"But, O, how dull is the intricate path of the philosopher, how uninteresting is all the laboured ingenuity of the artist, compared with the simple and touching pleasures which are alike open to the peasant, as to the scholar, the noble, or the monarch! It is in the gift of exquisite senses, and not in the adventitious circumstances of birth and fortune, that one human being excels another!
"The common air, the sun, the skies,
To him are opening Paradise."
"We are delighted to see reflected the same feelings, the same pleasures from the breasts of our ancestors. We hear the voices of those bearded chiefs, whose portraits adorn the pannels of our halls and galleries, still bearing witness to the same natural and eternal truths; still inveighing against the pomp, the fickleness, and the treachery of courts; and uttering the songs of the shepherd and the
woodman, in language that defies the changes of time, and speaks to all ages the touching effusions of the heart.
"If some little additional prejudice in favour of these compositions be given by the association in our ideas of their antiquity, if we connect some reverence, and some increased force, with expressions which were in favourite use with those who for two centuries have slept in the grave, the profound moral philosopher will neither blame nor regret this effect. It is among the most generous and most ornamental, if not among the most useful habits of the mind!
"Such are among the claims of this Collection to notice. But the seal that has been hitherto put upon this treasure; the deep oblivion in which the major parts of its contents have for ages been buried, ought to excite curiosity, and impart a generous delight at its revival. Who is there so cold as to be moved with no enthusiasm at drawing the mantle from the figure of Time? For my part, I confess how often I have watched the gradual developement with eager and breathless expectation; and gazed upon the reviving features till my warm fancy gave them a glow and a beauty, which perhaps the reality never in its happiest moments possessed."[723:A]
That very nearly two hundred years should have elapsed between the second and third editions of this miscellany is a striking proof of the neglect to which even the best of our ancient poetry has been hitherto subjected. The rapidly increasing taste of the present age, however, for the reliques of long-departed genius, cannot fail of precluding in future any return of such undeserved obscurity.
In 1600 the industry of Robert Allot presented the public with a large collection of extracts from the most popular poets of his times, under the title of "England's Parnassus: or the choysest flowers of our moderne poets, with their poeticall comparisons. Descriptions of Bewties, Personages, Castles, Pallaces, Mountaines, Groves, Seas, Springs, Rivers, &c. Whereunto are annexed other various discourses, both pleasant and profitable." Small 8vo. pp. 510.
Had the editor of this curious volume, beside citing the names of his authors, added the titles of the works from which he culled his specimens, an infinity of trouble would have been saved to subsequent research; yet the deficiency has served, in a peculiar manner, to mark the successful progress of modern bibliography. When Oldys wrote his Preface to Hayward's British Muse, which was first published in 1738, he complains grievously of this omission, observing that most of Allot's poets "were now so obsolete, that not knowing what they wrote, we can have no recourse to their works, if still extant."[724:A] Since this sentence was written, such has been the industry of our literary antiquaries, that almost every poem which Allot laid under contribution in forming his volume, has been ascertained, and rendered accessible to the curious enquirer; and so far from the writers being obsolete, after nearly eighty years have been added to their antiquity, we may venture to affirm that, excepting about half-a-dozen, they are as familiar to us as the poets of the present reign. It is but just, however, to acknowledge that a considerable portion of this intimacy may be ascribed to Allot's book, which, by its numerous passages from bards rendered scarce by neglect, has stimulated the bibliographical enthusiasm of the last twenty years to achieve their detection. An enumeration of the contributors to England's Parnassus, will serve to illustrate and confirm these remarks:—