentance. At length this sad evil utterance dies away in the throat of the expiring sinner, and behind his consummated ruin there arises a "mystic mountain range," along which voices are heard lamenting, or seeking to explain, the causes of his ruin. One says "Behold it was a crime timidity and weakness of his temperament. His utterance is not proportionate to his vision. He sometimes reminds us of a dumb man with important tidings within, but only able to express them by gestures, starts, sobs, and tears. His works are loopholes, not windows, through which intense glimpses come and go, but no broad, clear, and rounded prospect is commanded. As a thinker, he often seems Of sense, avenged by sense, that wore with like one who should perversely pause a time." Another "The crime of sense became The crime of malice, and is equal blame." A third "He had not wholly quench'd his powerA little grain of conscience made him sour." And thus, at length, in a darkness visible of mystery and grandeur, the "Vision of Sin" closes: hundred feet from the summit of a lofty hill, and refuse to ascend higher. "Up! the breezes call thee-the clouds marshal thy way—the glorious prospect waits thee, as a bride adorned for her husband-angels or gods may meet thee on the topit may be thy Mountain of Transfiguration." But no; the pensive or wilful poet chooses to remain below. Nevertheless, the eye of genius is flashing in Tennyson's head, and his ear is un Alfred Tennyson is the son of an English clergyman in Lincolnshire. He is of a retiring disposition, and seldom, though sometimes, emerges from his retirement into the literary coteries of London. And yet welcome is he ever among them— with his eager physiognomy, his dark hair and eyes, and his small, black tobacco-pipe. Some years ago, we met a brother of his in Dumfries, who bore, we were told, a marked, though miniature resemblance to him, a beautiful painter and an expert versifier, after the style of Alfred. stopped, whether to the harmonies of na- | rod shivered. Still, even as an artist, ture, or to the still sad music of huma- Tennyson has not yet done himself full nity. We care not much in which of the justice, nor built up any structure so tracks he has already cut out he may shapely, complete, and living, as may choose to walk; but we would prefer if perpetuate his name.* he were persuaded more frequently to see visions and dream dreams-like his "Vision of Sin"-imbued with high purpose, and forming the Modern Metamorphoses of truth. We have no hope that he will ever be, in the low sense, a popular poet, or that to him the task is allotted of extracting music from the railway train, or of setting in song the "fairy tales of science"-the great astronomical or geological discoveries of the age. Nor is he likely ever to write anything which, like the poems of Burns or Campbell, can go directly to the heart of the entire nation. For no "Song of the Shirt," even, need The particulars of his literary career we look from him. But the imaginative- are familiar to most. His first producness of his nature, the deep vein of his tion was a small volume of poems, pubmoral sentiment, the bias given to his lished in 1831. Praised in the "Westmind by his early reading, the airy charm minster" elaborately, and extravagantly of his versification, and the seclusion in eulogised in the "Englishman's Magawhich he lives, like a flower in its own zine" (a periodical conducted by William peculiar jar, all seem to prepare him for Kennedy, but long since defunct, and becoming a great spiritual dreamer, who which, according to some malicious permight write not only "Recollections of the sons, died of this same article)—it was Arabian Nights," but "Arabian Nights" sadly mangled by less generous critics. themselves, equally graceful in costume, "Blackwood's Magazine" doled it out but impressed with a deeper sentiment, some severely-sifted praise; and the chastened into severer taste, and warmed author, in his next volume, rhymed back with a purer flame. Success to such his ingratitude in the well-known lines pregnant slumbers! soft be the pillow as to "Rusty, musty, fusty, crusty Christhat of his own "Sleeping Beauty;" may topher," whose blame he forgave, but every syrup of strength and sweetness whose praise he could not. Meanwhile, drop upon his eyelids, and may his dreams he was quietly forming a small but zealbe such as to banish sleep from many an ous cohort of admirers; and some of his eye, and to fill the hearts of millions with poems, such as "Mariana," &c., were beauty! universally read and appreciated. His second production was less successful, and deserved to be less successful, than the first. It was stuffed with wilful im On the whole, Tennyson is less a prophet than an artist. And this alone would serve better to reconcile us to his silence, should it turn out that his poetic *His "Princess," published since the career is over. The loss of even the above, is not even an attempt towards a finest artist may be supplied-that of whole. Nor do we admire so much as the a prophet, who has been cut off in the public his "In Memoriam." It is a succesmidst of his mission, or whose words some sion of fine quaint moralisings, with many envious influence or circumstance has timid gleams of thought, but with no adesnatched from his lips, is irreparable. Inquate subject, no consecutive power, no new insight, no free, strong motion, no real unity, the one case, it is but a painter's pencil and discovering rather an elaborate and imithat is broken; in the other, it is a magic tative ingenuity than original genius. pertinences and affectations. His critics in their dim ocean mangers; but we are told him he wrote ill, and he answered not so willing to part with that beautiful them by writing worse. His third ex- sisterhood, and hope to