Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, August, 1880

His eye, as it ranges through boundless infinity,Finds the chief work of God the master of Trinity.

William Cowper. By Goldwin Smith. (English-Men-of-Letters Series.) New York: Harper & Brothers.

Much thoughtful and sympathetic criticism has been written on the life and writings of Cowper, without any new facts being brought to light or any decided progress made. His character reveals itself and his life is minutely recorded in his correspondence; but the few points which his letters leave unexplained still remain obscure after long search and study. The question of his rupture with Lady Austen, for instance, is just where Hayley left it. His poems present elements so apparently irreconcilable that, while their qualities are universally recognized, their place in literature is still an unsettled one. The reader of The Task may ask himself in one breath whether it is poetry at all, or whether it be not great poetry. There is no trace of the instinctive poetic utterance of bards such as Shelley and Keats, but there is a constant appeal to the strongest and most elementary human feelings, rarely met with in any but the greatest works of art. It was never Cowper's fate to be exposed to that brilliant but unsympathetic criticism which is the most short-sighted kind. No comprehension of him can be got without bringing in feeling as a factor of judgment, and it would not be singular if the moral beauty of his verse should blind readers to its artistic faults. As a matter of fact, however, the tendency now-a-days is to exaggerate Cowper's position rather than his qualities, and this arises not from warmth of feeling, but from hasty dogmatizing. There is a marked difference between The Task and any poem preceding it, but the distance from The Task to The Excursion is still wider. The resemblance to Wordsworth in the former poem is tolerably superficial: it is a likeness with a difference. Cowper was the observer, not the priest, of Nature, watching her minutely and tenderly, but with none of Wordsworth's passion. The finest passages in The Task are wholly descriptive, and of description pure and simple there is very little in Wordsworth's writings. Neither is there any strong proof of Cowper's influence in the work of his successor, though the influence felt most strongly by each was the same—that of Milton. When M. Taine speaks of the revolution effected by Cowper as one of style, when Mr. Lowell characterizes Wordsworth's blank verse as "essentially the blank verse of Cowper," those eminent critics agree in exalting Cowper above his age at the very point where he is most closely bound to it. In sentiment he made a certain advance toward Wordsworth, though on a lower plane, but in diction he is distinctly of the eighteenth century. His style is often as artificial as that of any of its rhymesters: it is full of inversions, freighted with long, formal words, and still more marred by others of a false dilettante ring. Wordsworth would never have spoken of "embellished Nature," "embroidered banks," or applied the word "elegant" to a rose, any more than he would have used "lubricity" or "stercoraceous" in verse.

Yet, formal as Cowper's language often is, narrow as are the ideas which take up a large part of his writings, the essence of his poetry is its truth. A false note in feeling he seldom struck, and the most artificial language cannot hinder his lines from going direct to the heart. The high-water mark of his genius was reached in two or three poems in which the words are in full harmony with the thought and reflect it limpidly, with no attempt at the "embellishment" which he too frequently employed.

In a book designed to introduce the subject to many readers we could have wished for a little more sympathy of tone than Mr. Goldwin Smith has allowed himself in his otherwise admirable volume. It is hardly necessary, for instance, to insist on the obvious narrowness of Cowper's religion. That the book is too short is a failing on the right side, and chargeable to the plan of the series rather than the writer, whose terse style and excellent arrangement make it full of interest. Cowper's life and poetry are bound together in a singularly close union. He belongs by circumstances rather than by genius to those unfortunate minds which, thrown off the proper balance, have gained a deeper insight and a stronger hold upon others through their very weakness. What lends a peculiar pathos and charm to his figure is the purity and gentleness of his mind, the efforts by which he clung to truth in the cruel darkness of mental disease, and the innocent gayety and light-heartedness which alternated with gloom. Like Rousseau, Cowper had, by the very reaction from sadness, a rare keenness of enjoyment. Little things were enough to feast it, and hence the most trivial matters came naturally into his verse. His poems have certainly had a varied history. Written to afford occupation to a mind on the verge of madness, linked with the slightest events of his daily life, it has been their fate to serve for a long time as poetic tracts, and afterward to be exalted by critics as prophecies of a new order of things, the beginning of a literary revolution.

