In reprinting this review, the long quotations from both odes have been omitted. This precedent is followed in all cases where the quotations are of inordinate length, or are offered merely as "specimens" without specific criticism. No useful end would be served in reprinting numerous pages of classic extracts that are readily accessible to every student. All omissions are, of course, properly indicated.
[1]. Quinault. Philippe Quinault (1635-1688), a popular French dramatist and librettist.
[2]. Mark'd for her own. An allusion to the line in the Epitaph appended to the Elegy: "And Melancholy marked him for her own."
Oliver Goldsmith
Goldsmith's Traveller (1764) was begun as early as 1755—before he had expressed what Professor Dowden calls his "qualified enthusiasm" and "official admiration" for Gray's Odes. In criticizing Gray, he quoted Isocrates' advice—Study the people—and properly bore that precept in mind while he was shaping his own verses. The Odes and the Traveller are respectively characteristic utterances of their authors—of the academic recluse, and of the warm-hearted lover of humanity.
The review, quoted from the Critical Rev., XVIII (458-462) (December, 1764), is from the pen of Dr. Samuel Johnson. Apart from its distinguished authorship and the strong words of commendation in the final sentence, it possesses slight interest as literary criticism. It is, in fact, little more than a brief summary of the poem, enriched by a few well-chosen illustrative extracts. The fact that Johnson contributed nine or ten lines to the poem (see Boswell, ed. Hill, I, p. 441, n. 1, and II, p. 6) may account partly for the character of the review. Johnson's quotations from the poem are not continuous and show several variations from authoritative texts.
William Cowper
Cowper stands almost alone among English poets as an instance of late manifestation of poetic power. He was over fifty years of age when he offered his first volume of Poems (1782) to the public. This collection, which included Table-Talk and other didactic poems, appeared at the beginning of the most prosaic age in the history of modern English literature; yet the critics did not find it sufficiently striking in quality to differentiate it from the level of contemporary verse, or to forecast the success of The Task and John Gilpin's Ride three years later.