see them again hibited a very different spirit. It con- at no distant day, standing in their lovely sisted of a selection from his two former isle, and singing, volumes, and a number of additional pieces the principal of which we have already analysed. In his selection, he winnows his former works with a very salutary severity; but what has he done with that delectable strain of the "Syrens?" We think he has acted well in stabling and shutting up his "Krakens" "Come hither, come hither, and be our lords, For merry brides are we. We will kiss sweet kisses, and speak sweet words. Ye will not find so happy a shore, DR GEORGE CROLY. Not only is the literary divine not a dis- | should "help the woman; and the grace to his profession, he is a positive thunder of a Bossuet, a Massillon, a Hall, honour. His pulpit becomes an emi- or a Chalmers breaking from the pulpit, nence, commanding a view of both worlds. does not speak so loud in behalf of our He is a witness at the nuptials of truth faith as the "still, small voice" issuing and beauty, and the general cause of from the studious chamber of an Addison, Christianity is subserved by him in more a Boyle, a Bowdler, an Isaac Taylor, and ways than one; for, first, the names of a Cowper. But men who might have great men devoted at once to letters and religion neutralise, and more than neutralise, those which are often produced and paraded on the other side; again, they show that the theory of science sanctified, and literature laid down before the Lord, has been proved and incarnated in living examples, and does not therefore remain in the baseless regions of mere hypothesis; and, thirdly, they evince that, even if religion be an imposture and a delusion, it is one so plausible and powerful as to have subjugated very strong intellects, and that it will not therefore do for every sciolist in the school of infidelity to pretend contempt for those who confess that it has commanded and convinced them. taken foremost places in the walks of letters and science, and yet have voluntarily devoted themselves to the Christian cause, and yet continue amid all this devotion tremblingly alive to all the graces, beauties, and powers of literature, are surely standing evidences at least of the sincerity of their own convictions, if not of the truth of that faith on which these convictions centre. And when they openly give testimony to their belief, we listen as if we heard science and literature themselves pronouncing the creed, or swearing the sacramental oath of Christianity. Such an one is Dr George Croly. He might have risen to distinction in any path he chose to pursue; he has attained wide eminence as a literary man; he has Literary divines, next to religious lay- never lost sight of the higher aims of his men, are the chosen champions of Chris-own profession; and he is now in the ripe tianity. We say next to laymen, for, when they come forth from their desks, their laboratories, or observatories, and bear spontaneous testimony in behalf of religion, it is as though the "earth” again autumn of his powers, with redoubled energy and hope, about to dive down in search of new pearls in that old deep which communicates with the omniscience of God. Dr Croly is almost the last survivor of now sounds thy requiem, and may peradthat school of Irish eloquence which in- venture herald thy future resurrection. cluded the names of Burke, Sheridan, Dr Croly has not altogether escaped Grattan, Curran, and Flood. He has the pervasive gloom of his country's literamost of the merits, and few of the faults, ture. This speaks in the choice of his of that school. A singular school it has subjects, and in the lofty, ambitious tone been, when we consider the circumstances of his manner. He would spring up above and character of the country where it the sphere of Ireland's dire attraction! flourished. The most miserable has been "Farthest from her is best." Irish subthe most eloquent of countries. The jects, therefore, are avoided, although worst cultivated country has borne the from no want of sympathy with Ireland. richest crop of flowers of speech. The Regions either enjoying a profounder calm, barrenness of its bogs has been compen- or torn by nobler agonies than those of sated by the rank fertility of its brains. Erin, are the chosen fields for his muse. Its groans have been set to a wild and Of his country's wild, reckless humour, wondrous music-its oratory has been a always reminding us of the mirth of desafety-valve to its otherwise intolerable spairing criminals, singing and dancing wrongs. Yet, over all Irish eloquence, out the last dregs of their life, Croly is and even Irish humour, there hovers a nearly destitute. For this his genius is certain shade of sadness. In vain they too stern and lofty. He does not deal in struggle to smile or to assume an air of sheet lightning, but in the forked flashes cheerfulness. A sense of their country's of a withering and blasting invective. But wretchedness-their Pariah position-in richness of figure, in strength of lanthe dark doom that seems suspended over guage, in vehemence of passion, and in everything connected with the Irish name, freedom and force of movement, he is lowers over and behind them as they speak eminently Irish. Stripped, however, he or write. Amidst the loftiest flights of is-partly by native taste, and partly by Burke's speculation, the gayest bravuras the friction of long residence in this of Sheridan's rhetoric, the fieriest bursts country-of the more glaring faults of of Grattan's or Curran's eloquence, this his country's style, its turbulence, exagstamp of the branding-iron-this down-geration, fanfaronade, florid diffusion, and ward drag of degradation-is never lost sight of or forgotten. that ludicrous pathos which so often, in lieu of tears of grief, elicits