Books Received

Barbara; or, Splendid Misery. By Miss M.E. Braddon.—For Her Dear Sake. By Mary Cecil Hay.—Daireen. By Frank Frankfort Moore.—Two Women. By Georgiana M. Craik.—Prince Hugo. By Maria M. Grant.—From Generation to Generation: A Novel. By Lady Augusta Noel.—Young Lord Penrith: A Novel. By John Berwick Harwood.—Clara Vaughan: A Novel. By R.D. Blackmore.—The Heart of Holland. By Henry Havard. Translated by Mrs. Cashel Hoey.—Reata: What's in a Name? A Novel. By E.D. Gerard.—Mary Anerley: A Yorkshire Tale. By R.D. Blackmore.—Poet and Peer: A Novel. By Hamilton Aidé.—The Pennant Family. By Anne Beale. (Franklin Square Library.) New York: Harper & Brothers.

The Diary of a Man of Fifty, and A Bundle of Letters. By Henry James, Jr.—Tales from the Odyssey, for Boys and Girls. By "Materfamilias."—Life of Charlemagne. By Eginhard.—The Right Honorable William Ewart Gladstone: A Biographical Sketch. By Henry W. Lucy. With Portrait.—British and American Education. By Mayo W. Hazeltine.—Mrs. Austin. By Margaret Veley.—Business Life in Ancient Rome. By Charles G. Herbermann, Ph.D. (Harper's Half-Hour Series.) New York: Harper & Brothers.

The Spell-bound Fiddler: A Norse Romance. By Kristofer Janson. Translated from the original by Auber Forestier. Chicago: S.C. Griggs & Co.

Studies of Irving. By Charles Dudley Warner, William Cullen Bryant and George Palmer Putnam. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons.

Sketches and Studies in Southern Europe. By John Addington Symonds. 2 vols. New York: Harper & Brothers.

Eminent Israelites of the Nineteenth Century. By Henry Samuel Morais. Philadelphia: Edward Stern & Co.

The Throat and its Functions. By Louis Elsberg, A.M., M.D. Illustrated. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons.

The Independent Movement in New York. By Junius. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons.

Preadamites. By Alexander Winchell, M.D. Chicago: S.C. Griggs & Co.

Ethylization. By R.J. Levis, M.D. Philadelphia.

1

In hunting dialect the warning "'ware" or "beware" is shortened to "war'," as in the old advice, "War' horse, war' hound, war' heel!"

2

On a scorching day in July I visited Susquehanna to obtain an authentic narrative from several parties who were eye-witnesses of the events which they related. At the residence of Mrs. Elizabeth Squires I found both herself and Mrs. Sally McKune, the widow of Joseph McKune. Mrs. Squires is considerably over seventy, and Mrs. McKune is about eighty, years of age. Both these ladies lived in the neighborhood at the time of the Smith manifestations. The statement given above with regard to the digging for treasure is that of Mrs. McKune, supplemented by Mrs. Squires. Jacob J. Skinner, the present owner of the farm, was about sixteen years old at the time of the search. For a number of years he has been engaged in filling the holes with stone to protect his cattle, but the boys still use the north-east hole as a swimming-pond in the summer.

3

Among the callers was Samuel Brush, now a vigorous man of seventy-five, who carries on a large farm and a lumber-mill three miles south-west of Susquehanna. At the time of the translation he often called Reuben Hale away from his work, and the pair went for a walk. Reuben also explained the phenomenon of the peek-stone on the theory of "deflected light." Mr. Brush declares that Martin Harris was a believer in "second sight," and that "Smith was a good and kind neighbor"—testimony which is also given by Mrs. McKune, Mrs. Squires and Mr. Skinner.

4

A note of inquiry has elicited from this sole survivor of the original "three witnesses" the information that he has this manuscript. Perhaps he may yet startle the Mormon world by publishing a facsimile edition of the original "translation."

5

Among other beliefs in regard to lightning is that of the upward stroke. It has even found expression in the American Journal of Science and Arts. On careful consideration of the cases offered in support, both printed and unprinted, I find that every one is susceptible of a reasonable explanation without this theory.

6

It is not usual that the body of moisture can be reached so near the surface, but this magazine is situated on low ground.