ART. S. Manfred, a Dramatic Poem. By Lord Byron. New-York, VAN WINKLE & WILEY. 24mo. pp. 70. WE E are willing, to any reasonable extent, to bear with every man's infirmity. But, as it has been tritely said, there is a point beyond which patience ceases to be a virtue ;—and, absolutely, on casting our eye on the advertisement of this pamphlet, we could hardly forbear exclaiming, with Colman's poor persecuted French apothecary,- Begar, here Monsieur Tonson come again! Never was there a more desperate case of the cacoethes scribendi, imprimendi, et edendi, than lord Byron's,-and the worst of it is that his lordship can only write in one strain, and on one subject, and unfortunately neither of them happens to be of the most agreeable kind. There is but one portrait in all his pictures, and that one is limned from himself. Other characters may be introduced into his pieces, but this always stands forth from the canvass, and however the disposition of the figures may be varied, the colour and the shading are forever the same. We do not attribute this perpetual monotony to any original defect of talent in his lordship, but to a mental malady which has poisoned his affections, and is preying on his powers. It is but justice to ourselves to declare that against lord Byron personally we can have no feelings of hostility. If we have ever been compelled to consider him in his private capacity, it is because he has so indissolubly blended his individual with his literary being, and has so gratuitously admitted the public into a confidence which they did not covet, and do not prize. As a man, we can say that we sincerely pity him. The pathetic description given by the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviewers of his unhappy temper has really touched our sympathies. We cannot, indeed, well conceive what there is so particularly malignant in the destiny of this wayward youth. Nature, education, and fortune conspired to crown him with their gifts. Wealth, learning, accomplishments, rank, genius, and beauty, rendered him the idol and the envy of the fashionable world on his very entrance into society. If he have slighted all these boons-if, he have lavished on unworthy objects all these liberal endowments, if, in a few short years, he have exhausted all the means or sources of delight, though we see much for him to deplore and repent, we see no reason why he should presume to murmur or repine. But still we cannot withhold our commiseration even for his self-inflicted griefs, or fancied desolation. We will no exclude him from our charity, although he have none for his fellow-men. We will not become his accusers, if he will but consent to veil his shame. But we cannot look upon him as worthy of a tenderer feeling than is due to that wretchedness which ever flows from guilt. We will not confirm him in a miserable delusion. We will not lead him to imagine that he has monopolized all the sufferings, nor all the sensibilities of his species -nor will we encourage him in the belief that mankind are like to derive much pleasure or profit, from the periodical detail of his doleful experiences. God knows we have all calamities enough of our own to struggle with, and were each sufferer, in this vale of tears,' to reveal and reiterate his woes, life itself would be consumed in condolence. It would soon become a serious strife who should be deemed supreme in wretchedness.' But were we to award the palm of so unenviable a distinction, it should be, not to the supine hypochondriac, but to The brave man struggling in the storms of fate. Happily, however, common politeness interdicts the indulgence of an eternal querulousness. We would, therefore, earnestly recommend it to lord Bypast surgery,' to leave off whining. ron, even though he may be 'wounded merit, and faults-enough to sink a As a poet, lord Byron has decided navy.' His merit consists in the strength and truth of his descriptions of natural scenery, the tact with which he selects from a multitude of external objects those best calculated for effect, and the fidelity with which he interprets the mute language of inanimate nature,--and in masterly delineations of the passions, which discover no less knowledge of the human heart, than graphical skill. Sadness always leads us to commune with ourselves, and to seek for the silent sympathies of the material world. Deep sorrow, if it be not the best casuist, fails not to induce profound reflection. No man was ever brought intimately acquainted with himself, except in the school of adversity. Lord Byron has been, in some respects, deed 'courage from hope," but " an apt pupil. He has caught, not inlution from despair.' He dares to look on the worst that can befall him,-nay, he reso almost dares defy it. Ashamed of that weakness of nerves to which he owes his misfortunes, he affects to wrap himself in stera indifference. To avert injury he becomes the aggressor. Having relinquished the pursuit of virtue as unattainable, he underrates its value, and questions its existence. He attempts to destroy moral distinctions, or labours to make the worse appear the better reason.' To this moody madness' we ascribe some of lord Byron's characteristic excellencies, and most of his peculiar faults. Those are incidental and superinduced, these are radical and connate with his