LECTURES ON THE ENGLISH POETS
I. ON POETRY IN GENERAL
Any differences between the text quoted by Hazlitt and the texts used for the purposes of these notes which seem worth pointing out are indicated in square brackets.
For Sergeant Talfourd’s impressions of these lectures, and other matters of interest connected with their delivery, the reader may be referred to the Memoirs of William Hazlitt, vol. i., pp. 236 et seq.
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[1]. Spreads its sweet leaves. Romeo and Juliet, I. 1.
[2]. The stuff of which our life is made. Cf. The Tempest, IV. 1.
Mere oblivion. As You Like It, II. 7.
Man’s life is poor as beast’s. King Lear, II. 4. [‘Man’s life’s as cheap as beast’s.’]
There is warrant for it. Cf. Richard III., I. 4, and Macbeth, II. 3.
Such seething brains and the lunatic. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, V. 1.
[3]. Angelica and Medoro. Characters in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1516).
Plato banished the poets. The Republic, Book X.
Ecstasy is very cunning in. Hamlet, III. 4.
According to Lord Bacon. An adaptation of a passage in the Advancement of Learning, Book II., Chap. xiii. (ed. Joseph Devey, Bohn, p. 97).
[4]. Our eyes are made the fools. Macbeth, II. 1.
That if it would but apprehend. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, V. 1.
The flame o’ the taper. Cymbeline, II. 2.
For they are old. Cf. King Lear, II. 4.
[5]. Nothing but his unkind daughters. King Lear, III. 4. [‘Could have subdued nature to such a lowness.’]
The little dogs. King Lear, III. 6.
So I am. King Lear, IV. 7.
O now for ever. Othello, III. 3.
[6]. Never, Iago. Othello, III. 3.
But there where I have garner’d. Othello, IV. 2.
Moore. Edward Moore (1712–1757), author of The Gamester (1753).
Lillo. George Lillo (1693–1739), author of The London Merchant, or the History of George Barnwell (1731).
[7]. As Mr. Burke observes. Sublime and Beautiful, Part I. § 15.
Masterless passion. Merchant of Venice, IV. 1.
[‘for affection,
Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood.’]
Satisfaction to the thought. Cf. Othello, III. 3.
[8]. Now night descending. Dunciad, I. 89, 90.
[8]. Throw him on the steep. Ode to Fear.
[‘ridgy steep
Of some loose hanging rock to sleep.’]
Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend. King Lear, I. 4. [‘More hideous, when thou show’st thee in a child.’]
Both at the first and now. Hamlet, III. 2.
[9]. Doctor Chalmers’s Discoveries. Thomas Chalmers, D.D. (1780–1847), who sought in his A Series of Discourses on the Christian Revelation, viewed in connection with Modern Astronomy (1817), to reconcile science with current conceptions of Christianity. See The Spirit of the Age, vol. III. p. 228 and note.
[10]. Bandit fierce. Comus, l. 426.
Our fell of hair. Macbeth, V. 5.
Macbeth ... for the sake of the music. Probably Purcell’s. It was written for D’Avenant’s version and produced in 1672 (Genest). Cf. The Round Table, vol. I. p. 138 and note.
Between the acting. Julius Caesar, II. 1. [‘The Genius and the mortal instruments.’]
[11]. Thoughts that voluntary move. Paradise Lost, III. 37, 38.
The words of Mercury. Love’s Labour’s Lost, V. 11. [‘The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo.’]
So from the ground. Faery Queene, I. vi. [‘With doubled Eccho.’]
[12]. The secret soul of harmony. L’Allegro, l. 144. [‘The hidden soul of harmony.’]
The golden cadences of poetry. Love’s Labour’s Lost, IV. 2.
Sailing with supreme dominion. Gray’s Progress of Poesy, III. 3.
[13]. Sounding always. Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, l. 275.
Addison’s Campaign. 1705. Addison wrote it on Marlborough’s victory of Blenheim. For its description as a ‘Gazette in Rhyme,’ see Dr. Joseph Warton’s (1722–1800) An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope (1756–82).
[14]. Married to immortal verse. L’Allegro, l. 137.
Dipped in dews of Castalie. Cf. T. Heywood’s,
‘And Jonson, though his learned pen
Was dipt in Castaly, is still but Ben.’
The most beautiful of all the Greek tragedies. Sophocles’s Philoctetes.
As I walked about. Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, Part I. p. 125, ed. G. A. Aitken.
[15]. Give an echo. Twelfth Night, II. 4.
Our poesy. Timon of Athens, I. 1. [‘Which oozes.’]
[16]. All plumed like ostriches. Adapted from the First Part of King Henry IV., IV. 1. [‘As full of spirit as the month of May.’]
If we fly into the uttermost parts of the earth. Cf. Psalms, cxxxix. 9–11.
[18]. Pope Anastasius the Sixth. Inferno, XI.
Count Ugolino. Inferno, XXXIII. Neither was Lamb satisfied with the conception. See his paper on ‘The Reynolds Gallery’ in The Examiner, June 6, 1813.
The lamentation of Selma. Colma’s lament in the Songs of Selma.
II. ON CHAUCER AND SPENSER.
The Chaucer and Spenser references throughout are to Skeat’s Student’s Chaucer, and to the Globe Edition of Spenser (Morris and Hales).
[19]. Chaucer. Modern authorities date Chaucer’s birth from 1340. It is no longer held as true that he had an university education. The story of his plot against the king, his flight and his imprisonment, is also legendary.
[20]. Close pent up, and the next quotation. King Lear, III. 2.
Flowery tenderness. Measure for Measure, III. 1.
And as the new abashed nightingale. Troilus and Criseyde, III. 177.
Thus passeth yere by yere. ll. 1033–9 [‘fairer of hem two’].
[21]. That stondeth at a gap. ‘The Knightes Tale,’ 1639–42.
Have ye not seen. ‘The Tale of the Man of Law,’ 645–51.
Swiche sorrow he maketh. ‘The Knightes Tale,’ 1277–80.
[22]. Babbling gossip of the air. Twelfth Night, I. 5.
There was also a nonne. ‘The Prologue,’ 118–129 [‘Entuned in hir nose ful semely’]; 137–155 [‘And held after the newe world the space’]; 165–178; 189–207.
