Had I not heard thy gentle tread approach, My chilly forehead prest. 'Tis true, I then had wandered where the earths Beyond the azured eye; And with the rapturous, eager greet had hail'd, That throng'd the comet's disk; Had ask'd the novice questions, and obtain❜d, Than ages here unfold! But I had then not ended here below, Recovery, daughter of creation, too, Sent thee from Heaven to me. We could willingly delay to enter into a larger consideration of the odes of Klopstock. "The Two Muses" is known, from Madame de Stael's eloquent work on Germany. The "Festival of Spring," and the "Choirs," are the most striking of any of which Mr. Taylor offers a version, but are too long for insertion. Our author appears to us to characterize with truth the general character of the odes of Klopstock, when he says of them, that "Their form has no parallel in modern literature. Klopstock was formed by the study of the Bible; and writes about modern occurrences somewhat as a Hebrew bard would have done. In force of thought and of feeling, his finer rhapsodies are unequalled; far-darting thought, heart-cheering feeling, they indeed display; but they are executed with an affected nakedness of manner, with a stripping, flaying hate of unnecessary ornament, and even of necessary connexion. They resemble the dry bones of Ezekiel, risen in the attitudes of vigorous life, and on the point of springing through the gates of paradise, but still awaiting the graceful contour and colouring of the uncreated flesh.” In the analysis of the Messiah, we find several passages cited and rendered in hexameters. Our time bids us beware not to enter on the consideration of that mystical epic; yet, as English imitations of the classic measure are uncommon, we venture to cite a passage, in which the daring of Philo is compared: "So when on mountains unclimb'd encamps tremendous a nigh storm, One of the black huge clouds, most arm'd for destroying, advances Bulging alone: while others but seize on the tops of the cedars, This from the east to the west shall enkindle centennial forests, Fire the haughtily-towering league-long cities of monarchs, Burying homes of men in ashes and ruin, with thund'rings Thousand fold." These lines are rendered word for word; and many of the verses of the Messiah are in measure and in melody inferior to them. It is only by slow degrees that the German hexameter has been brought to the perfection which is displayed in the verses of Wolf. Klopstock at first used very often to put a trochee for a spondee, and in consequence many of his lines are as imperfect in the measure, as they are painfully grating to the ear. The first volume of Mr. Taylor's work closes with an interesting sketch of Lessing's life and character, and an excellent translation of Nathan the Wise. But Lessing's highest claim to respect, is as a bold and independent critic; not as a poet. His merits cannot be well understood, without a survey of his position in relation to his age, and the nature of the contemporary influence which he exercised. Our author has the amiable failing of giving Bürger at least as high praise as the general voice will confirm. For ourselves, we think the ballads of Leonora and the Parson's Daughter have had their day of lavish admiration. We find more of truth and nature in some of Percy's Reliques. In writing these ballads, Bürger was much assisted by the old popular rhymes which were current in his day. He has therefore no great claims to invention. In Leonora, a story such as it is, we think the style and manner of narration could not be improved. But this rapidity of narration is all the merit which the poet can claim. The incidents are common to ghost stories; and there is no delineation of character, and little of sentiment, in the ballad. We would ask, is not the Bride of Corinth, a poem which is not the most conspicuous of Goethe's, a finer production than the best of Bürger's? Let it be further remembered, that after two or three ballads, the works of Bürger have doubtful claims to praise, and most of them hardly rise beyond mediocrity. Mr. Taylor devotes more than half of his second volume to the works of Wieland; and he is prodigal of praise to a writer, who is represented as having promoted a spirit of philanthropy, and smoothed away the rough edges of prejudice. At one time our critic contrasts Wieland with Byron; at another he calls the author of Oberon equal to the poet of the Fire Worshippers; and we confess our partialities for Dryden were startled, by expressions which seem to ascribe to the versified narrations of Wieland, a superiority over the tales and fables of the great English bard. Of these tales of Wieland, Geron the Courteous is altogether the best. An honourable tale of chivalrous friendship, is narrated with considerable simplicity and artlessness; and of all that the fifty volumes of Wieland's works contain, this will doubtless be read with most satisfaction. But, in execution, it does not seem to us to surpass, and hardly to equal, the writings of some of the English poets, whom the prevailing taste would hardly raise above the second or third rank. The King of the Black Isles is also given in an appropriate version. We are utterly blind to the high merits which can give it a claim to a comparison with the tales of Byron in his youth, or of Dryden in his age. But it is not the want of genius in Wieland's productions that chiefly merits observation-it is the perversion of moral principle, the debility of his system of philosophy, protruded in almost every tale and novel, which is eminently calculated to excite and justify disgust. Wieland, in his sneers at virtue, aimed at being natural and witty, and a faithful delineator of realities; but fortunately, none but the highest ability is able to give a permanent interest to these destructive exhibitions of human weakness. The banquet to which Wieland invites his guests, is served up with a sameness of food, which soon satiates. His philosophy has not body enough to be preserved; its spirit evaporates immediately on its exposure to the public eye, and there remains nothing but a stale and loathsome caput mortuum. The enthusiasm of youth becomes firmness of principle and maturity in those who are most happy in the care of their moral nature. When this is not the case, it is changed either into a fiendish scoffing and trampling on human virtue, or a quiet acquiescence in the influence of self-indulgence. A poet who is unhappy enough to be possessed of the passion for vehement irony and scornful insolence, is never contented in his own mind, and never cherished by his fellow men; but, like an angry yet timid serpent, brandishes his forked tongue, and hisses with poisonous venom, as he flies from the