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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), August 1825, Edition 1 of 1, Page 484, Untitled Article

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    • REVIEW. " Still pleased to praise, yet not afraid to blame."—Pore.
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      Untitled Article

      Art . I . —The Works of Anna Ltetitia Barbauld . With a Memoir , by Lucy Aikin . 2 vols . 8 vo . pp . 424 and 476 . Longman and Co . 1825 . MRS . BARBAULD's is an unsullied and honoured name in

      English literature . She took a high rank amongst our writers the moment she appeared before the public , and from this she never descended . It was her rare felicity to excel equally in verse and prose . The republic of letters justly appreciated her talents and taste ,

      and she maintained a due respect for the world and for herself , and sent forth no hasty composition , nor lent her name to any publication unworthy of her high reputation . * Her friends and admirers were wont to regret that her exhibitions as an author were like

      an gel-visits , " few and far between ;" but they may now derive pleasure from the reflection that she did enough to establish a lasting- fame , and that nearly all her productions are classical . " The small bulk of the writings of

      Mrs . Bai'baulu , compared with the long course of years during which she exercised the pen , is a sufficient proof that she offered to the public none but the happiest inspirations of her muse , and not even these till they had received all the polish of which she judged them susceptible . To a friend who had expressed his surprise at not . finding inserted in her volume a poem which he had admired in

      (manuscript , she well and characteristically replied , 1 had rather it should be asked of twenty pieces why they are not here , than of one why it is . " —Mem . pp . lix .

      lx-In the best sense of the word , Mrs Barbauld is & popular writer . She is not known to all readers , but she is unknown to none that have any pretensions to taste and refinement . Her beautiful and unequalled " Hymns in prose for Children" are in use in almost every establishment for early education that is conducted upon true moral and religious principles ; some of her minor poems are to be found in most collections for youth ; and * Perhaps y one exception may be made to tliis statement .

      Untitled Article

      several of her devotional pieces are inserted in all the Selections of Psalms and Hymns which are used by the congregations of liberal Dissenters . With a sound and vigorous understanding " , Mrs . Barbauld united an exquisite perception of the right and true in character and conduct , a richly

      cultivated mind , and a playful but chaste imagination . She had formed herself as a writer upon a pure En . g-lish model . She was not ashamed to admire Addison , Pope and Dryden ; she equalled the two first in their terseness and elegance , and she sometimes reminds us of the fervid genius of the last .

      Of Mrs . Barbauld , more than of almost any other writer , it may be said in praise , that her fine character appears in all her works . She is not only a moral writer—all her writings have a direct moral tendency . Her muse was consecrated to piety , and

      very many are there who have been bettered while they have been delighted with her verses . What Lord Lyttleton said , with truth upon the whole , of Thomson , may be said , mutatis mutandis , with perfect truth of her , that her works contained

      No line which , dying-, she could wish to blot . The " Memoir" of her aunt by Miss Aikin is a well-drawn description of her life , which ran in an even tenour . It is interesting , not so much from a succession and variety of incidents as from the impression of her

      own character and genius which Mrs . Barbauld stamped upon every scene and every circle with which she was connected . The biographer with judgment and taste abstains from eulogistic epithets , though she cannot wholly check ( who could have wished her to check ?) the flowing ™ of natural

      affection and friendship . We were favoured in our number for March , ( pp . 185 , 186 , ) with a sketch of Mrs . Barbauld ' s lifc , w believe from the same pen which has traced the " Memoir" before ns , to that obituary account there V 6 litl" - ' that is historical to be added . ^

      Review. " Still Pleased To Praise, Yet Not Afraid To Blame."—Pore.

      REVIEW . " Still pleased to praise , yet not afraid to blame . "—Pore .

      Untitled Article

      ( 484

  • Citation
    • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Aug. 2, 1825, page 484, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2539/page/30/