The approaches of this dreadful malady he began to feel soon after his uncle’s death; and, with the usual weakness of men so diseased, eagerly snatched that temporary relief, with which the table and the bottle flatter and seduce.
But his health continually declined, and he grew more and more burdensome to himself.
To what I have formerly said of his writings may be added, that his diction was often harsh, unskilfully laboured, and injudiciously selected. He affected the obsolete when it was not worthy of revival; and he puts his words out of the common order, seeming to think, with some later candidates for fame, that not to write prose is certainly to write poetry. His lines commonly are of slow motion, clogged and impeded with clusters of consonants. As men are often esteemed who cannot be loved, so the poetry of Collins may, sometimes, extort praise when it gives little pleasure.
Mr. Collins’s first production is added here from the Poetical Calendar.
TO MISS AURELIA C——R,
ON HER WEEPING AT HER SISTER’S WEDDING.
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Cease, fair Aurelia, cease to mourn; Lament not Hannah’s happy state; You may be happy in your turn, And seize the treasure you regret. With love united hymen stands, And softly whispers to your charms, “Meet but your lover in my bands, You’ll find your sister in his arms.” |