Taste dwells in the Mind only. Stretch'd on a rock and drench'd with falling dews A perfect taste dwells only in the mind, 240 * About the end of the sixteenth century, the poem here alluded to was produced in Spain. It is celebrated for peculiar beauties, for the singularity of the subject, and is remarkable from the character of its author. His name was Don Alonzo d'Ercilla Y. Cuniga, he commanded some troops in Chili, where he waged war in a little mountainous country, called Auracauna, inhabited by a race of men more robust and ferocious than all the other American nations. In this war he underwent extreme dangers, and performed the most astonishing actions: This occasioned him to conceive the design of immortalizing himself by immortalizing his enemies. He was both a conqueror and a poet, and entitled his poem Auracauna, from the name of the country. His pen was as busily employed amidst those wilds as his sword. He wrote his poem on the scenes of his battles and as night afforded more rest from the toils of war than the day, he often obeyed the dictates of his muse, reclining on the rocks, and aided by the light of the moon. As he could not at all times obtain paper, parts of his work were written upon leather and upon the bark of trees. He has introduced much fire in his battles. His poem is as wild as the nations who are the subject, and discovers great copiousness and strength of imagination. : C Ossian. Amidst his native wilds and misty plains, May thy bold spirit visit these dull climes! 260 It *Ossian may be called the most mournful of bards. is impossible to read his poems without being lulled into a thoughtful melancholy which is more beneficial to the heart than the brightest joy. The regions which a poet inhabits will always give a cast to his strains. Ossian, amidst his isle of mists, caught his gloomy enthusiasm. There was presented to his view, a wild, picturesque, and melancholy country, long tracts of mountainous desert, covered with dark heath. There he wandered through narrow vallies, thinly inhabited and bounded by precipices, which by the light of the moon presented a landscape the most grotesque Ariosto. See Ariosto* take his boundless course Thro' fields of air upon his griffin horse; and ghastly. There he heard on every side the fall of torrents, the mournful dashing of the waves along the friths and lakes, and the hollow sound of the winds through the rocks and the caverns, which he has compared to the voice of a spirit. The admiration which the works of Ossian have excited abroad, is a confirming evidence of their excellence, and should meliorate the criticism of those whose taste is submissive to the prejudice of the great Dr. Johnson. Most of the nations of Europe have listened to the songs of Ossian with delight. The Germans prefer them to the Iliad and the Ænied---and they have received in Spain all the decorations which the printer and painter could afford. His In *This poet, whom the author of the Pursuits of Literature has classed among the greatest geniuses of the world, had the kindred soul of Shakespeare. His imagination appears from his works to be inexhaustible. His impetuosity bears him above every difficulty. Amid fields of unlimited space he could only stretch his wings. His immense bark could float on no other waves than those of the ocean. mighty arm would wield no sword but that of Orlando, which fell upon the foe like the thunder of heaven. genius, Ariosto is much superior to his rival Tasso, but he sinks behind him in taste and incorrectness. If we compare their different merits we will at once be struck with the greater originality of Ariosto, and with the greater tenderness of Tasso.---Tasso abounds with some of the most moving beauties of poetry, but he also abounds with glittering tinsel, and the general outlines of his poem are drawn Burns. From which he looks upon the world below, His sole instructors Nature and the heart; from Homer's Iliad.--Whereas Ariosto disdained any imitation. He delighted in the sublimity of irregularity. His flight is regulated by no rules. He soars beyond the reach of criticism. *Burns, to an exquisite sensibility, united a power of description, not inferior to that of the author of the Seas sons. His scanty information, however, repressed the exertions of his wild Genius. His muse seldom looks beyond the glens of Scotland, its hills and romantic waters. Soured by misfortune, and doomed to feel the pains of those, who, in humble life have listened to the trump of Fame, he sought indulgence to his sorrow among those scenes, which, while they soothed his mind, awoke the pathos of his muse. His Cotter's Saturday Night---his Address to a Mountain Daisy---his Lament of Mary Queen of Scots--his Lament on a Friend's Unfortunate Amour-his Lament on the Death Beauties of Nature. 280 Or see him seek the distant sounding shore His soul delighted with the dashing roar; Or when young summer mantles o'r the earth And warm with life gives every flowret birth, See him muse lonely o'er the village green, And view with rapture each reviving scene, Snatch his quick pencil and with fervour trace "Transporting Nature in her wildest grace,* "The Tay meand'ring in his infant pride, "The palace rising on his verdant side, "The lawns wood-fring'd in Nature's simple taste, "The hillocks dropt in Nature's careless haste, "The arches striding o'er the running stream, "The village glittering in the noontide beam, "The sweeping theatre of hanging woods, "Th' incessant roar of headlong-tumbling floods." See him arouse his heaven-instructed lyre, And look through Nature, with creative fire! 291 of the Earl of Glencairn---his Vision---and the Petition of Bruar Water, will be lasting monuments of his talents. The history of this bard, written by Dr. Currie, and prefixed to his elegant edition of his works, is a composition extremely pleasing, and possesses biographical merit of the very first order. *The lines which are quoted, with little variation, are taken from Burns. |