He has a magic power over words: they come winged at his bldding; and seem to know their places. They are struck out at a heat, on the spur of the occasion, and have all the truth and vividness which arise from an actual impression of the objects. His epithets and single phrases are like sparkles, thrown off from an imagination, fired by the whirling rapidity of its own motion. His language is hieroglyphical. It translates thoughts into visible images. It abounds in sudden transitions and elliptical expressions. This is the source of his mixed metaphors, which are only abbreviated forms of speech. These, however, give no pain from long custom. They have, in fact, become idioms in the language. They are the building, and not the scaffolding to thought. We take the meaning and effect of a well-known passage entire, and no more stop to scan and spell out the particular words and phrases, than the syllables of which they are composed. In trying to recollect any other author, one sometimes stumbles, in case of failure, on a word as good. In Shakspeare, any other word but the true one is sure to be wrong. If any body, for instance, could not recollect the words of the following description, Light thickens, And the crow makes wing to the rooky wood,' he would be greatly at a loss to substitute others for them equally expressive of the feeling.-His versification is no less powerful, sweet, and varied. It has every occasional excellence, of sullen intricacy, crabbed and perplexed, or of the smoothest and loftiest expansion-from the ease and familiarity of measured conversation to the lyrical sounds Of ditties highly penned, Sung by a fair queen in a bower of beauty, It is the only blank verse in the language, except Milton's, that for itself is readable. It is not stately and uniformly swelling like his, but varied and broken by the inequalities of the ground it has to pass over in its uncertain course, ، And so by many winding nooks it strays, Of Shakspeare as a poet, if the poetical be separated from the dramatic character, the reader is left to judge from the following specimens. His poems were among his earliest productions; but the spirit of his mind is clearly discernible in them all. In the "Rape of Lucrece," and the "Venus and Adonis," there is much beautiful description; and many of the sonnets have the sweetness and strength of Shakspeare's dramatic muse. The slighter pieces interspersed with his plays have the airy grace and gay fancy of the best modern lyrics, with the Shaksperian luxuriance of the olden time, DESCRIPTION OF LUCRECE ASLEEP AS HER lily hand her rosy cheek lies under, Who, therefore angry, seems to part in sunder, Without the bed her other fair hand was, Her hair, like golden threads, play'd with her breath; O modest wantons! wanton modesty ! Showing life's triumph in the map of death, And death's dim look in life's mortality. Each in her sleep themselves so beautify, But that life liv'd in death, and death in life. 豪 DESCRIPTION OF THE STEED OF ADONIS. IMPERIOUSLY he leaps, he neighs, he bounds, The iron bit he crushes 'tween his teeth, His ears up prick'd; his braided hanging mane Upon his compass'd crest now stands on end; His nostrils drink the air, and forth again, As from a furnace, vapours doth he send : His eye, which glisters scornfully like fire, Shows his hot courage and his high desire. Sometimes he trots as if he told the steps, And thus I do to captivate the eye Of the fair breeder that is standing by." Look, when a painter would surpass the life, His art with Nature's workmanship at strife, Round-hoof'd, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long, Broad breast, full eyes, small head, and nostril wide, High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing strong, Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide : Look what a horse should have, he did not lack, Save a proud rider on so proud a back. Sometimes he scuds far off, and there he stares; And whêr he run, or fly, they know not whether; For through his mane and tail the high wind sings, Fanning the hairs, who wave like feather'd wings. SONNETS. WHEN in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, I all alone beweep my outcast state, And trouble deaf Heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself, and curse my fate, Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd, Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy contented least ; Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising, LET me confess that we two must be twain, Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame; No longer mourn for me when I am dead, That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot, |