[24]. Lawyer Dowling. Book VIII., Chap. viii.
No wher so besy a man. ‘The Prologue,’ 321–2.
Whose hous it snewed. Ibid. 345.
Who rode upon a rouncie. Ibid. 390.
Whose studie was but litel of the Bible. Ibid. 438.
All whose parish. Ibid. 449–52.
Whose parish was wide. Ibid. 491.
A slendre colerike man. Ibid. 587.
Chaucer, it has been said, numbered the classes of men. Cf. Wm. Blake’s Descriptive Catalogue, III. ‘As Newton numbered the stars, and as Linnaeus numbered the plants, so Chaucer numbered the classes of men.’
A Sompnoure. Ibid. 623–41. [‘Children were aferd,’ ‘oynons, and eek lekes,’ ‘A fewe termes hadde he’]; 663–669.
[25]. Ther maist thou se. ‘The Knightes Tale,’ 2128–2151; 2155–2178; 2185–6.
[27]. The Flower and the Leaf. Most modern scholars regard the evidence which attributes this poem to Chaucer as insufficient. The same few words of Hazlitt’s were originally used in The Round Table, ‘Why the Arts are not Progressive?’ vol. I. p. 162.
[28]. Griselda. ‘The Clerkes Tale.’ See The Round Table, vol. I. p. 162.
The faith of Constance. ‘The Tale of the Man of Law.’
[29]. Oh Alma redemptoris mater. ‘The Prioress’s Tale.’
Whan that Arcite. ‘The Knightes Tale,’ 1355–71. [‘His hewe falwe.’]
Alas the wo! ll. 2771–9.
[30]. The three temples, ll. 1918–2092.
Dryden’s version, i.e. his ‘Palamon and Arcite.’
Why shulde I not. ‘The Knightes Tale,’ 1967–9, 1972–80. [‘In which ther dwelleth.’]
The statue of Mars. Ibid. 2041–2, 2047–8.
That heaves no sigh. ‘Heave thou no sigh, nor shed a tear,’ Prior: Answer to Chloe.
Let me not like a worm. ‘The Clerkes Tale,’ l. 880.
[31]. Nought fer fro thilke paleis honourable. Ibid. 197–245. [‘Sette his yë’]; 274–94 [‘Hir threshold goon’].
[32]. All conscience and tender heart. ‘The Prologue,’ 150.
From grave to gay. Pope, Essay on Man, Ep. IV. 380.
[33]. The Cock and the Fox. ‘The Nonne Preestes Tale of the Cok and Hen.’
January and May. ‘The Marchantes Tale.’
The story of the three thieves. ‘The Pardoners Tale.’
Mr. West. Benjamin West (1738–1820). See the article on this picture by Hazlitt in The Edinburgh Magazine, Dec. 1817, where the same extract is quoted.
[34]. Ne Deth, alas. ‘The Marchantes Tale,’ 727–38.
[34]. Occleve. Thomas Hoccleve or Occleve (b. 1368), who expressed his grief at his ‘master dear’ Chaucer’s death in his version of De Regimine Principum.
‘Ancient Gower’ John Gower (1330–1408), who wrote Confessio Amantis (1392–3), and to whom Chaucer dedicated (‘O moral Gower’) his Troilus and Criseyde. See Pericles, I.
Lydgate. John Lydgate (c. 1370–c. 1440), poet and imitator of Chaucer.
Wyatt, Surry, and Sackville. Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503–1542), courtier and poet; Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey (c. 1518–1547), who shares with Wyatt the honour of introducing the sonnet into English verse; Thomas Sackville, Earl of Dorset (c. 1536–1608), part author of the earliest tragedy in English, Ferrex and Porrex, acted 1561–2.
Sir John Davies (1569–1626), poet and statesman. Spenser was sent to Ireland in 1580 as private secretary to Arthur, Lord Grey de Wilton, Lord Deputy of Ireland. Davies was sent to Ireland as Solicitor-General in 1603, four years after Spenser’s death.
The bog of Allan. The Faerie Queene, Book II. Canto IX.
An ably written paper. ‘A View of the Present State of Ireland,’ registered 1598, printed 1633.
An obscure inn. In King Street, Westminster, Jan. 13, 1599.
The treatment he received from Burleigh. It has been suggested that the disfavour with which Spenser was regarded by Burleigh—a disfavour that stood in the way of his preferment—was because of Spenser’s friendship with Essex, and Leicester’s patronage of him.
[35]. Clap on high. The Faerie Queene, III. XII. 23.
In green vine leaves. I. IV. 22.
Upon the top of all his lofty crest. I. VII. 32.
In reading the Faery Queen. The incidents mentioned will be found in Books III. 9, I. 7, II. 6, and III. 12, respectively.
[36]. And mask, and antique pageantry. L’Allegro, 128.
And more to lull him. I. I. 41.
The honey-heavy dew of slumber. Julius Caesar, II. 1.
Eftsoones they heard. II. XII. 70–1. [‘To read what manner.’]
The whiles some one did chaunt. Ibid. 74–8. [‘Bare to ready spoyl.’]
[38]. The House of Pride. I. IV.
The Cave of Mammon. II. VII. 28–50.
The Cave of Despair. I. IX. 33–35.
The wars he well remember’d. II. IX. 56.
The description of Belphœbe. II. III. 21.
Florimel and the Witch’s son. III. VII. 12.
The gardens of Adonis. III. VI. 29.
The Bower of Bliss. II. XII. 42.
Poussin’s pictures. Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665). See Hazlitt’s Table Talk, vol. VI. p. 168, et seq.
And eke that stranger knight. III. IX. 20.
Her hair was sprinkled with flowers. II. III. 30.
The cold icicles. III. VIII. 35. [‘Ivory breast.’].
That was Arion crowned. IV. XI. line 3, stanza 23, and line 1, stanza 24.
[39]. And by his side rode loathsome Gluttony. I. IV. 21–2. [‘In shape and life.’]
And next to him rode lustfull Lechery. Ibid. 24–6.
[40]. Yet not more sweet. Carmen Nuptiale, The Lay of the Laureate (1816), xviii. 4–6.
The first was Fancy. III. XII. 7–13, 22–3. [‘Next after her.’]
