SKETCH

OF THE

LIFE OF WILLIAM COWPER, ES

ESQ.

OF THE INNER TEMPLE.

WILLIAM COWPER was born at Berkhamstead, of spirits, into a state of great mental disorder. Herts, November 26, 1731. His father, the rec- At this period, he was led into a deep consideration tor of the parish, was the reverend John Cowper, of his religious state; and, having imbibed the D. D., son of Spencer Cowper, one of the justices doctrine of election and reprobation in its most apof the common pleas, a younger brother of the lord palling rigor, he was led to a very dismal state of chancellor Cowper. He received his early educa-apprehension. We are told, "that the terror of tion at a school in his native county, whence he eternal judgment overpowered and actually disorwas removed to that of Westminster. Here he dered his faculties; and he remained seven months adquired a competent portion of classical know-in a continual expectation of being instantly plungledge; but, from the delicacy of his temperament, ed into eternal misery." In this shocking condiand the timid shyness of his disposition, he seems tion, confinement became necessary, and he was to have endured a species of martyrdom from the placed in a receptacle for lunatics, kept by the rudeness and tyranny of his more robust compan- amiable and well-known doctor Cotton of St. Alions, and to have received, indelibly, the impres- ban's. At length, his mind recovered a degree of sions that subsequently produced his Tirocinium, serenity, and he retired to Huntingdon, where he in which poem his dislike to the system of public formed an acquaintance with the family of the education in England is very strongly stated. On reverend Mr. Unwin, which ripened into the strictleaving Westminster, he was articled, for three est intimacy. In 1773, he was again assailed by years, to an eminent attorney, during which time religious despondency, and endured a partial alienhe appears to have paid very little attention to his ation of mind for some years, during which afflicprofession; nor did he alter on this point after his tion he was highly indebted to the affectionate care entry at the Temple, in order to qualify himself of Mrs. Unwin. In 1778, he again recovered; in for the honourable and lucrative place of clerk to 1780, he was persuaded to translate some of the the house of lords, which post his family interest spiritual songs of the celebrated madame Guion. had secured for him. While he resided in the In the same and the following year, he was also inducTemple, he appears to have been rather gay and ed to prepare a volume of poems for the press, which social in his intercourse, numbering among his was printed in 1782. This volume did not attract companions Lloyd, Churchill, Thornton and Col- any great degree of public attention. The princiman, all of whom had been his companions at pal topics are, Error, Truth, Expostulation, Hope, Westminster school, and the two latter of whom Charity, Retirement and Conversation; all of which he assisted with some papers in the Connoisseur. are treated with originality, but, at the same time, His natural disposition, however, remained timid with a portion of religious austerity, which, withand diffident, and his spirits so constitutionally in-out some very striking recommendation, was not, firm, that, when the time arrived for his assuming at that time, of a nature to acquire popularity. the post to which he had been destined, he was thrown into such unaccountable terror at the idea of making his appearance before the assembled peemge, that he was not only obliged to resign the appointment, but was precipitated, by his agitation

They are in rhymed heroics; the style being rather strong than poetical, although never flat or insipid. A short time before the publication of this volume. Mr. Cowper became acquainted with lady Austen, widow of sir Robert Austen, who subsequently

