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918 W272 v, 3

SECOND EDITION.

JOSEPH ADDISON.

[JOSEPH ADDISON was born on the 1st of May, 1672. His first English poem was an address to Dryden on the publication of the latter's Translations of Ovid. This was written in his twenty-second year. In 1694 he published, in one of Dryden's Miscellanies, his Account of the Principal English Poets; in 1695 appeared his Address to King William. Having obtained a pension of £300 to enable him to travel. he visited the continent, and in 1701 wrote his Letter from Italy to Lord Halifax. When Godolphin in 1704 was in search of a poet to celebrate in an adequate manner the victory of Blenheim, Halifax directed him to Addison, who in answer to the Treasurer's application produced The Campaign, and obtained as a reward the post of Under-Secretary of State. His opera Rosamond was performed in 1706. In 17c9 The Tatler began to appear, and The Spectator in 1711. Addison's tragedy of Cato was brought out in 1713. He also wrote Prologues and Epilogues to various plays; among others the Prologue to The Tender Husband and the Epilogue to Lord Lansdowne's British Enchanters. He died on the 17th of June, 1719.]

No English poet illustrates more vividly than Addison the truth of the principle, 'Poeta nascitur non fit.' Possessed of an inimitable prose style, which makes him the most graceful of all social satirists, the creator of Sir Roger de Coverley rarely succeeds, as a poet, in impressing us with the sense-the true touchstone of poetical art-that what he is saying is expressed better in verse than it could be expressed in prose. Nor is this to be attributed to the comparatively prosaic nature of the subjects he undertakes. Dryden, Pope, and Goldsmith write on themes which seem unpropitious when compared with the materials of the Elizabethan poets; but the best work of these three poets is, in its class, first-rate; Addison's work is never more than second-rate. Account of the Principal English Poets is just but tame; he probably wrote it in metre merely because Roscommon had done something of the same kind before him; at any rate, by the side of the animated judgments of Pope in his Epistle to Augustus, his historical survey of English poetry seems flat and languid. His VOL. III.

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His

Letter from Italy is certainly his most successful composition; but those who compare it with Goldsmith's Traveller will be chiefly struck with the different degrees of fertility a somewhat Darren subject may exhibit when treated by an ordinary versifier and a master of poetical design. The same is true of Addison's complimentary verse compared with that of Pope. Poems of this kind are seldom very sincere ; but some of Pope's noblest lines of raise were addressed to the not very noble Earl of Oxford. Whether or no Pope really felt as he pretended, he seemned at east to write with ardour, but the style of Addison's panegyrics ›n King William III is as artificial as the sentiments by which hey were prompted. His sole conception of poetical compliment s hyperbole. When, for instance, he wishes to excuse himself for in inadequate celebration of William's heroic prowess, he says hat, as Troy had perished long before Homer appeared, so perlaps some mighty bard may lie hid in futurity to write an Iliad ›n the Battle of the Boyne, when that river shall have ceased to low. If he seeks to represent the terrors of Algiers and Tunis inder the British attack, he says—

'Fain from the neighbouring dangers would they run,

And wish themselves much nearer to the sun.'

We see in such a conceit the evil influence of Dryden; but the arge opulence of thought and the noble diction with which Dryden toned for his extravagances are wanting in his pupil.

Yet with all Addison's deficiencies in poetical genius, his fine aste and blameless character were not without their effect on the course of our poetry. He never, like Dryden, prostituted his Muse o utterly unworthy objects; if his poetry is not free from ‘courtly tains,' it is at least animated by a genuine love of freedom; and is lines on Liberty are a fine expression of the Whig spirit of the times. The Campaign was called by Warton, not unjustly, 'gazette in rhyme'; the epic style however seems to have been considered indispensable to the subject; and allowing for this preiminary condition, Addison deserves credit for having depicted he character of his hero with some loftiness and dignity.

Addison's versification is pure though not vigorous; his treatnent of the heroic couplet, in its antithesis and careful selection of epithet, marks the period of transition between the large and lowing style of Dryden and the compressed energy of Pope. W. J. COURTHOPE.

THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY.

[From the Letter from Italy.]

Oh Liberty, thou goddess heav'nly bright,
Profuse of bliss and pregnant with delight!
Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign,
And smiling Plenty leads thy wanton train;
Eas'd of her load, Subjection grows more light,
And Poverty looks cheerful in thy sight;
Thou mak'st the gloomy face of nature gay,
Giv'st beauty to the sun and pleasure to the day.
Thee, goddess, thee Britannia's isle adores :
How has she oft exhausted all her stores,
How oft in fields of death thy presence sought,
Nor thinks the mighty prize too dearly bought !
On foreign mountains may the sun refine
The grape's soft juice and mellow it to wine,
With citron groves adorn a distant soil,
And the fat olive swell with floods of oil:
We envy not the warmer clime, that lies

In ten degrees of more indulgent skies,
Nor at the coarseness of our heav'n repine,

Though o'er our heads the frozen Pleiads shine:

'Tis Liberty that crowns Britannia's isle

And makes her barren rocks and her bleak mountains smile.

Others with tow'ring piles may please the sight

And in their proud aspiring domes delight:

A nicer touch to the stretch'd canvass give,

Or teach their animated rocks to live:

'Tis Britain's care to watch o'er Europe's fate And hold in balance each contending state,

To threaten bold presumptuous kings with war,
And answer her afflicted neighbours' pray'r.

The Dane and Swede rous'd up by fierce alarms,
Bless the wise conduct of her pious arms :
Soon as her fleets appear their terrors cease,
And all the northern world lies hush'd in peace.

MARLBOROUGH AT BLENHEIM.

[From The Campaign.]

Behold, in awful march and dread array
The long extended squadrons shape their way!
Death, in approaching terrible, imparts
An anxious horror to the bravest hearts;
Yet do their beating breasts demand the strife,
And thirst of glory quells the love of life.
No vulgar fears can British minds control
Heat of revenge, and noble pride of soul,
O'erlook the foe, advantag'd by his post,
Lessen his numbers, and contract his host:
Though fens and floods possess'd the middle space,
That unprovok'd they would have fear'd to pass,
Nor fens nor floods can stop Britannia's bands,
When her proud foe rang'd on their borders stands.
But O, my muse, what numbers wilt thou find
To sing the furious troops in battle join'd!
Methinks I hear the drum's tumultuous sound,
The victor's shouts and dying groans confound,
The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies,
And all the thunder of the battle rise.
'Twas then great Marlbro's mighty soul was prov'd,
That, in the shock of charging hosts unmov'd,
Amidst confusion, horror, and despair,
Examin'd all the dreadful scenes of war;

In peaceful thought the field of death survey'd,
To fainting squadrons sent the timely aid,

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