[42]. The account of Satyrane. I. VI. 24.
Go seek some other play-fellows. Stanza 28. [‘Go find.’]
[42]. By the help of his fayre horns. III. X. 47.
The change of Malbecco into Jealousy. III. X. 56–60.
That house’s form. II. VII. 28–9, 23.
That all with one consent. Troilus and Cressida, III. 3.
[43]. High over hill. III. X. 55.
Pope, who used to ask. In view of this remark, it may be of interest to quote the following passage from Spence’s Anecdotes (pp. 296–7, 1820; Section viii., 1743–4): ‘There is something in Spenser that pleases one as strongly in one’s old age, as it did in one’s youth. I read the Faerie Queene, when I was about twelve, with infinite delight, and I think it gave me as much, when I read it over about a year or two ago.’
The account of Talus, the Iron Man. V. I. 12.
The ... Episode of Pastorella. VI. IX. 12.
[44]. In many a winding bout. L’Allegro, 139–140.
III. ON SHAKSPEARE AND MILTON
The references are to the Globe Edition of Shakespeare, and Masson’s three-volume edition of Milton’s Poetical Works. See The Round Table, ‘On Milton’s Versification,’ vol. i. pp. 36 et seq., for passages used again for the purposes of this lecture. See also ibid. ‘Why the Arts are not Progressive?’ pp. 160 et seq., and notes to those two Essays.
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[46]. The human face divine. Paradise Lost, III. 44.
And made a sunshine in the shady place. Faerie Queene, I. III. 4.
The fault has been more in their [is not in our] stars. Cf. Julius Caesar, I. 2.
[47]. A mind reflecting ages past. See vol. IV. notes to p. 213.
All corners of the earth. Cymbeline, III. iv.
Nodded to him. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, III. 1.
His so potent art. Tempest, V. 1.
[48]. Subject [servile] to the same [all] skyey influences. Measure for Measure, III. 1.
His frequent haunts [‘my daily walks’]. Comus, 314.
Coheres semblably together.. Cf. 2 Henry IV., V. 1.
Me and thy crying self. The Tempest, I. 2.
What, man! ne’er pull your hat. Macbeth, IV. 3.
Man delights not me, and the following quotation. Adapted from Hamlet, II. 2. Rosencraus should be Rosencrantz.
A combination and a form. Hamlet, III. 4.
[49]. My lord, as I was reading [sewing], Hamlet, II. 1. [‘His stockings foul’d ... so piteous in purport ... loosed out of hell.’]
There is a willow [‘grows aslant’]. Hamlet, IV. 7.
[50]. He’s speaking now. Antony and Cleopatra, I. 5.
It is my birth-day. Antony and Cleopatra, III. 13.
[51]. Nigh sphered in Heaven. Collins’s Ode on the Poetical Character, 66.
To make society the sweeter welcome. Macbeth, III. 1.
[52]. With a little act upon the blood [burn] like the mines of sulphur. Othello, III. 3. [‘Syrups of the world.’].
While rage with rage. Troilus and Cressida, I. 3.
In their untroubled element.
‘That glorious star
In its untroubled element will shine,
As now it shines, when we are laid in earth
And safe from all our sorrows.’
Wordsworth, The Excursion, VI. 763–66.
[52]. Satan’s address to the sun. Paradise Lost, IV. 31 et seq.
[53]. O that I were a mockery king of snow [standing before] the sun of Bolingbroke. Richard II., IV. 1.
His form had not yet lost. Paradise Lost, I. 591–4.
A modern school of poetry. The Lake School.
With what measure they mete. St. Mark, iv. 24; St. Luke, vi. 38.
It glances from heaven to earth. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, V. 1.
Puts a girdle. Ibid. II. 1.
[54]. I ask that I might waken reverence [‘and bid the cheek’]. Troilus and Cressida, I. 3.
No man is the lord of anything, and the following quotation. Ibid. III. 3.
[55]. In Shakespeare. Cf. ‘On application to study,’ The Plain Speaker.
Light thickens. Macbeth, III. 2.
His whole course of love. Othello, I. 3.
The business of the State. Ibid. IV. 2.
Of ditties highly penned. 1 King Henry IV., III. 1.
And so by many winding nooks. Two Gentlemen of Verona, II. 7.
[56]. Great vulgar and the small. Cowley’s Translation of Horace’s Ode, III. 1.
His delights [were] dolphin-like. Antony and Cleopatra, V. 2.
[57]. Blind Thamyris. Paradise Lost, III. 35–6.
With darkness. Ibid. VII. 27.
Piling up every stone. Ibid. XI. 324–5.
For after ... I had from my first years. The Reason of Church Government, Book II.
[58]. The noble heart. Faerie Queene, I. V. 1.
Makes Ossa like a wart. Hamlet, V. 1.
[59]. Him followed Rimmon. Paradise Lost, I. 467–9.
As when a vulture. Ibid. III. 431–9.
The great vision. Lycidas, 161.
The Pilot. Paradise Lost, I. 204.
The wandering moon. Il Penseroso, 67–70.
[60]. Like a steam. Comus, 556.
He soon saw within ken. Paradise Lost, III. 621–44.
[61]. With Atlantean shoulders. Ibid. II. 306–7.
Lay floating many a rood. Ibid. I. 196.
That sea beast, Leviathan. Ibid. I. 200–202.
What a force of imagination. Cf. Notes and Queries, 4th Series, xi. 174, where J. H. T. Oakley points out that Milton is simply translating a well-known Greek phrase for the ocean.
His hand was known. Paradise Lost, I. 732–47.
[62]. But chief the spacious hall. Ibid. I. 762–88.
Round he surveys. Ibid. III. 555–67.
[63]. Such as the meeting soul. L’Allegro, 138–140.
The hidden soul. Ibid. 144.
God the Father turns a school-divine. Pope, 1st Epistle, Hor. Book II. 102.
As when heaven’s fire. Paradise Lost, I. 612–13.
[64]. All is not lost. Paradise Lost, I. 106–9.
That intellectual being. Paradise Lost, II. 147–8.
Being swallowed up. Ibid. II. 149–50.
Fallen cherub. Ibid. I. 157–8.
Rising aloft [‘he steers his flight aloft’]. Ibid. I. 225–6.
