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fact , if other proof were wanting . It is published by subscription ; and the list of subscribers is filled with names , many of which evince the progress of the sentiments which the writer has suffered so cruelly for avowing . We mean not to aver that the list contains the names of many actual converts to liberalism ; but simply that there are not a few among them , which would certainly not
have appeared in such a place some years ago , when mention was rarely made of Hunt , or Hazlitt , except as amongst the cacodemons and evil genii of humanity . We believe that his life has been , in one respect , but too poetical ; he has often had to make one shilling do the work of two . We wish him two to do the -work of one . He has a large family , who depend entirely upon
his exertions . He has suffered much for society , and we hope that society will make a generous atonement . The amende honorable is commonly made over the grave , too late for f the poor inhabitant below ; ' we would fain hope that our own age will reject this unworthy practice ; and that when the injured ask us for bread , we shall no longer give them a posthumous stone .
The bias of this writer towards our early literature has produced a twofold good effect upon his poems . It has , in the first place , given to his versification a harmony and a variety , which , perhaps , no recent composer in the fine old heroic couplet has equalled . It cannot be a ^ reproach to him , that he is one of those rhymers who have Pope ' s tune by heart . ' Monotony is a stranger to his free and changeful verse . Its variations of structure and of
pause continually keep the ear awake , and fill it with unwearying melody . In the second place , the same bias has had the still superior good effect of keeping him aloof and apart from that bane of all good poetry , the conventional poetic dialect , its gaudy and glittering Euphuism . True poetry derives its power not from the words , but from the thought with which they are charged . The thunder does not make the lightning , but the lightning the
thunder . Accustomed as we are to see this principle inverted , we delight to regard a writer whose genius speaks to us in no conventional language , but in that of a purer taste and a better age . The chief composition in the volume is the 4 Story of Rimini . ' Why should we not say that it is worthy of Dryden ? Lord Byron said of it , ' after his sour fashion / that there never were more
good things spout than in Hunt ' s * Rimini . ' The world , we believe , has long made up its mind respecting the deference due to the noble poet ' s conversational criticisms . They were not always remarkable for their consistency with themselves , with each other ,
or with his written ones ; and had usually too much about them which betokened their effervescence from the splendida bilis of his nature . In this respect , however , even he might think differently of the writings of his unpopular contemporary , if he saw them in their present form . We do not mean that the handsomeness of the book would make any impression upon him ; yet even
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180 Tht Poetical FForks of Leigh HunL
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1833, page 180, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2610/page/36/
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