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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
All nature smiles , but the poor artisan , Alas ! he smiles not , but looks pale and blank , Subdu'd , and spiritless , and less than man , For poverty , and labour ' s dungeon dank , Have vanquished in his soul all sense of manhood ' s rank . ' Passing over the factory frolics , and Tom Trundle in the sack , travelling fifty furlongs for * four half gallons , tatoes , steaks , and onions / we come to amusements somewhat less boisterous and more poetical . In the following morceuu of humble innocence , there is one expression in which the eye of the critic will immediately detect the poetical spirit : —
* He was a 'prentice youth of lowly home , ' And she a humble tradesman ' s child , and they Had made appointment here to meet and roam , And taste the sweetness of a holiday . To see St . Paul ' s Cathedral , and the tomb Where , Nelson in his Marbfe cabin dwells . To mount the airy summit of the dome , And see the play at night at Sadler ' s Wells , And all the wonders there , the wond ' rous hand-bill tells . *
The next stanza , which we quote together with the author ' s note , has given us , as we think it must our readers , a more heartfelt thrill of delight than any thing we have read lately . It explains a combination of words , which unless we had given it up as a puzzle too dark for us , we should , in all probability , have mistaken very grossly , and very unjustly . The terms ' picture fuddle' are , indeed , a strange union . We trust we may take that union as evidence of a transition state from the lower to the higher regions of taste , from the gratifications of the swine to those of the artist : —
4 And now advancing , see ! a chosen band , In thoughtful and congenial knot they huddle , And wander through the City and the Strand , T' enjoy the pleasure of a " picture fuddle , * A picture-shop they gain , —now closely note How each unto the glass his visage brings , O ' er Wilkits graceful household stuff they gloat , And mighty Martin ' s high imaginings , And admiration then goes round in whisp ' rings . ' The author has not here availed himself of any poetical license . To those who observe , the streets of London have for some time
* * Those who can enjoy a " picture fuddle " will soon have an opportunity of gratifying their propensity more largely than they have hitherto been accustomed , thanks to those patriotic individuals to whom we are indebted for the " National Gallery , " where all classes , I understand , are to be admitted free of expense to inspect the works of the best masters . This in my opinion will do much to generate among tbe people a taste for what is correct , generous , and noble . Let us hope that no evil aristocratic spirit will rise to turn this inutitution from the purposes for which it was established .
Untitled Article
832 Saint Monday .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1833, page 832, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2628/page/28/
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