resided, for some time, at the parsonage-house at ly a more accurate representation of Homer than Olney. To the influence of this lady, the world the version of Pope; but English blank verse can is indebted for the exquisitely humorous ballad of not sufficiently sustain the less poetical parts of John Gilpin, and the author's master-piece, the Homer, and the general effect is bald and prosaic. Task. The latter admirable poem chiefly occupi- Disappointed at the reception of this laborious ed his second volume, which was published in work, he meditated a revision of it, as also the su1785, and rapidly secured universal admiration. perintendence of an edition of Milton, and a new The Task unites minute accuracy with great ele-didactic poem, to be entitled the Four Ages; but, gance and picturesque beauty; and, after Thom- although he occasionally wrote a few verses, and son, Cowper is probably the poet who has added revised his Odyssey, amidst his glimmerings of most to the stock of natural imagery. The moral reason, those and all other undertakings finally reflections in this poem are also exceedingly im- gave way to a relapse of his malady. His disorpressive, and its delineation of character abounds der extended, with little intermission to the close in genuine nature. His religious system, too, al- of life; which, melancholy to relate, ended in a though discoverable, is less gloomily exhibited in state of absolute despair. In 1794, a pension of this than in his other productions. This volume 300l. per annum was granted him by the crown. also contained his Tirocinium-a piece strongly In the beginning of 1800, this gifted, but afflicted written, and abounding with striking observations, man of genius, exhibited symptoms of dropsy, whatever may be thought of its decision against which carried him off on the 25th of April followpublic education. About the year 1784, he began ing. Since his death, Cowper has, by the care his version of Homer, which, after many impedi- and industry of his friend and biographer, Hayments, appeared in July, 1791. This work pos- ley, become known to the world, as one of the most sesses much exactness, as to sense, and is certain-easy and elegant letter-writers on record.

To quell the faction, that affronts the throne,
By silent magnanimity alone;

To nurse with tender care the thriving arts;
Watch every beam Philosophy imparts;
To give Religion her unbridled scope,
Nor judge by statute a believer's hope;
With close fidelity and love unfeigned,
To keep the matrimonial bond unstained;
Covetous only of a virtuous praise;
His life a lesson to the land he sways;
To touch the sword with conscientious awe,
Nor draw it but when duty bids him draw;
To sheathe it in the peace-restoring close,
With joy beyond what victory bestows;-
Blest country, where these kingly glories shine!
Blest England, if this happiness be thine!

A. Guard what you say, the patriotic tribe
Will sneer, and charge you with a bribe-
B. A bribe?

The worth of his three kingdoms I defy,
To lure me to the baseness of a lie:
And, of all lies (be that one poet's boast,)
The lie that flatters I abhor the most.
Those arts be theirs, who hate his gentle reign;
But he that loves him has no need to feign.
A. Your smooth eulogium to one crown addrest,
Seems to imply a censure on the rest.

B. Quevedo, as he tells his sober tale,
Asked, when in hell, to see the royal jail;
Approved their method in all other things:
But where, good sir, do you confine your kings?
There- said his guide-the group is full in view.
Indeed?-replied the don-there are but few.
His black interpreter the charge disdained-
Few, fellow?—there are all that ever reigned.
Wit, undistinguishing, is apt to strike
The guilty and not guilty both alike:
I grant the sarcasm is too severe,
And we can readily refute it here;
While Alfred's name, the father of his age,
And the sixth Edward's grace th' historic page.
A. Kings then, at last, have but the lot of all:
By their own conduct they must stand or fall.
B. True. While they live, the courtly laureat
pays

His quitrent ode, his peppercorn of praise;
And many a dunce, whose fingers itch to write,
Adds, as he can, his tributary mite.

A subject's faults a subject may proclaim,
A monarch s errors are forbidden game!
Thus, free from censure, overawed by fear,
And praised for virtues that they scorn to wear,
The fleeting forms of majesty engage
Respect, while stalking o'er life's narrow stage;
Then leave their crimes for history to scan.
And ask, with busy scorn, was this the man?
I pity kings, whom Worship waits upon
Obsequious from the cradle to the throne;

|Before whose infant eyes the flatterer bows,
And binds a wreath about their baby brows;
Whom Education stiffens into state,
And Death awakens from that dream too late.
Oh! if Servility, with supple knees,
Whose trade it is to smile, to crouch, to please;
If smooth Dissimulation, skilled to grace
A devil's purpose with an angel's face;
If smiling peeresses, and simpering peers,
Encompassing his throne a few short years;
If the gilt carriage and the pampered steed,
That wants no driving, and disdains the lead;
If guards, mechanically formed in ranks,
Playing, at beat of drum, their martial pranks,
Shouldering and standing as if struck to stone,
While condescending majesty looks on!
If monarchy consist in such base things,
Sighing, I say again, I pity kings!