tear-torrents of laughter. To use the well-known witticism of Curran, he has so often wagged his tongue in England, that he has at last caught its accent, and his brogue is the faintest in the world. The heat of the Irish blood and its wild poetical afflatus he has not sought, nor, if he had, would have been able to relinquish. Ireland! art thou a living string of God's great lyre, the earth; or art thou an instrument, thrown aside like a neglected harp, and only valuable for the chance notes of joy or sorrow, mad mirth or despair, which the hands of passengers can discourse upon thee? Art thou only a wayward child of the mighty mother, or art thou altogether a monstrous and in- Dr Croly's principal power is that of curable birth? Has nature taught thee gorgeous and eloquent description. There thy notes of riant mirth or yet richer are five different species of the describer. pathos, or have torture and tyranny, like The first describes a scene or character cruel arts of hell, awoke within thee as it appears to him, but as it really is those slumbering energies which it were not, he having, through weakness of sight well for thee had slept for ever? Well or inaccuracy of observation, missed the for thee it may be, but not for the reality, and substituted a vague someworld; for thy loss has been our gain, thing, more cognate to himself than to and from thy long and living death has his object. The second is the literal deflowed forth that long, swelling, sinking, scriber-the bare, bald truth before him is always dying, yet never dead music, which | barely and baldly caught—a certain spirit that hovered over it, as if on wing to fly, are rather those of the poet than of the having amid the bustling details of the ex-seer. They are rapid, but always clear, ecution been disturbed and scared away. vivid, strong, and eloquent, and over each The third is the ideal describer, who movement of his pen an invisible pencil catches and arrests that volatile film, ex- seems to hang and to keep time. pressing the life of life, the gloss of joy, Searching somewhat more accurately the light of darkness, and the wild sheen for a classification of minds, they seem of death; in short, the fine or terrible to us to include five orders—the prophet, something which is really about the object, the artist, the analyst, the copiast, and but which the eye of the gifted alone can the combination in part of all the four. see, even as in certain atmospheres only There is, first, the prophet, who receives the rays of the sun are visible. The immediately and gives out unresistingly fourth is the historical describer, who sees the torrent of the breath and power of and paints objects in relation to their his own soul, which has become touched past and future history, who gets so far by a high and holy influence from behind within the person or the thing as to have him. This is no MECHANICAL office; the glimpses behind and before about it, as fact that he is chosen to be such an inif he belonged to it, like a memory or a strument, itself proclaims his breadth, conscience; and the fifth is the universal elevation, power, and patency. There is describer, who sees the object amidst its next the artist, who receives the same total bearings, representing in it more or influence in a less measure, and who, inless fully the great whole of which it is stead of implicitly obeying the current, one significant part. Thus, suppose the tries to adjust, control, and get it to object a tree, one will slump up its move in certain bounded and modulated character as large or beautiful-words streams. There is, thirdly, the analyst, which really mean nothing; another will, who, in proportion to the faintness in with the accuracy of a botanist, analyse which the breath of inspiration reaches it into its root, trunk, branches, and him, is the more desirous to turn round leaves; a third will make its rustle seem upon it, to reduce it to its elements, and the rhythm of a poem; a fourth will see to trace it to its source. There is, fourthly, in it, as Cowper in Yardley Oak, its the copiast-we coin a term, as he would entire history, from the acorn to the axe, like to turn the far-off sigh of the aboor perchance from the germ to the final riginal thought, which alone reaches him, conflagration; and a fifth will look on it into a new and powerful spoken word— as a mouth and mirror of the Infinite-but in vain. And there is, lastly, the a slip of Igdrasil. Or is the object the combination of the whole four-the cleocean-one will describe it as vast, or ver, nay, gifted mimic, whose light energy serene, or tremendous, epithets which enables him to circulate between, and to burden the air but do not exhaust the be sometimes mistaken for, them altoocean; another will regard it as a bound-gether. less solution of salt; a third will be fasci- Dr Croly is the artist, and in general nated by its terrible beauty; a fourth, an accomplished and powerful artist he with a far look into the dim records of its is. There is sometimes a little of the experience, will call it (how different from slapdash in his manner, as of one who is the foregoing appellations!) the "melan-in haste to be done with his subject. His choly main;" and the fifth will see in it style sometimes sounds like the horsethe reflector of man's history, the shadow shoes of the belated traveller, "spurring and mad sister of earth-the type of eter-apace to gain the timely inn." He genity! These last three orders, if not one, at least slide often into each other, and Dr Croly appears to us a combination of the third and the fourth. His descriptions nerally, indeed, goes off at a gallop, and continues at this generous, breakneck pace to the close. He consequently has too few pauses and rests. He and you rush up panting, and arrive breathless |