[65]. Is this the region. Ibid. I. 242–63.
[66]. His philippics against Salmasius. In 1651 Milton replied in his Defensio pro Populo Anglicano to Defensio Regia pro Carolo I. (1649) by Claudius Salmasius or Claude de Saumaise (1588–1658), a professor at Leyden. The latter work had been undertaken at the request of Charles II. by Salmasius, who was regarded as the leading European scholar of his day.
With hideous ruin. Paradise Lost, I. 46.
Retreated in a silent valley. Paradise Lost, II. 547–50.
A noted political writer of the present day. See Political Essays, vol. III. pp. 155, et seq. ‘Illustrations of the Times Newspaper,’ and notes thereto. Dr. Stoddart and Napoleon the Great are the persons alluded to. See also Hone’s ‘Buonapartephobia, or the Origin of Dr. Slop’s Name,’ which had reached a tenth edition in 1820.
Longinus. On the Sublime, IX.
[67]. No kind of traffic. Adapted from The Tempest, II. 1.
The generations were prepared. Wordsworth, The Excursion, VI. 554–57.
The unapparent deep. Paradise Lost, VII. 103.
Know to know no more. Cf. Cowper, Truth, 327.
They toiled not. St. Matthew, VI. 28, 29.
In them the burthen. Wordsworth, ‘Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey,’ 38–41.
Such as angels weep. Paradise Lost, I. 620.
[68]. In either hand. Paradise Lost, XII. 637–47.
IV. ON DRYDEN AND POPE
The references throughout are to the Globe Editions of Pope and Dryden.
69–71. The question, whether Pope was a poet. In a slightly different form these paragraphs appeared in The Edinburgh Magazine, Feb. 1818.
[70]. The pale reflex of Cynthia’s brow. Romeo and Juliet, III. 5.
[71]. Martha Blount (1690–1762). She was Pope’s life-long friend, to whom he dedicated several poems, and to whom he bequeathed most of his property.
In Fortune’s ray. Troilus and Cressida, I. 3.
The gnarled oak ... the soft myrtle. Measure for Measure, II. 2.
Calm contemplation and poetic ease. Thomson’s Autumn, 1275.
[72]. More subtle web Arachne cannot spin. Faerie Queene, II. XII. 77.
Not with more glories. The Rape of the Lock, II. 1–22.
[73]. From her fair head. Ibid. III. 154.
Now meet thy fate. Ibid. V. 87–96.
The Lutrin of Boileau. Boileau’s account of an ecclesiastical dispute over a reading-desk was published in 1674–81. It was translated into English by Nicholas Rowe in 1708. The Rape of the Lock was published in 1712–14.
’Tis with our judgments. Essay on Criticism, 9–10.
[74]. Still green with bays. Ibid. 181–92.
His little bark with theirs should sail. Essay on Man, IV. 383–6. [‘My little bark attendant sail.’]
But of the two, etc. Essay on Criticism, See the Round Table, vol. I. p. 41, for the first mention of these couplets by Hazlitt.
[75]. There died the best of passions. Eloisa to Abelard, 40.
[76]. If ever chance. Ibid. 347–8.
He spins [‘draweth out’] the thread of his verbosity. Love’s Labour’s Lost, V. 1.
The very words. Macbeth, I. 3.
Now night descending. The Dunciad, I. 89–90.
Virtue may chuse. Epilogue to the Satires, Dialogue I., 137–172.
[77]. His character of Chartres. Moral Essays, Epistle III.
Where Murray. Imitations of Horace, Epistle VI., To Mr. Murray, 52–3. William Murray (1704–1793) was created Baron Mansfield in 1756.
Why rail they then. Epilogue to the Satires, Dialogue II. 138–9.
Despise low thoughts [joys]. Imitations of Horace, Epistle VI., To Mr. Murray, 60–2.
[78]. Character of Addison. Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, 193–214.
Alas! how changed. Moral Essays, Epistle III. 305–8.
Why did I write? Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, 125–146.
Oh, lasting as those colours. Epistle to Mr. Jervas, 63–78.
[79]. Who have eyes, but they see not. Psalm, CXV. 5, etc.
I lisp’d in numbers. Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, 128.
Et quum conabar scribere, versus erat. Ovid, Trist., IV. x. 25–26.
‘Sponte sua numeros carmen veniebat ad aptos;
Et quod tentabam dicere, versus erat.’
[80]. Besides these jolly birds. The Hind and the Panther, III. 991–1025. [‘Whose crops impure.’]
[81]. The jolly God. Alexander’s Feast, or the power of music: A song in honour of St. Cecilia’s Day 1697, 49–52. A few phrases from this criticism were used in the Essay on Mr. Wordsworth, The Spirit of the Age (vol. IV. p. 276).
For for, as piece, read for, as a piece.
[82]. The best character of Shakespeare. Dryden’s Essay of Dramatic Poesy, ed. Ker, I. 79–80.
Tancred and Sigismunda. i.e. Sigismonda and Guiscardo.
Thou gladder of the mount. Palamon and Arcite, III. 145.
[83]. Donne. John Donne (1573–1631), whose life was written by Izaak Walton, and whom Ben Jonson described as ‘the first poet in the world in some things,’ but who would not live ‘for not being understood.’
Waller. Edmund Waller’s (1605–1687) Saccharissa was Lady Dorothy Sidney, daughter of the Earl of Leicester.
Marvel. Andrew Marvell (1621–1678), ‘poet, patriot, and friend of Milton.’
Harsh, as the words of Mercury. [‘The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo.’] Love’s Labour’s Lost, V. 2.
Rochester. John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester (1647–1680).
Denham. Sir John Denham (1615–1669). His Cooper’s Hill was published in 1642.
Wither’s. George Wither (1588–1667). See Lamb’s Essay on the Poetical Works of George Wither. Poems, Plays, and Essays, ed. Ainger. The lines quoted by Hazlitt are from ‘The Shepheards’ Hunting,’ (1615). [‘To be pleasing ornaments.’ ‘Let me never taste of gladnesse.’]
V. ON THOMSON AND COWPER
[85]. Dr. Johnson makes it his praise. ‘It is said by Lord Lyttelton, in the Prologue to his posthumous play, that his works contained “no line which, dying, he could wish to blot.“’ Life of Thomson.
