In fuch an age, and among fuch barbarous nobility, what but wretched neglect could be the fate of a Camoëns! After all, however, if he was imprudent on his first appearance at the court of John III. if the honesty of his indignation led him into great imprudence, as certainly it did, when at Goa he fatirised the viceroy and the first Goths in power; yet let it also be remembered, that "The "gifts of imagination bring the heaviest task upon "the vigilance of reafon; and to bear thofe faculties "with unerring rectitude or invariable propriety, re"quires a degree of firmnefs and of cool attention, "which doth not always attend the higher gifts of the "mind. Yet difficult as nature herfelf feems to have "rendered the task of regularity to genius, it is the su"preme confolation of dullnefs and of folly to point "with Gothic triumph to thofe exceffes which are the "overflowings of faculties they never enjoyed. Per"fectly ing the quarters were found gibbeted in the most public parts of the city. And thus the man who despised the wreath with which Camoëns crowned his grandfather, brought that grandfather's effigies to the deepest insult, which can be offered to the memory of the deceased. Nor were his own effigies happier. On his recal to Europe, the first object that struck him, when he went on board the ship appointed to carry him, was a figure hanging by the neck at the yard-arm, exactly like himself in feature and habit. He asked what it meant; and was refolutely answered, It reprefents you, and thefe are the men who bung it up. Nor muft another infult be omitted. After being a few days at fea, he was neceffitated to return to the port from whence he had failed, for fresh provifions, for all his live stock, it was found, was poifoned. After his return to Europe, he used all his intereft to be reinstated in India, which, in his old days, after twenty years folicitation at the court of Madrid, he at last obtained. His fecond government, how. ever, is wrapped in much obfcurity, and is distinguished by no important action or event. "fectly unconscious that they are indebted to their "ftupidity for the confiftency of their conduct, they plume themselves on an imaginary virtue, which has its "origin in what is really their difgrace.-Let fuch, if "fuch dare approach the fhrine of Camoëns, withdraw "to a refpectful diftance; and fhould they behold the "ruins of genius, or the weakness of an exalted mind, "let them be taught to lament, that nature has left the "nobleft of her works imperfect *." And poetry is not only the nobleft, but also not the leaft ufeful, if civilization of manners be of advantage to mankind. No moral truth may be more certainly demonftrated, than that a Virgil or a Milton are not only the first ornaments of a state, but also of the first confequence, if the laft refinement of the mental powers be of importance. Strange as this might appear to a ↑ Bur leigh This paffage in inverted commas is cited, with the alteration of the name only, from Dr. Langhorne's account of the life of William Collins. + Burleigh, though an able politician, and deep in state intrigue, had no idea, that to introduce polite literature into the vernacular tongue, was of any benefit to a nation; though her vernacular literature was the glory of Rome when at the height of empire, and though empire fell with its declenfion. Spenfer, the man who greatly conduced to refine the English mufes, was by Burleigh esteemed a ballad-maker, unworthy of regard. Yet the English polite literature, fo greatly indebted to Spenfer, is at this day, in the esteem which it commands abroad, of more real service to England, than all the reputation or intrigues of Burleigh. And ten thousand Burleighs, according to Sir W. Temple, are born for one Spenfer. Ten thousand are born, fays Sir William, with abilities requifite to form a great statesman, for one who is born with the talents or genius of a great poet. Locke's ideas of poetry are accounted for in one fhort fentence; HE KNEW NOTHING ABOUT THE MATTER. An extract from his correfpondence with M. Molyneux and a citation from one of his treatises, shall demonftrate the troth of this affertion. Molyneux leigh or a Locke, it is philofophically accounted for by Bacon; nor is Locke's opinion either inexplicable or irrefutable. Molyneux writes to Locke: "Mr. Churchill favoured me with the prefent of Sir R. Blackmore's K. Arthur. I had read Pr. Arthur before, and read it with admiration, which is not at all leffened by this fecond piece. All our English poets (except Milton) have been mere ballad-makers in comparison to bim. Upon the publication of his first poem, I intimated to him, through Mr. Churchill's hands, how excellently I thought he might perform a philosophic poem, from many touches he gave in his Pr. Arthur, particularly from Mopas's fong. And I perceive by his preface to K. Arthur he has had the like intimations from others, but rejects them as being an enemy to all philofophic hypothefis." Mr. Locke anfwers: "1 fhall, when I fee Sir R. Blackmore, difcourfe him as you defire. There is, I with pleafure find, a ftrange harmony throughout, between your thoughts and mine." Molyneux replies: "I perceive you are fo happy as to be acquainted with Sir Rich. Blackmore; he is an extraordinary person, and I admire his two prefaces as much as I do any parts of his books: The first, wherein he exposes "the "licentiousness and immorality of our late poetry," is incomparable; and the fecond, wherein he profecutes the same subject, and delivers his thoughts concerning hypothefes, is no lefs judicious; and I am wholly of his opinion relating to the latter. However, the hiftory and phænomena of nature we may venture at; and this is what I propose to be the fubject of a philofophic poem. Sir R. Blackmore has exquifite touches of this kind, dispersed in many places of his books; (to pass over Mopas's fong) I'll instance one particular in the moft profound fpeculations of Mr. Newton's philosophy, thus curiously touched in King Arthur, Book ix. p. 243. The conftellations fhine at his command, He