evinced a nobler disposition, and less prejudice and rancour than you have shown; even now if, omitting personal insults, gross exaggerations, undeserved aspersions, you would bring to the task as much acuteness as you please, but no bitterness, no turning, a step beyond decorum, into attempts to COMMIT A RAPE, I would meet you.

That a word has appeared, from which you might suppose I alluded with disrespect to your situation in life, I regret—indictum id volo-but allusions to the private life of a retired clergyman, in which he is held out almost as a crazy hypochondriac, is not criticism, but "railling." Your manner of speaking on the subject of personal allusions is manly; and, as you are not the writer of the article in the Quarterly, which many besides myself think, in two or three passages, to look like both " railing and raving," and perso nally insulting, I assure you, that the passage in the Pamphleteer, which will be thought objectionable, particularly if your first aggression is not considered, shall be left out when the copies of my defence are printed separately. And, if you could as readily be brought to admit that many reflections on me have been far from just, that some representations were not warranted, some language personally irritating, hardly reconcileable with the acknowledged courtesies of literary discussion or fair criticism, then the hope might not be in vain, that whatever I have advanced concerning Pope might be discussed without acrimony, of which, though I have replied to you, in a manner, I think, you deserve, I can confidently affirm I have none; you would find my acknowledgment of any fault committed, either to the living or the dead, would be as "AMPLE," and I should regret it was ever occasioned. And so, I bid you farewell for the present, till I speak of your other answer!

I shall take a glance at that when these sheets are printed. In the mean time, I turn to my original task of discussing the article in the Quarterly Review. Thus then we com

mence:

Dr. Warton had declared, or, according to the phraseology of this critic, Joseph Warton had the " MERIT of first declaring of Pope, that he did not think him at the head of his profession, and that his species of poetry was not the most excellent one of

the art."

Nothing can be more clearly expressed. This is Warton's opinion, and this is mine; and this opinion I have_supported in the Principles of Poetry; and this opinion I think I can easily defend (though I believe that so defined it will be generally admitted) against Doctor Johnson, Mr. Campbell, and this critic. But first, as to what Dr., or, (if the writer pleases,) "Samuel" Johnson, has to say against it:

"Johnson, interrogating this critic," that is, Samuel Johnson interrogating Joseph Warton, inquired, "If Pope BE NOT A POET, where is POETRY to be found?" Reader, mark the logical consequence,

"To circumscribe poetry by a definition will only show the narrowness of the definer." "If Pope be not a poet, where is poetry to be found?" Now, suppose Dr. Warton had said, "the song of the lark is not the most excellent; for, melodious as it is, it yields in variety, and compass, and richness, to the song of the nightingale!" would any one, of common sense, think it an answer, to be told, that " if the LARK be not a singing bird, where is a singing bird to be found," when its song was admitted to be only inferior to that of the nightingale ?

Such is the Doctor's logic! just as decisive of the point at issue, and just as much to the purpose!

"Aye! but such a definer," adds the critic, " arose in the disciple of Warton, the Rev. W. L. Bowles, who has distinguished himself in this IDLE controversy." Now, such a definer did not arise in W. L. B. He was not so absurd as to attempt "circumscribing" poetry, to ONE species, and to that ONE SPECIES ALONE! He never thought, and never implied he thought, that Pope was not a poet, or that any definition would exclude him from a most high order; but, when vague claims were made, as they now are, respecting his absolute supremacy in the art-not his Jine of art the Rev. W. L. Bowles thought, and does think, with his master, not that Pope was not a poet, a poet the most finished and most excellent in his order, but that his order was not the highest in poetry.

I must here also observe, that I did not enter into this" idle controversy" voluntarily, but was forced into it, in the first place, by Mr. Campbell's totally misrepresenting my statements.

I proceed to consider the other authority which this critic advances, namely, that of Mr. Campbell, for whose opinions on any subject, none has greater respect than myself. The sentence in which the authority of his name is produced is this:

"Mr. Bowles opens his observations on the poetic character of Pope, with two regular propositions: that IMAGES drawn from what is SUBLIME or BEAUTIFUL in Nature are MORE poetical, (PER SE, in the original, that is, ABSTRACTEDLY) than images drawn from art, and that passions are more adapted to poetry than

This is my proposition, which I think unanswerable, and I am obliged to the writer for being so far fair, in this one instance, as not to leave out the latter part of the sentence. This is my position, and I think it unanswered and unanswerable.

For the sake of clearness, I shall restate the grounds of my opinions..

"All images drawn from what is BEAUTIFUL or SUBLIME in the WORKS of NATURE, are more beautiful and sublime than any images drawn from art, and they are therefore, PER SE, (abstractedly) more poetical! In like manner, those PASSIONS of the human heart, which belong to NATURE in general, are 'per se' more adapted to the higher species of poetry than those derived from INCIDENTAL and transient manners!"

I have not Mr. Campbell's Speciniens at hand, and as I am now answering the critic in the Quarterly Review who brings the passage against me, I must take the words before me.

"Mr. Campbell judges, that the exquisite description of artificial objects and manners is NOT LESS-(than what? not LESS POETICAL than exquisite descriptions of nature! No such thing;) —EXQUISITE DESCRIPTIONS of artificial objects are not less CHARACTERISTIC of GENIUS than the description of simple physical appearances!!"

In the first place, Campbell never knew I had spoken of "passions," as the most essential part of the higher order of poetry : he took his opinions at second-hand, from the Edinburgh Review. The critic here confines himself to the first part of my proposition. Instead of answering even this part, he says, the "exquisite description" of works of art is not less characteristic of genius than descriptions of simple PHYSICAL APPEARANCES! Doubtless; but one half, and that the most essential, of my proposition, is entirely omitted, and the other half mistaken. Why all this veering in the critic of the Quarterly? Why not take the plain words of the proposition, and answer "negatur ?"