Bub Doddington. George Bubb Dodington (1691–1762), one of Browning’s ‘persons of importance in their day.’ His Diary was published in 1784.
Would he had blotted a thousand! Said by Ben Jonson of Shakespeare, in his Timber.
[86]. Cannot be constrained by mastery.
‘Love will not submit to be controlled
By mastery.’
Wordsworth, The Excursion, VI.
Come, gentle Spring! ‘Spring,’ 1–4.
And see where surly Winter. Ibid. 11–25.
[88]. A man of genius. Coleridge. See Hazlitt’s Essay, ‘My First Acquaintance with the Poets.’
A burnished fly. The Castle of Indolence, I. 64. [‘In prime of June.’]
For whom the merry bells. Ibid. I. 62.
All was one full-swelling bed. Ibid. I. 33.
The stock-dove’s plaint. Ibid. I. 4.
The effects of the contagion. ‘Summer,’ 1040–51.
Of the frequent corse. Ibid. 1048–9.
Breath’d hot. Ibid. 961–979.
[89]. The inhuman rout. ‘Autumn,’ 439–44.
There through the prison. ‘Winter,’ 799–809.
Where pure Niemi’s fairy mountains rise. Ibid. 875–6.
The traveller lost in the snow. Ibid. 925–35.
[90]. Through the hush’d air. Ibid. 229–64.
Enfield’s Speaker. The Speaker, or Miscellaneous Pieces selected from the best English Writers, 1775, and often reprinted. By William Enfield, LL.D., (1741–1797).
Palemon and Lavinia. ‘Autumn,’ 177–309.
Damon and Musidora. ‘Summer,’ 1267–1370.
Celadon and Amelia. Ibid. 1171–1222.
[91]. Overrun with the spleen. Cf. ‘The lad lay swallow’d up in spleen.’—Swift’s Cassinus and Peter, a Tragical Elegy, 1731.
Unbought grace. Burke’s Reflections on the French Revolution: Select Works, ed. Payne, II. 89.
[92]. His Vashti. The Task, III. 715.
Crazy Kate, etc. The Task, I. 534, et seq.
Loud hissing urn. Ibid. IV. 38.
The night was winter. Ibid. VI. 57–117.
[94]. The first volume of Cowper’s poems. This was published in 1782, and contained Table Talk, The Progress of Error, Truth, Expostulation, Hope, Charity, Conversation, Retirement, etc.
The proud and humble believer. Truth, 58–70.
Yon cottager. Truth, 317–36.
But if, unblamable in word and thought. Hope, 622–34.
[95]. Robert Bloomfield (1766–1823). The Farmer’s Boy was written in a London garret. It was published in 1800, and rapidly became popular.
[96]. Thomson, in describing the same image. The Seasons, ‘Spring,’ 833–45.
While yet the year. [‘As yet the trembling year is unconfirm’d.’] The Seasons, ‘Spring,’ 18.
[97]. Burn’s Justice. Justice of the Peace, by Richard Burn (1709–1785), the first of many editions of which was issued in two vols., 1755.
Wears cruel garters. Twelfth Night, II. 5. [‘Cross-gartered.’]
A panopticon. Jeremy Bentham’s name for his method of prison supervision. See The Spirit of the Age, vol. III., note to p. 197.
The latter end of his Commonwealth [does not] forget the beginning. The Tempest, II. 1.
[98]. Mother Hubberd’s Tale. Prosopopoia, or Mother Hubberd’s Tale.
[98]. The Oak and the Briar. ‘Februarie,’ in The Shepheard’s Calender.
Browne. William Browne (1591–?1643), pastoral poet. His chief work was Britannia’s Pastorals (1613–6).
Withers. See note to p. 83, ante. The family name is occasionally spelt Withers though the poet is generally known as Wither.
The shepherd boy piping. Book I. chap. ii.
Like Nicholas Poussin’s picture. See Hazlitt’s Essay ‘On a Landscape by Nicolas Poussin’ in Table Talk, vol. VI. p. 168, et seq.
Sannazarius’s Piscatory Eclogues. Iacopo Sannazaro’s (1458–1530) Piscatory Eclogues, translated by Rooke, appeared in England in 1726. See The Round Table, vol. I. p. 56, ‘On John Buncle,’ for a similar passage on Walton.
[99]. A fair and happy milk-maid. The quotation of the ‘Character’ from Sir Thomas Overbury’s Wife was contributed to the notes to Walton’s Complete Angler by Sir Henry Ellis, editor of Bagster’s edition, 1815. He took it from the twelfth edition, 1627, of Sir Thomas Overbury’s book. The following passages may be added between ‘curfew’ and ‘her breath’ to make the note as quoted perfect:—‘In milking a cow, and straining the teats through her fingers, it seems that so sweet a milk press makes the milk the whiter or sweeter; for never came almond glue or aromatic ointment of her palm to taint it. The golden ears of corn fall and kiss her feet when she reaps them, as if they wished to be bound and led prisoners by the same hand that felled them.’
[100]. Two quarto volumes. John Horne Tooke’s Diversions of Purley was published in two volumes, 4to, in 1786–1805. See The Spirit of the Age, vol. IV. p. 231, on ‘The Late Mr. Horne Tooke.’
The heart of his mystery. Hamlet, III. 2.
Rousseau in his Confessions ... a little spot of green. Part I. Book III. See The Round Table, ‘On the Love of the Country,’ and notes thereto, vol. I. p. 17, et seq. The greater part of that letter was used for the purposes of this lecture.
[102]. Expatiates freely. Pope’s Essay on Man, Epis. I. 5.
Mrs. Radcliffe’s romances. Ann Radcliffe (1764–1823), author of The Romance of the Forest (1791), The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794), and other popular stories of sombre mystery and gloom.
[103]. My heart leaps up. Wordsworth.
[‘So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.’]
Ah! voila de la pervenche. Confessions, Part I. Book VI.
That wandering voice. Wordsworth. To the Cuckoo.
VI. ON SWIFT, YOUNG, GRAY, COLLINS, Etc.
[104]. Parnell. Thomas Parnell (1679–1717). His poems were published by Pope, and his life was written by Goldsmith.
