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    Untitled Article

    We write with a strong desire to carry the minds of our readers with us , seriously and earnestly , into reflection upon this subject . It is one of heaven ' s best blessings to have our lot cast in a period of rapid and durable improvement . There is no enjoyment like it . Even in death it is delightful to think that we leave the world better than we found it . and that the next

    generation will find and leave it better still . A deep interest in the well-being of our country and of mankind brings its ^ cares , and disappointments ,, and vexations ; but it brings also the noblest pleasures , —pleasures which are god-like . Without it , man is but a contemptible being , whatever he may babble of his respectability and morality . Is it pleasant to watch the breaking of the morning ? or the coming on of spring ? or the growth of a child ?

    or the strengthening and maturing of a noble intellect ? or the first setting in of that tide of love that knows no ebb in the ocean of a mighty heart ? None of it is like Milton ' s vision of a f noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep , and shaking her invincible locks . ' Dream on , great poet—* Methinks I see her as an eagle muing her

    mighty youth , and kindling her undazzled eyes at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance ; while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds , with those also that love the twilight , flutter about , amazed at what she means , and in their envious gabble would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms . ' Would that the bard were living at this hour , that his deep rich voice might roll its solemn music in the ears of the legislators of Great Britain ,

    inspiring them to fulfil their high vocation , and be the heralds of a new era , the founders of a new order of things , most beautiful and g lorious . Would that he were living , to aid , as he would aid , the rig ht ; and infuse his own dignity of soul into the strife of words ; and render the appeals and arguments , which are

    demanded by our temporary circumstances , vehicles of the poetry and eloquence of everlasting truth . Amid all the abuse and virulence of party , there are thousands who would listen in reverence to the miscalled , ( as he would be , ) * Theorist / ' Destructive / and ' Anarchist / the < wild and blaspheming Heretic / the ' blind old Jacobin of Bunhill Row .

    The poet , or the patriot , rather , ( for the Bard of Paradise Lost * ought to be only the second title of the ' Defender of the People of England /) lived and suffered under one of the revulsions to which we have referred . In the fervour of strenuous conflict and of partial success , he had thought that a political and religious millennium had commenced in the land of his nativity and of his love . But soon there came , over all his hopes , the blight of the Stuart Restoration . He lived not till the Revolution : and if he

    had , the outbreaking of that sunshine was not longunbeclouded . Tile reign of Prerogative closed , but that of Influence commenced . The tyrannizing of depraved individuals was exchanged for that

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    2 Forwards or Backwards ?

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1834, page 2, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2629/page/2/