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Untitled Article
find it hard t , o imagine that ths following specimen is not the only one of its kind in these ambitious and , we conclude , elaborate compositions . It is part of a duet entitled ' Maiden of Jeshimon / and runs exactly as follows : —
1 st voice . —O , lives one love-spark in your heart , Maiden of Jeshimon ! pray you tell ? 2 d voice . —T * o ask at her whom you now love best ; Ask her the way you know full well . 1 st voice . —Women are fickle , and all untrue ! 2 c ? voice . —Men are ungrateful ; so are you !
1 st voice . —Vanity ! 2 c ? voice . —Lenity ! Both voices . —Wormwood and gall ! ^ 2 c ? voice . —Suavity ! 1 st voice . —Levity ! Both voices . —Worst of all ! ' &c . &c . —( Works , vol . iv . p . 215 . )
There is not , indeed , much of this quality ; but , on the whole , the poems are not remarkable for their poetry , or for any tendency to strengthen religious principle or to excite devotional feeling . They have only added another failure to the list of those who have attempted in vain to strike the harp of David and Isaiah . The harp remains ; but it remains like the bow of Ulysses , to be apparently our glory and our despair .
* The Pilgrims of the Sun ' is a very singular composition ; and , though unequal as a whole , it contains some fine imaginings . A Scottish maiden is carried by a celestial being through more worlds than we have leisure to enumerate ; and the poem relates what she thought , and heard , and saw . We subjoin one or two extracts , the morality of which might , we think , atone for greater poetical demerits than they are chargeable withal . Our first is from Part Second : —
* ¦ ' - * Passing inward still Towards the centre of the heavens , they saw The dwelling's of the saints of ancient days And martyrs for the right—men of all creeds , Features , and hues ! Much did the virgin muse , And much reflect on this strange mystery , So ill conform to all she had been taught From infancy to think , by holy men ;
Till looking round upon the spacious globes Dependent on that heaven of light , and all Rejoicing in their God ' s beneficence , These words spontaneously burst from her lips : 44 Child that I was , ah ! could my stinted mind Harbour the thought , that the Almighty ' s love , Life , and salvation , could to single sect Of creatures be confined , all his alike !' Last of them all , in ample circle spread Around the p alaces of heavep , they pass' 4
Untitled Article
' $ 20 On the Connexion between Poetry and Religion .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1832, page 620, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1820/page/44/
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