Arbuthnot. John Arbuthnot (1667–1735), physician and writer. He had the chief share in the Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus, which was published amongst Pope’s works in 1741. His History of John Bull was published in 1712.
[105]. Trim ... the old jack-boots. Tristram Shandy, III. 20.
[106]. Prior. Matthew Prior (1664–1721), diplomatist and writer of ‘occasional’ verse. See Thackeray’s English Humourists.
Sedley. Sir Charles Sedley (1639–1701), Restoration courtier and poet.
Little Will. An English Ballad on the taking of Namur by the King of Great Britain, 1695.
[107]. Gay. John Gay (1685–1732), the author of Fables, The Beggar’s Opera, so often quoted by Hazlitt, and Black-eyed Susan. Polly was intended as a sequel to The Beggar’s Opera, but it was prohibited from being played, though permitted to be printed. See The Round Table, The Beggar’s Opera, and notes thereto. That Essay was used as part of the present lecture.
Happy alchemy of mind. See The Round Table, vol. i., p. 65. Cf. also Lamb’s essay, ‘The Londoner,’ Morning Post, Feb. 1, 1802: ‘Thus an art of extracting morality from the commonest incidents of a town life, is attained by the same well-natured alchemy, with which the Foresters of Arden,’ etc.
O’erstepping [not] the modesty of nature. Hamlet, III. 2.
[108]. Miss Hannah More’s laboured invectives. Thoughts on the Importance of the Manners of the Great to General Society, 1788, and An Estimate of the Religion of the Fashionable World, 1790. Each passed through several editions before the close of the century. Of the first named, the third edition is stated to have been sold out in four hours.
Sir Richard Blackmore. Court physician to William and Anne. He died in 1729, after having written six epics in sixty books.
[109]. Mr. Jekyll’s parody. Joseph Jekyll (1754–1837), Master of Chancery. The parody was published in the Morning Chronicle, Friday, Aug. 19, 1809.
A City Shower. See The Tatler, No. 238.
[110]. Mary the cookmaid ... Mrs. Harris. ‘Mary the Cook-maid’s letter to Dr. Sheridan,’ 1723, which begins thus:—
‘Well, if ever I saw such another man since my mother bound my head!
You a gentleman! marry come up! I wonder where you were bred.’
‘Mrs. Harris’s Petition,’ 1699, after the preliminaries—
‘Humbly sheweth,
That I went to warm myself in Lady Betty’s chamber, because I was cold;
And I had in a purse seven pounds, four shillings, and sixpence, besides farthings, in money and gold.’
Rector of Laracor. Swift was appointed to the vicarage of Laracor, Trim, West Meath, Ireland, in 1700.
Gulliver’s nurse. In the Voyage to Brobdingnag.
An eminent critic. Jeffrey’s article on Scott’s Swift, Edinburgh Review, No. 53, Sept. 1816, vol. xxvii. pp. 1 et seq.
[112]. Shews vice her own image. [To shew virtue her own feature, scorn her own image.] Hamlet, III. 2.
Indignatio facit versus. [Facit indignatio versum.] Juvenal, Sat. I. 79.
As dry as the remainder biscuit. As You Like It, II. 7.
Reigned there and revelled. Paradise Lost, IV. 765.
As riches fineless. Othello, III. 3.
[113]. Camacho’s wedding. Part II. chap. xx.
How Friar John ... lays about him. Gargantua, Book I., chap. xxvii.
How Panurge whines in the storm. Pantagruel, Book IV. chap. xix., et seq.
How Gargantua mewls. Gargantua, Book I., chap. vii.
[113]. The pieces of silver money in the Arabian Nights. The Story of the Barber’s Fourth Brother.
Mortal consequences. Macbeth, V. 3.
[114]. The dull product of a scoffer’s pen. Wordsworth’s Excursion, Book II.
Nothing can touch him further. Macbeth, III. 2.
Voltaire’s Traveller. See Histoire des Voyages de Scarmentado.
Be wise to-day. Night Thoughts, I. 390–433.
[115]. Zanga is a vulgar caricature of it. Cf. Characters of Shakespear’s Plays, ‘Othello,’ vol. I. p. 209. Edward Young’s (1683–1765) Revenge was first acted in 1721.
[116]. We poets in our youth. Wordsworth, Resolution and Independence, 8.
Read the account of Collins. See Johnson’s life of him in his English Poets, where the eighth verse of the ‘Ode to Evening’ is as follows:—
‘Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene,
Or find some ruin ‘midst its dreary dells,
Whose Walls more awful nod,
By thy religious gleams.’
And the last:—
‘So long regardful of thy quiet rule,
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling Peace,
Thy gentlest influence own,
And love thy favourite name!’
[118]. Hammond. James Hammond (1710–1741). See Johnson’s Lives of the Poets. He seems to have died of love. His Love Elegies, in imitation of Tibullus, were published posthumously.
Mr. Coleridge (in his Literary Life). See ed. Bohn, p. 19. ‘[I] felt almost as if I had been newly couched, when by Mr. Wordsworth’s conversation, I had been induced to re-examine with impartial strictness Gray’s celebrated Elegy.’
The still sad music of humanity. Wordsworth’s Tintern Abbey.
Be mine ... to read eternal new romances. Letter to Richard West, Thursday, April 1742.
Don’t you remember Lords —— and ——. Letter to Richard West, May 27, 1742.
Shenstone. William Shenstone (1714–1763),the ‘water-gruel bard’ of Horace Walpole.
[119]. Akenside. Mark Akenside (1721–1770), physician and poet. The Pleasures of the Imagination was begun in his eighteenth year, and was first published in 1744.
Armstrong. John Armstrong (1709–1779), also physician and poet, whose Art of Preserving Health, a poem in four books, was also published in 1744.
Churchill. Charles Churchill (1731–1764), satirist. His Rosciad, in which the chief actors of the time were taken off, was published in 1761. The Prophecy of Famine, a Scots Pastoral, inscribed to John Wilkes, Esq., in which the Scotch are ridiculed, appeared in 1763.
Green. Matthew Green (1696–1737). The Spleen (1737).
Dyer. John Dyer (?1700–1758), Grongar Hill (1727). See Johnson’s Lives of the Poets and Wordsworth’s Sonnet to him.