conceptions. The defects of his lordship's poetry are such as admit of no other extenuation, than might be pleaded by the perpetrators of the crimes, on which his lordship loves so dearly to descant. In fact, we think them less susceptible of palliation. We can forgive something to the frailty which sinks under temptation, but what excuse can we find for one who in his calmest hours, and in the most tranquil retirement, will feast with a carnivorous appetite on the vilest and most degrading contemplations, and find an unnatural enjoyment in embalming in all the odours of song, the most loathsome recrements of mortality! Such is the elegant amusement of lord Byron. Never has his lordship found a hero worthy of his lyre, whose exploits had not rendered him, in the eye of justice and the law, equally worthy of the gibbet. Nor does he hold up these monsters as 'examples to deter,' though he may not design them as 'pat terns to imitate.' He uniformly represents their vices as the consequences of an intellectual greatness which had elevated them above the thoughts and fears of common men; and seems to resolve the idea of perfect grandeur of soul into a magnanimous contempt of all statutes and sanctions human and divine. Whatever inference others may draw from his fables, he leaves us in no doubt in regard to his own opinions. But even had lord Byron intended to excite a detestation of vice, which it is evident he did not, he has not employed the proper means to attain his end. As it has been well observed by Madame de Genlis, to hate evil we need only learn to love good; and though we cannot escape the knowledge of the existence of wickedness, we are not obliged continually to dress it out in all the array of circumstance. 'S'il est necessaire,' says this excellent writer, de savoir que le vice existe, peut-il jaVOL. I. NO. v. mais l'être de fixer nos regards sur les peintures dégoûtantes qui nous en retra cent la diformité? Le moyen le plus certain pour le faire hair, est d'omir, avec tous ses charmes, la brillante image de la virtu.' Very different has been the course of lord Byron. He has never attempted to excite reverence for piety, or emulation of virtue. The courage he has lauded,-and it is the only good quality he has imparted to most of the actors in his plots, has ever been displayed in spurning man and braving the majesty of heaven. He seems to have forgotten that the authors of fiction are bound to inculcate truth, and that the object of the fine arts is the imitation of natural and the production of moral beauty. Instead of endeavouring to add to the number of innocent delights, and to increase the sum of human happiness, he has only toiled to add ideal to actual distresses, and to shroud all the sunny prospects of life in a dismal night. No enthusiast ever sought the To Kanov, with greater diligence or zeal than lord Byron has discovered in the search of the To Kazov and to Auszpov Manfred is the most atrocious hero that lord Byron's prolific muse has yet produced. We have said that lord Byron has painted from himself. We do not mean to impute to his lordship either the overt acts he has charged upon the offspring of his fancy, or even the premeditation of similar enormities. But we have a right to ascribe to his lordship sentiments expressed by himself, entirely analagous to those he has avowedly assumed. In Childe Harold,' we may discover the stamina of all his lordship's heroes. They are precisely what 'Childe Harold' would have been in their situation. Since, then, Childe Harold' is perfectly understood to be lord Byron, and as all his Giaours, Corsairs, &c. are but duplicates of Childe Harold,' and as it is a geometrical axiom that things that are equal to the same thing are equal to one another, we have a right to consider lord Byron as speaking in the person of these imaginary ruffians. At least it is fair to conclude that his lordship must in some measure approve what he is so assiduous in promulgating. We will waive, however, our remarks on the character of Manfred till we have made him better known to our readers. As there is little intricacy in the story of this Dramatic Poem, we shall, as far as possible, make it explain itself. It opens in an imposing manner. The curtain rises, and discovers 'MANFRED alone 2Y It will not burn so long as I must watch: Or lurking love of something on the earth.- - The task he speaks of is no small one, --for though it be an easy thing enough 'to call spirits from the vasty deep,' yet it is not often that they will come, when we do call for them.' Manfred, however, was a potent enchanter, and at his summons, his familiars, after much demuring, at last attend. There are seven of these spirits who obey the invocationthe cloud spirit, the mountain spirit, the. water spirit, the fire spirit, the storm spirit, the spirit of darkness, and the spirit of the ruling star of Manfred's destiny,which star is indeed typical of his genius, being The burning wreck of a demolish'd world, A wandering hell in the eternal space. All these spirits have something to say for themselves, which we have not room to copy, and the omission of which is no great loss. We at length ascertain the object of this extraordinary convocation, the spirits putting a very natural interrogatory, What wouldst thou with us, son of mortals--say? Man. Forgetfulness First Spi. Of what---of whom---and why? Man. Of that which is within me; read it there-- Ye know it, and I cannot utter it. The sprites, however, cannot grant him this boon. Still he continues to demand 'oblivion, self-oblivion,' till satisfied at last, that he cannot obtain this blessing at their hand, he finally requests that they will appear to him in their accustomed forms, but they not being accustomed to wear any forms, find a difficulty in complying even with this innocent desire. They offer, however, to appear in any shape he may choose. Man. I have no choice; there is no form on Hideous or beautiful to me. Let him, Man. Oh God! if it be thus, and thou I yet might be most happy.