common abodes of man. This is bad enough; but for a poet to yield himself, (in philosophy at least, for Wieland's life was regular,) to the influence of his animal nature, and then rattling his chains, to think their clanking is melody, and poetry, and wisdom, is an absurdity. As plants cannot thrive without the pure air of heaven, so true poetry cannot put forth its glory without the influence of the "breath of God in the soul of man." We venerate the erudition and great variety and accuracy of knowledge of Wieland, but in respect to the moral of his writings, he seems to us like a snail, creeping over the best things in life, and leaving them odious by the filthy slime which marks his progress. The mind of Wieland was passive, not creative. He gathered, but did not produce. He brought into his own garner what he himself never sowed. He did not gain his inspiration from communing with his own soul, nor with nature, nor with God; but he picked it up by piece-meal; gathering a crumb from Cervantes, and another from Fielding, and yet more from Lucian; stealing a grace from Ariosto, and a story from Chaucer, and stocking his mind with as much poetry, and as much knowledge of human nature, as the shelves of a good library can afford an industrious man of ready powers at acquiring. Strike from literature the entire works of Wieland, and nothing would be lost to the world. He drew his inspiration, "not from the heat of youth or the vapour of wine," as Milton writes, if we quote his words rightly, nor yet "did he obtain it by devout prayer to that eternal spirit, who can enrich with all utterance, but by the invocation of memory and her syren daughters." He did not kindle with a bright, and honourable, and purifying flame; -the heaps collected by his erudition, seem to be heated by a sort of smouldering fire, which consumes slowly, and does not emit light enough to guide, or warmth enough to cherish. Wieland professed the love of virtue from good taste; and his writings teach the art of getting on from the morning to the evening of earthly being, with comfort, quiet, and enjoyment. Of hopes beyond he is silent. Of aspirations, which rise above this world, he takes little heed. Generally, he is adverse to enthusiasm, and opens a tame and tranquil view of things. With him, virtue, notwithstanding he thinks it is in such excellent good taste, is not quite to be expected. Virtue with him is heroism; and no man is bound to be a hero. The business of society requires a moral currency; but a currency based on such credit, as is common, will do; the names of high qualities stamped upon bits of paper, of which it would be as foolish to demand the redemption, as of the bills of a broken bank. Still the currency is essential; it serves the purpose of a circulating medium, and is lawful tender in the transactions of life. If such is human nature—if virtue is a heroism so rare, there is the greater need that the eloquence of moral truth should make itself heard. The pictures of natural passion, drawn by a licentious hand, may often be grossly offensive, and produce extensive mischiefs; but it is infinitely worse, to demonstrate, that, of poor human nature nothing very pure can be expected, and that the philosophy of Plato is ludicrously untenable, when contrasted with the more appropriate and wiser philosophy of Aristippus. Wieland offends in both ways. He manufactures Rinaldos and Armidas by the score; delights in repeating his indecent descriptions, passing the limits of delicacy, and bordering on coarseness, and then is pretty sure to add an argument, showing, that all this is quite consistent with the best that can be expected. And this is poetry! There is a kind of scepticism which deserves forbearancethe agony of doubt in minds of real energy; but quiet scepticism is a result of intellectual indolence, the proof of an inactive or of a weak understanding. If they are doubly happy who VOL. VII.—NO. 14. 57 have strength of wing to rise to the bright upper regions, where truth is contemplated in unclouded lustre, contempt should fall on those who make "a base abandonment of reason" in Epicurcan employments. An English writer has constructed a novel on the story of a poor girl, who was tempted and did not fall; and another, still more celebrated, on the adventures of one who atoned for her errors by death. Pamela Andrews and Clarissa Harlowe must not be spoken of too slightly; but Wieland is perpetually exhibiting the enthusiasm of a young man under the influence of the dangers of life; he is for ever introducing his hero under some vow of chastity, or some natural consciousness of the merits of self-denial, and then drawing, with a feeble but voluptuous pencil, a minute picture of the arts by which the virtue of that hero is assailed. He rings a set of changes on small feet, and white bosoms, and the arts of coquetry, with wearisome prolixity and tedious repetition. We have it in his novels and in his poems; in the worst and in the best; it is the turning point in Oberon, the foundation of Agathon, and, in short, the main staple of Wieland's productions. It is his philosophy, his poetry, his prose, his incident, his catastrophe. We cannot admire even the epic poem of Oberon. The narration is easy and agreeable, clear, and generally interesting. The plots are closely connected, and the story conducted to a perfect end. But the best things in it are borrowed. Besides, after making all possible allowances for nature, and heathenism, and chivalry, and youthful influences, the accident which brings about the severe suffering and temporary separation of the hero and heroine, cannot, by any machinery of fairies, be dignified into a poetic incident. Our author selects, for his highest admiration, the scene in which the unmarried heroine gives birth to a child. In the series of the gallery of the Luxembourg, (so called,) by Rubens, there is a picture, in which the Goddess of Justice gives to the Genius of Health the new-born Lewis XIII. in the presence of the mother, on whose countenance the pains that she has endured are already yielding to the joy of maternal love. The figure of the queen is delicately managed, and has been a general subject of admiration. But Wieland has no forbearance; and, in his usual prolixity, describes, with great delicacy, it is true, a scene that belongs to a hospital rather than to an epic. Agathon, the most famous prose work of Wieland, is Tom Jones turned philosopher. The story is invested with an Attic mask, and the arts of crudition are called in to give a lustre to the romance. We have the philosophy of Plato assailed by Hippias in person; a mistress of Alcibiades becomes the Molly Seagrim to the hero, who is yet not hero enough to practise the |