form'd their radiant orbs, and with his hand "I doubt not but Sir R. Blackmore, in thefe lines, had a regard to the proportionment of the projective motion of the vis centripeta, that keeps the planets in their continued courfes. †Thefe lines, however, are a dull wretched paraphrase of some parts of the Pfalms. irrefutable. The great genius of Aristotle, and that of his great resembler, Sir Francis Bacon, faw deeper into the "I have by me fome obfervations, made by a judicious friend of mine, on both of Sir R. Bleckmore's poems. If they may be any ways acceptable to Sir R. I shall send them to you." Mr. Locke again replies: "Though Sir R. B's vein in poetry be what every body must allow him to have an extraordinary talent in; and though, with you, I exceedingly valued his first preface, yet I must own to you, there was nothing that I fo much admired him for, as for what he says of hypotheses in his last. It feems to me fo right, and is yet fo much out of the way of the ordinary writers and practitioners in that faculty, that it fhews as great a strength and penetration of judgment as bis poetry bas fhewn flights of fancy." As the best comment on this, let an extract from Locke's Effay on Education fully explain his ideas. "If he have a poetic vein, 'tis to me the strangest thing in the world that the father should defire or suffer it to be cherished or improved. Methinks the parents should labour to have it stifled and suppressed as much as may be ; and I know not what reason a father can have to wish his fon a poet, who does not defire to have him bid defiance to all other callings or business; which is not yet the worst of the cafe; for if he proves a successful rhymer, and gets once the reputation of a wit, I defire it may be confidered, what company and places he is like to spend his time in, nay, and estate too; for it is very feldom seen that any one discovers mines of gold or filver in Parnaffus. 'Tis a pleasant air, but barren foil, and there are very few instances of those who have added to their patrimony by any thing they have reaped from thence. Poetry and gaming, which usually go together, are alike in this too, that they feldom bring any advantage but to those who have nothing elfe to live on. Men of eftates almost constantly go away lofers; and 'tis well if they escape at a cheaper rate, than their whole estates, or the greatest part of them. If therefore you would not have your fon the fiddle to every jovial company, without whom the sparks could not relish their wine, nor know how to spend an afternoon idly; if you would not have him waste his time and eftate to divert others, and contemn the dirty acres left him by his ancestors, I do not think you will much care he should be a poet." This ignorance of poetry is even worse than the Dutch idea of it. But this, and his opinion of Blackmore, fully prove, that Locke, however great in other respects, knew no difference between a Shakespeare, that unequalled philofopher of the paffions, and the dulleft Grub-street plodder; between a Milton and the tavern rhymers of the days of the fecond Charles. But the true spirit of poetry and the human affections than In ancient Greece, the works of Homer a Burleigh. were But Milton's knowledge of the affections discovered in the cultivation of the mufes an use of the first importance. A tafte formed by the great poetry, he esteems as the ultimate refinement of the understanding. "This (fays he, in his Tractate on the Education of Youth) would make them foon perceive, what despicable creatures our common rhymers and playwriters be; and shew them what religious, what glorious and magnificent use might be made of poetry, both in divine and human things. From hence, and not till now, will be the right season of forming them to be able writers and composers in every excellent matter. . . whether they be to speak in parliament or council, honour and attention would be waiting on their lips. There would then alfo appear in pulpits other vifages, other gestures, and ftuff otherwife wrought, than what we now fit under."-Milton evidently alludes to the general dulnefs of the furious fectaries of his own time. The furious bigots of every fect have been as remarkable for their inelegance as for their rage. And the cultivation of polite literature has ever been found the best preventive of gloomy enthusiasm, and religious intolerance. In Milton, and every great poet, the poet and fublime philosopher are united, though Milton was perhaps the only man of his age, who perceived this union or fameness of character. Lord Clarendon feems to have confidered poetry merely as puerile fing-fong. Waller, he says, addicted himfelf to poetry at thirty, the time when others leave it off. Nor was Charles I. less unhappy in his estimate of it. In the dedication of Sir John Denham's works to Charles II. we have this remarkable passage: "One morn❝ing, waiting upon him (Charles I.) at Caufham, fmiling upon me, he "faid he could tell me fome news of myself, which was that he had seen "fome verfes of mine the evening before, and asking me when I made "them, I told him two or three years fince; he was pleased to say, that "having never seen them before, he was afraid I had written them fince "my return into England, and though he liked them well, he would advise "me to write no more, alleging, that when men are young, and have little "elfe to do, they might vent the overflowings of their fancy that way; but "when they were thought fit for more ferious employments, if they still "perfifted in that course, it would look as if they minded not the way to "any better." Yet this monarch, who could perceive nothing but idle puerility in poetry, was the zealous patron of architecture, fculpture, and painting; and his favourite, the duke of Buckingham, laid out the enormous sum of 400,000l. on paintings and curiofities. But had Charles's bounty given a Shakespeare or a Milton to the public, he would have done his kingdoms infinitely more service than if he had imported into England all the pictures and all the antiques in the world. The |