His lot [feasts] though small. The Traveller.
And turn’d and look’d. The Deserted Village, 370. ‘Return’d and wept and still return’d to weep.’
[120]. Mr. Liston. John Liston (1776–1846).
[120]. His character of a country schoolmaster. In The Deserted Village.
Warton. Thomas Warton (1728–1790), author of The History of English Poetry (1774–81). He succeeded William Whitehead as poet laureate.
Tedious and brief. All’s Well that Ends Well, II. 3, etc.
[122]. Chatterton. Thomas Chatterton (1752–1770). The verse of Wordsworth’s quoted is in Resolution and Independence.
Dr. Milles, etc. Dr. Jeremiah Milles (1713–1784), whom Coleridge described as ‘an owl mangling a poor dead nightingale.’ See Sir Herbert Croft’s (1751–1816) Love and Madness, Letter 51 (1780). Vicesimus Knox, D.D. (1752–1821), author of many volumes of Essays, Sermons, etc.
VII. ON BURNS, AND THE OLD ENGLISH BALLADS
[123]. Unslacked of motion. See vol. IV., note to p. 42.
Anderson. Robert Anderson, M.D. (1751–1830), editor and biographer of British Poets.
Mr. Malone. Edmond Malone (1741–1812), the Shakespearian editor. He did not believe in the ‘antiquity’ of Chatterton’s productions. See his ‘Cursory Observations on the Poems attributed to Thomas Rowley,’ 1782.
Dr. Gregory. George Gregory, D.D. (1754–1808), author of The Life of Thomas Chatterton, with Criticisms on his Genius and Writings, and a concise view of the Controversy concerning Rowley’s Poems. 1789.
[124]. Annibal Caracci. Annibale Caracci (1560–1609), painter of the Farnese Gallery at Rome.
Essays, p. 144. The reference should be to Dr. Knox’s Essay, No. CXLIV., not p. 144 (vol. iii. p. 206, 1787).
[127]. He was like a man made after supper. 2 King Henry IV., III. 2.
Some one said. Cf. Hazlitt’s Essay, ‘Of Persons one would wish to have seen,’ where Burns’s hand, held out to be grasped, is described as ‘in a burning fever.’
Made him poetical. As You Like It, III. 2.
Create a soul under the ribs of death. Comus, 562.
[128]. A brazen candlestick tuned. 1 King Henry IV., III. 1.
In a letter to Mr. Gray. January 1816.
Via goodman Dull. Love’s Labour’s Lost, V. 1.
[129]. Out upon this half-faced fellowship. 1 King Henry IV., I. 3.
As my Uncle Toby. Tristram Shandy, Book VI., chap. xxxii.
Drunk full after. Chaucer’s The Clerkes Tale. ‘Wel ofter of the welle than of the tonne she drank.’
The act and practique part. King Henry V., I. 1.
The fly that sips treacle. The Beggar’s Opera, II. 2.
[131]. In a poetical epistle. To a friend who had declared his intention of writing no more poetry.
Self-love and social. Pope’s Essay on Man, IV. 396.
Himself alone. 3 King Henry VI., V. 6.
If the species were continued like trees. Sir Thomas Browne’s Religio Medici, Part II.
This, this was the unkindest cut. Julius Caesar, III. 2.
[132]. Launce’s account of his dog Crabbe. Two Gentlemen of Verona, IV. 4.
[135]. Tam o’ Shanter. [For ‘light cotillon,’ read ‘cotillon, brent.’]
[137]. The bosom of its Father. Gray’s Elegy.
The Cotter’s Saturday Night. [For ‘carking cares,’ read ‘kiaugh and care.’]
[139]. The true pathos and sublime of human life. Burns, ‘Epistle to Dr. Blacklock.’
[140]. O gin my love. [‘O my luv’s like a red, red rose.’]
[140]. Thoughts that often lie. Wordsworth’s Intimations of Immortality.
Singing the ancient ballad of Roncesvalles. Part II., Chap. IX.
[141]. Archbishop Herring. Thomas Herring (1693–1757), Archbishop of Canterbury. Letters to William Duncombe, Esq., 1728–1757 (1777), Letter XII., Sept. 11, 1739.
Auld Robin Gray ... Lady Ann Bothwell’s lament. Lady Anne Barnard (1750–1825) did not acknowledge her authorship of ‘Auld Robin Gray’ (to Sir Walter Scott) until 1823.
[142]. O waly, waly. This ballad was first published in Allan Ramsay’s Tea Table Miscellany, 1724.
[I. 8. ‘Sae my true love did lichtlie me.’
II. 5–8. ‘O wherefore should I busk my heid,
Or wherefore should I kame my hair?
For my true love has me forsook,
And says he’ll never lo’e me mair.’
III. 2, 8. ‘The sheets sall ne’er be press’d by me
For of my life I am wearie.’
V. 7–8. ‘And I mysel’ were dead and gane,
And the green grass growing over me!‘]
William Allingham’s Ballad Book, p. 41.
The Braes of Yarrow. By William Hamilton, of Bangour (1704–1754).
[143]. Turner’s History of England. Sharon Turner (1768–1847), History of England from the Norman Conquest to the Death of Elizabeth (1814–1823). The story is a pretty one, but the Eastern lady was not the mother of the Cardinal.
J. H. Reynolds. John Hamilton Reynolds (1796–1852).
VIII. ON THE LIVING POETS
[143]. No more talk where God or angel guest. Paradise Lost, IX. 1–3.
[146]. The Darwins, the Hayleys, the Sewards. Erasmus Darwin (1731–1802), grandfather of Charles Darwin, and author of The Loves of the Plants (1789), a poem parodied by Frere in The Anti-Jacobin as ‘The Loves of the Triangles.’ William Hayley (1745–1820), who wrote The Triumphs of Temper and a Life of Cowper. Anna Seward (1747–1809), the ‘Swan of Lichfield.’ She wrote poetical novels, sonnets and a life of Dr. Darwin.
Face-making. Hamlet, III. 2.
Mrs. Inchbald. Elizabeth Inchbald (1753–1821), novelist, dramatist and actress.
Thank the Gods. Cf. As You Like It, III. 3.