Without talking of "exquisite description" of arts, as "characteristic of genius," will any one deny, that" images, drawn from what is SUBLIME OF BEAUTIFUL in the WORKS of NATURE, are MORE beautiful and sublime than any images drawn from art, and therefore, per se, abstractedly, MORE POETICAL?" Will this critic deny this? Then, why confound the proposition, by talking of "characteristics of genius?"

I used the words per se, designedly, to show that, let works of art be as sublime or beautiful as they might, images drawn from what is SUBLIME OF BEAUTIFUL in NATURE, that is, from the great and beautiful works of the Almighty, are MORE so, and therefore more poetical.

What would be the most exquisite description of Mr. Campbell's ship, abstractedly, as a poetical object, in comparison

This is an axiom, not a "6 theory."

with the description of the same ship, in conjunction with the elements of nature? This I have shown; nor have I said any thing as to the point whether the "exquisite description" of this object or of that, is "most characteristic of genius!" I spoke of the invariable principles of poetry. An "exquisite" painting on a snuff-box may be, for aught I have said to the contrary, as characteristic of genius, so far as exquisite skill goes, in that line; but the most exquisite skill in that line cannot make a painter so eminent in all that relates to the higher orders of his art, as the cartoons conceived by the genius, and EXECUTED by the hand of a Raphael!

I turn from Dr. Johnson and Mr. Campbell to my critic. I will show more fairness to him than he has shown to me, by transcribing, word for word, not "splitting sentences," the whole luminous passage in which he displays so triumphantly his consummate analytical powers of philosophy and criticism. Let us put on our spectacles.

"It is clear to us that a theory, which frequently admitting every "thing the votary of Pope could desire, to substantiate the high ge“nius of his master, yet terminates in excluding the poet from 'the highest order of poets,' must involve some fallacy; and this we presume we have discovered in the absurd attempt to raise 'a cri"terion of poetical talents.' Such an artificial test is repugnant to "the man of taste who can take enlarged views, and to the experience of the true critic. In the contrast of human tempers and "habits, in the changes of circumstances in society, and the consequent mutations of tastes, the objects of poetry may be different "in different periods; pre-eminent genius obtains its purpose by its adaptation to this eternal variety; and on this principle, if we "would justly appreciate the creative faculty, we cannot see why "Pope should not class, at least in file, with Dante, or Milton. It is probable that Pope could not have produced an 'Inferno,' or Paradise Lost,' for his invention was elsewhere: but it is equally probable that Dante and Milton, with their cast of mind, "could not have so exquisitely touched the refined gaiety of the Rape of the Lock.'

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"It has frequently been attempted to raise up such arbitrary "standards and such narrowing theories of art; and these crite"rions' and invariable principles' have usually been drawn from "the habitual practices and individual tastes of the framers; they are a sort of concealed egotism, a stratagem of self-love. When "Mr. Bowles informs us that one of the essential qualities of a poet' is to have an eye attentive to and familiar with,' (for so "he strengthens his canons of criticism) 'every external appearance "of nature, every change of season, every variation of light and "shade, every rock, every tree, every leaf, every diversity of hue,

"&c.;' we all know who the poet is that Mr. Bowles so fondly de"scribes.' 'Here, Pope,' he adds, 'from infirmities and from phy"sical causes was particularly deficient.' In artificial life, 'he per"fectly succeeded;' how minute in his description when he describes "what he is master of! for instance, the game of ombre in the 66 Rape of the Lock.-If he had been gifted with the same powers of observing outward nature, I have no doubt he would have " exhibited as much accuracy in describing the appropriate beauties "of the forest where he lived, as he was able to describe in a manner so novel and with colors so vivid a game of cards.' It hap"pened, however, that Pope preferred in-door to out-door nature; "but did this require inferior skill or less of the creative faculty than "Mr. Bowles's Nature? In Pope's artificial life we discover a great deal of nature; and in Mr. Bowles's nature, or poetry, we **find much that is artificial. On this absurd principle of definition "and criterion, Mr. Wordsworth, who is often by genius so true a poet, is by his theory so mistaken a one. Darwin too ascertained "that the invariable principle of poetry,' or, in his own words, "the essence of poetry, was picture.' This was a convenient prin"ciple for one whose solitary talent lay in the minute pencillings "of his descriptions; and the idea was instantly adopted as being so consonant to nature, and to Alderman Boydell, that our author"painters now asserted that if the excellence of a poem consisted "in forming a picture, the more perfect poetry would be painting "itself:-in consequence of this invariable principle of poetry,' "Mr. Shee, in his brilliant Rhymes on Art' declared that 'the "narrative of an action is not comparable to the action itself before the eyes, and Barry ardently exclaimed, that' painting is poetry realised!' To detract from what itself is excellent, by "parallels with another species of excellence, or by trying it by "some arbitrary criterion, will ever terminate, as here, in false cri"ticism and absurd depreciation."-Quarterly Review.

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I beg the reader attentively to peruse this passage, which is so luminous, in comparison of my "mystic dreams," and which exhibits such powers of logical and accurate discrimination. I might say, as Chillingworth did, when he heard that Knox, the Jesuit, was engaged in controversy against him,

Si Pergama dextra

Defendi possent, etiam hac defensa videbo !

. Having let my lucid annotator speak for himself, I proceed to set before the reader the whole of my positions, which he has garbled so dishonorably.

I had in view only descriptive poets, and of these, particularly, Thomson and Cowper! so that there was no "concealed egotism" in the matter.