APPENDIX.

This extract, as the preceding, is both pathetic and grand. It is one of the poems held in remembrance in its original language, by many in the north of Scotland, and is considered by them as uncommonly beautiful and affecting. The heroism and generosity of Fingal are finely contrasted with the fortitude of Orla, in misfortune. Fingal appears in all the glory of victory and in all the amiableness of humanity. Orla, sinking under a mortal wound while the thoughts of his spouse and the banks of Loda rushed upon his heart--still rises superior to his situation, and dies while Fingal bends over him in admiration.

The Germans have obtained an high literary character among the nations of Europe.-In the various departments of Science, in the diversified walks of Poesy they have produced several writers of eminence. In the roll of Genius, Gesner, Klopstock, Goethe, Wieland, Herder, Schiller and the author of Alf von Deulmen claim a distinguished place. Very few writers have possessed talents more versatile than those of Wieland. With the inquisitive Philosopher he has searched into the depths of science. In the gravity of Fiction he has travelled through the shades of mystery and of terror; and in indulgence to the spirit of Gaiety

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and Love he has wantoned on the wings of the most sportive fancy. His "Oberon" is a performance which discovers, in an eminent degree, the powers of Invention, and the elegance and fascination of narrative and description. Some portions of it should be condemned as licentious. It has been translated into English verse by Sotheby, who in the music of his numbers, in the variety and chasteness of his diction, and in the richness of his Imagery, is not excelled by any poet now living in England. From Oberon I have introduced among these illustrations the two following verses. They exhibit a picture which for boldness of conception and vivid colouring I have never seen surpassed. The Satan of Milton is not a sublimer Portrait.

XIV.

Plain on his noble aspect shone confest,
Grandeur beneath a cowl that mildly gleam'd;
His eye a smile on all creation beam'd.

And tho' the touch of time had gently prest
His neck, soft bow'd beneath the weight of years,
Sublimely rais'd to heaven his brow appears,
The shrine of peace; and like a sun-gilt height,
Where never earthly mist obscur'd the light,
Above the stormy world its tranquil summit rears.

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XV.

Time from his features long had wore away
The rust of earth and Passion's gloomy frown,
He would not stoop to grasp a falling crown,
Nor bend the sceptre of the world to sway.
Free from the vain desires that earth inthral,
Free from vain terrors that mankind appal,
Untouch'd by pain and unassail'd by fear
To Truth alone he turn'd his mental ear,
Alone to Nature tun'd and her sweet simple call.

These illustrations, with the observations connected with them have proceeded to a length so far beyond that which I expected; that I shall omit several passages, I had marked in other poets; and shall only further offer the following instances in prose.

"Truth is compared in scriptures to a streaming fountain; if her waters flow not in perpetual progression, they sicken into a muddy pool of conformity and tradition.

"Truth came once into our world with her divine master, and was a perfect shape, most glorious to look on: but when he ascended, and his disciples after him were laid asleep, then strait arose a wicked race of deceivers, who, as that story goes of the Egyptian Typhon, with his con

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spirators, how they dealt with the good Osiris, took the virgin Truth, hewed her lovely form into a thousand pieces, and scattered them to the four winds. From that time ever since, the sad friends of Truth, such as durst appear, imitating the careful search that Isis made for the mangled body of Osiris, went up and down gathering up limb by limb, still as they could find them. We have not yet found them all lords and commons, nor ever shall do, till her master's second coming; he shall bring together every joint and member, and shall mould them into an immortal feature of loveliness and perfection. Suffer not these licensing prohibitions to stand at every place of opportunity, forbidding and disturbing them that continue seeking, that continue to do our obsequies to the torn body of our martyred saint. We boast our light; but if we look not wisely on the sun itself it smites us into darkness. Who can discern those planets that are oft comcust, and those stars of brightest magnitude, that rise and set with the sun, until the opposite motion of their orbs, bring them to such a place in the firmament, where they may be seen evening or morning?

"Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation, rousing herself like a strong man after

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sleep, and shaking her invincible locks: methinks I see her as an eagle muing her mighty young, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam; purging and unscaling her long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance; while the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about amaz'd at what she means, and in their envious gabble, would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms."

Milton's Speech for the Liberty of unlicensed Printing.

"Wisdom hath always a good conscience attending it, that purest delight and richest cordial of the soul; that brazen wall and impregnable fortress against both external assaults, and internal commotions.

"If a fool prosper, the honour is attributed to propitious chance; if he miscarry, to his own ill management: but the entire glory of happy undertakings, crowns the head of wisdom; while the disgrace of unlucky events falls otherwhere. His light like that of the sun, cannot totally be eclipsed; it may be dimmed but never extinguished, and always maintains a day though over