Mrs. Leicester’s School. Ten narratives, seven by Mary, three by Charles, Lamb (1807).
The next three volumes of the Tales of My Landlord. The Heart of Midlothian (second series of the Tales) was published in 1818, and the third series, consisting of The Bride of Lammermoor and A Legend of Montrose, in 1819.
[147]. Mrs. Barbauld. Anna Letitia Barbauld (1743–1825), daughter of the Rev. John Aitken, D.D., joint-author, with her brother John Aitken, of Evenings at Home.
Mrs. Hannah More (1745–1833). Her verses and sacred dramas were published in the first half of her life: she gradually retired from London society, and this may have led to Hazlitt’s doubtful remark as to her being still in life.
[147]. Miss Baillie. Joanna Baillie (1762–1851). Count Basil is one of her Plays of the Passions (1798–1802), and is concerned with the ‘passion’ of love. De Montfort was acted at Drury Lane in 1800 by Mrs. Siddons and Kemble.
Remorse, Bertram, and lastly Fazio. Coleridge’s Remorse (1813), for twenty nights at Drury Lane. C. R. Maturin’s Bertram (1816), successful at Drury lane. Dean Milman’s Fazio (1815), acted at Bath and then at Covent Garden.
A man of no mark. 1 King Henry IV., III. 2.
Make mouths [in them]. Hamlet, IV. 3.
Mr. Rogers’s Pleasures of Memory. Published in 1792.
The Election. Genest says it was performed for the third time on June 10, 1817.
[148]. The Della Cruscan. The sentimental and affected style, initiated in 1785 by some English residents at Florence, and extinguished by Gifford’s satire in the Baviad (1794), and Maeviad (1796).
To show that power of love
‘He knows who gave that love sublime,
And gave that strength of feeling great
Above all human estimate.’
Wordsworth’s Fidelity.
[149]. Campbell’s Pleasures of Hope. Published in 1799, Gertrude of Wyoming in 1809.
Some hamlet shade. Pleasures of Hope, I. 309–10.
Curiosa infelicitas. ‘Curiosa felicitas Horatii.’ Petronius Arbiter, § 118.
Of outward show elaborate. Paradise Lost, VIII. 538.
Tutus nimium, timidusque procellarum. Horace, De Arte Poet., 128.
[150]. Like morning brought by night. Gertrude of Wyoming, I. xiii.
Like Angels’ visits. Pleasures of Hope, Part II., l. 378. Cf. The Spirit of the Age, vol. III. p. 346.
Nec Deus intersit, nisi dignus vindice nodus. Horace, De Arte Poetica, 191.
[151]. So work the honey-bees. Henry V., I. 2.
Around him the bees. From the Sixth Song in The Beggar’s Opera.
Perilous stuff. Macbeth, V. 3.
[152]. Nest of spicery. King Richard III., IV. 4.
Therefore to be possessed with double pomp. King John, IV. 2.
[153]. Nook monastic. As You Like It, III. 2.
He hath a demon. Cf. ‘He hath a devil,’ St. John X. 20.
House on the wild sea. Coleridge’s The Piccolomini, I. iv. 117.
[154]. Looks on tempests. Shakespeare’s Sonnets, CXVI.
Great princes’ favourites. Shakespeare’s Sonnets, XXV.
[155]. Their mortal consequences. Macbeth, V. 3.
The warriors in the Lady of the Lake. Canto V. 9.
The Goblin Page. Canto II. 31.
Mr. Westall’s pictures. Richard Westall (1765–1836). He designed numerous drawings to illustrate Milton, Shakespeare, Scott, etc.
[156]. Robinson Crusoe’s boat. The Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, p. 138, ed. G. A. Aitken.
I did what little I could. Hazlitt reviewed The Excursion in The Examiner (see The Round Table, vol. I. pp. 111–125).
[162]. Coryate’s Crudites. Hastily gobled up in Five Moneths’ Travells in France, etc. (1611), by Thomas Coryate (? 1577–1617).
The present poet-laureate. Southey.
Neither butress nor coign of vantage. Macbeth, I. 6.
[162]. Born so high. King Richard III., I. 3.
In their train [‘his livery’] walked crowns. Antony and Cleopatra, V. 2.
[163]. Meek daughters. Coleridge’s The Eolian Harp.
Owls and night-ravens flew. Cf. Titus Andronicus, II. 3. ‘The nightly owl or fatal raven.’
Degrees, priority, and place. Troilus and Cressida, I. 3.
No figures nor no fantasies. Julius Caesar, II. 1.
[No] trivial fond records. Hamlet, I. v.
The marshal’s truncheon, and the next quotation. Measure for Measure, II. 2.
Metre ballad-mongering. 1 King Henry IV., III. 1.
The bare trees and mountains bare. Wordsworth, ‘To my Sister.’
He hates conchology. See The Spirit of the Age, vol. IV. p. 277.
[164]. The Anti-Jacobin Review. Not The Anti-Jacobin Review (1798–1821) but The Anti-Jacobin, wherein will be found Canning and Frere’s parodies, the best-known of which is the one on Southey’s The Widow, entitled ‘The Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grinder.’
When Adam delved. See Political Essays, ‘Wat Tyler,’ Vol. III. pp. 192 et seq., and notes thereto.
The Rejected Addresses. By Horace and James Smith (1812).
Sir Richard Blackmore. See p. 108 and note thereto ante.
[166]. Is there here any dear friend of Caesar? Julius Caesar, III. 2.
Conceive of poetry. ‘Apprehends death no more dreadfully but as a drunken sleep; careless, reckless, and fearless of what’s past, present, or to come,’ Measure for Measure, IV. 2.
It might seem insidious. Probably a misprint for ‘invidious.’
[167]. Schiller! that hour.
[‘Lest in some after moment aught more mean ...
Diminished shrunk from the more withering scene.’]
His Conciones ad Populum. Two addresses against Pitt, 1795, republished in ‘Essays on his Own Times.’
The Watchman. A Weekly Miscellany lasted from March 1, 1796, to May 13, 1796.
His Friend. Coleridge’s weekly paper lived from June 1, 1809, to March 15, 1810.
What though the radiance. Intimations of Immortality.
[‘Of splendour in the grass; of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find.’]