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Untitled Article
laurel-crowned , tlie form of Shfelley , who seems ( how justly , we stop not now to discuss , ) to have been the god of his early idolatry . Whatever inspiration may have been upon him from that deity ,, the mysticism of the original oracles has been happily avoided . And whatever resemblance he may bear to Tennyson ,
( a fellow worshipper probably at the same shrine ) he owes nothing of the perhaps inferior melody of his verse to an employment of archaisms which it is difficult to defend from the charge of affectation . But he has not given himself the chance for popularity which Tennyson did , and which it is evident that he easily might have done . His poem stands alone , with none of those slight
but taking accompaniments , songs that sing themselves , sketches that every body knows , light little lyrics , floating about like humming birds , around the trunk and foliage of the poem itself ; and which would attract so many eyes , and delight so many ears , that will be slow to perceive the higher beauty of that composition , and
to whom a sycamore is no sycamore , unless it be ' musical with bees . ' That his not having done so , is owing to no want of the picturesque faculty , the grace , the sentiment which give their charm to such minor effusions , can soon be shown by a few quotations taken as they rise in the volume . We shall intermix with these as they may happen to come , others of a higher class , to complete the exemplification already contained in our citations of
the author ' s powers . The following is a pretty instance of that peculiarity of modern poetry , arising from its more philosophical character , by which the internal is brought to illustrate the external , and the feeling is made an image of the object . ' Spring ' s first breath Blew soft from the moist hills—the black-thorn boughs , So dark in the bare wood ; when glistening la the sunshine were white with conning buds , Like the bright side of a sorrow—and the banks Had violets opening from sleep like eyes . '
Shelley was the author ' s adoration and inspiration when « it was , or seemed to him , a solitary thing to feel that power , which he now believes to be expanding into dominion . The fervency , the remembrance , the half re g ret mingling with the exultation of the following passage are as true , a& its leading image is beautiful . 1 Sun-treader—life and light be thine for ever ; Thou art gone from us—years go by—and spring Gladdens , and the young earth is beautiful , Yet thy songs come not—other bards arise , Bat none like thee—they stand—thy majesties , Like mighty works which tell some Spirit there Hath sat regardless of neglect and scorn , Till , its long- task completed , it hath risen
Untitled Article
FauHne . 259
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1833, page 259, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2612/page/43/
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