Health, leisure, means t' improve it, friendship, peace, No loose or wanton, tho' a wand'ring muse, Thus blest, I draw a picture of that bliss, Created fair so much in vain for them, Should seek the guiltless joys that I describe, The cause of piety, and sacred truth, And virtue, and those scenes, which God ordain'd Should best secure them, and promote them most. Forsaken, or through folly not enjoy'd." Indeed the great and rare art of enjoying life, in its purest and sublimest delights, is what this beneficent poet appears most anxious to communicate, and impress on the heart and soul of his reader. Witness that most exquisite passage of the Task, where he teaches the pensive student, who contemplates the face of the earth, to survey the works of his Maker with a tender transport of filial exultation, He looks abroad into the varied field Of nature, and though poor, perhaps, compar'd His are the mountains, and the vallies his, With a propriety, that none can feel, Can lift to Heaven an unpresumptuous eye, And smiling say My Father made them all! Are they not his by a peculiar right! And by an emphasis of int'rest his, Whose eye they fill with tears of holy joy, Whose heart with praise, and whose exalted mind, Yes! ye may fill your garners, ye that reap The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good In senseless riot, but ye will not find, In feast, or in the chace, in song, or dance, A liberty like his, who unimpeach'd Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong, Appropriates nature as his Father's work, And has a richer use of yours, than you. I believe the happiest hours of Cowper's life were those in which he was engaged on this noble poem, and as his happiness was in a great measure the fruit of his occupation, it is the more to be regretted that some incident propitious to poetry, did not engage his active spirit a second time in the construction of a great original work. There was indeed a time, when his zealous, and much regarded friend and neighbour, Mr. Greatheed, most kindly exhorted him to such an enterprize : An anecdote, that I seize this opportunity of recording in the words of that gentleman. "Homer being completely translated, and committed to the press, I endeavoured to urge upon Mr. Cowper's attention, the idea of a British epic, and would have recommended to him the reign of Alfred, the brightest ornament of the English throne, as one of the most eventful periods of our history. He discovered reluctance to the undertaking, and to the best of my recollection principally objected to the difficulties attending the introduction of a suitable machinery under the Christian dispensation. He pointed out the absurdities of Tasso, and the deficiency of Glover in this respect, and thought that Milton had occupied the only epic ground fit for a Christian poet." Cowper would probably have thought otherwise on such a suggestion, had it been pressed upon his fancy in a more propitious season of his life, before his spirit was harrassed by many troubles, which attended him during the latter years that he bestowed upon Homer, and above all, by the enfeebled health of Mrs. Unwin, to which he gratefully devoted such incessant attention, as must have inevitably impeded any great mental enterprize, even if his fervid imagination had been happily struck with any less obvous, and more promising, subject for epic song. Had he engaged in such an enterprize at a favorable season of his life, I am persuaded he would have enriched the literature of his country with a composition more valuable than his version of Homer, allowing to that version as high a value as translation can boast. He possessed all the requisites for the happiest accomplishment of the most arduous original work— fancy, judgment, and taste; all of the highest order, VOL. 4. Q and in union so admirable, that they heightened the powers of each other! He was singularly exempt from the two great sources of literary, and indeed of moral imperfections---negligence, and affectation! From the first he was secured by a modest sense of his own abilities, united to a spirit of application like the alacrity of Cæsar. "Nil actum reputans, si quid superesset agendum." From affectation of every kind he was perpetually preserved by a majestic simplicity of mind, never seduced by false splendour, and most feelingly alive to all the graces of truth. But with the rarest combination of different faculties for the successful execution of any great poetical work, his tender and modest genius, sublime as it was, wanted the animating voice of friendship to raise it into confident exertion. The Task would not have been written without the inspiring voice of Lady Austen. The solemn and sage spirit of Numa required the inspiration of his Egeria. "Sic sacra Numæ ritusque colendos Mitis Aricinio dictabat nympha sub antro." The great pleasure that Cowper felt in the con |