-! will clasp thee, After this a voice utters a long incantation, which concludes with the following denouncement. And on thy head I pour the vial Though thy death shall still seem near Lo! the spell now works around thee, The next scene presents Manfred on the Mountain of the Jungfrau.' He is soliloquizing again. He seems inclined to precipitate himself from this giddy height, but, continues he, There is a power upon me which withholds If it be life to wear within myself This barrenness of spirit, and to be Beautiful! Half dust, half deity, alike unfit To sink or soar, with our mix'd essence make selves, And trust not to each other. Hark! the note, [The Shepherd's pipe in the distance is heard.] The natural music of the mountain reedFor here the patriarchal days are not A pastoral fable-pipes in the liberal air, Mix'd with the sweet bells of the sauntering berds; were My soul would drink those echoes.—Oh that I A bodiless enjoyment-born and dying A Chamois Hunter enters here. Manfred, without observing him, continues his audible meditations, till he has firmly made up his determination to throw himself from the mountain's summit into the yawning vale. At this instant the hunter forcibly interposes, and they quietly descended the declivity together, with commendable caution. The second act introduces us to the hunter's cottage amongst the Bernese Alps. The hunter offers wine to Manfred. Come, pledge me fairly. Man. Away, away! there's blood upon the brim! Will it then never-never sink in the earth? C. Hun. What dost thou mean? thy senses wander from thee. Man. I say 'tis blood-my blood! the pure Which ran in the veins of my fathers, and in ours yet The aid of holy men, and heavenly patience— Man. Patience and patience! Hence--that word was made For brutes of burden, not for birds of prey; On the hunter's urging his maturer age, Manfred proceeds: Think'st thou existence doth depend on time? Barren and cold, on which the wild waves break, What is it That thou dost see, or think thou look'st upon? Thy humble virtues, hospitable home, same; My pang shall find a voice. From my youth upwards My spirit walk'd not with the souls of men, dust, Conclusions most forbidden. Then I pass'd As I do thee-and with my knowledge grew Man Oh! I but thus prolonged my words, Beasting these idle attributes, because As I approach the core of my heart's grief- Witch. Spare not thyself-proceed. Man. She was like me in lineaments-her eyes, Her hair, her features, all, to the very tone The quest of hidden knowledge, and a mind Nem. I was detained repairing shattered thrones, Marrying fools, restoring dynasties, We are now admitted into the hall of Arimanes, a very powerful and pestilent spirit, to whom all the rest are subservient. Here all these incorporeal agents are congregated. Manfred intrudes into Her faults were mine---her virtues were her the assembly. He is reproved for his It gazed on mine, and withered. I have shed Blood, but not hers---and yet her blood was sbed I saw-and could not stanch it. The Witch promises him, if he will swear fealty to her, she will aid a wish he now expresses as all that remains to him -to raise the dead. He contemns the proposition, and dismisses her. Another monologue concludes this scene. We are again obliged to climb the Jungfrau mountain. The Destinies are convening by moonlight on its summit. They successively inform us of their several employments. That of the second Destiny has a political allusion, which will be easily understood. The third Destiny has been wrecking a vessel, from which she had suffered only one to escape, And he was a subject well worthy my care; The first of these Fatal Sisters now relates her pastime,-which consisted in desolating a city by the plague. Nemesis next enters, and gives the following account of her evening's recreation; which has a bearing at least as palpable, as the one already pointed out. rashness, and commanded to worship Arimanes. He refuses. The spirits cry Crush the worm! out Tear hun in pieces!- The first Destiny steps forward to vindicate him. She declares him, a man Of no common order, as his port And presence here denote. his aspirations Have been beyond the dwellers of the earth, And they have only taught him what we know— That knowledge is not happiness, and science But an exchange of ignorance for that Which is another kind of ignorance. She adds, that he has become the victim of his passions. Manfred demands the evocation of Astarte from the tomb. Her phantom 'rises and stands in the midst.' Manfred accosts it. He urges her to speak to him. Look on me!--the grave hath not chang'd thee |