To be suspected, thwarted, and withstood,
E'en when he labours for his country's good;
To see a band called patriot for no cause,
But that they catch at popular applause,
Careless of all th' anxiety he feels,
Hook disappointment on the public wheels;
With all their flippant fluency of tongue,
Most confident when palpably most wrong;
If this be kingly, then farewell for me
All kingship; and may I be poor and free!
To be the table talk of clubs up-stairs,
To which th' unwashed artificer repairs,
T'indulge his genius after long fatigue,
By diving into cabinet intrigue;

(For what kings deem a toil, as well they may,
To him is relaxation and mere play;)

To win no praise when well-wrought plans prevail
But to be rudely censured when they fail;
To doubt the love his favourites may pretend,
And in reality to find no friend;

If he indulge a cultivated taste,

His galleries with the works of art well graced,
To hear it called extravagance and waste;
If these attendants, and if such as these,
Must follow royalty, then welcome ease;
However humbled and confined the sphere,
Happy the state that has not these to fear.
A. Thus men, whose thoughts contemplative
have dwelt

On situations that they never felt,

Start up sagacious, covered with the dust,
Of dreaming study and pedantic rust,
And prate and preach about what others prove,
As if the world and they were hand and glove.
Leave kingly backs to cope with kingly cares;
They have their weight to carry, subjects theirs,
Poets, of all men, ever least regret
Increasing taxes and the nation's debt.
Could you contrive the payment, and rehearse
The mighty plan, oracular, in verse,

No bard, howe'er majestic, old or new,
Should claim my fixed attention more than you.
B. Not Brindley nor Bridgewater would essay
To turn the course of Helicon that way;
Nor would the Nine consent the sacred tide
Should purl amidst the traffic of Cheapside,
Or tinkle in 'Change Alley, to amuse
The leathern ears of stockjobbers and Jews.

A. Vouchsafe, at least, to pitch the key of rhyme
To themes more pertinent, if less sublime.
When ministers and ministerial arts;
Patriots, who love good places at their hearts;
When admirals, extolled for standing still,
Or doing nothing with a deal of skill;
Gen'rals, who will not conquer when they may,
Firm friends to peace, to pleasure, and good pay;
When Freedom, wounded almost to despair,
Though Discontent alone can find out where;
When themes like these employ the poet's tongue,
I hear as mute as if a syren sung.

Or tell me, if you can, what power maintains,
A Briton's scorn of arbitrary chains:
That were a theme might animate the dead,
And move the lips of poets cast in lead.

|

Is alwas happy, reign whoever may,
And laughs the sense of misery far away.
He drinks his simple beverage with a gust;
And, feasting on an onion and a crust,
We never feel th' alacrity and joy

With which he shouts and carols Vive la Roi,
Filled with as much true merriment and glee,
As if he heard his king say-Slave, be free.

Thus happiness depends, as Nature shows,
Less on exterior things than most suppose,
Vigilant over all that he has made,
Kind Providence attends with gracious aid;
Bids equity throughout his works prevail,
And weighs the nations in an even scale;
He can encourage Slavery to a smile,
And fill with discontent a British isle.

A. Freeman, and slave then, if the case be such,
Stand on a level; and you prove too much:
If all men indiscriminately share
His fostering power, and tutelary care,
As well be yoked by Despotism's hand,

As dwell at large in Britain's chartered land.
B. No. Freedom has a thousand charms to
show,

B. The cause, tho' worth the search, may yet That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.

elude

Conjecture and remark, however shrewd.
They take perhaps a well-directed aim,
Who seek it in his climate and his frame.
Liberal in all things else, yet Nature here
With stern severity deals out the year,
Winter invades the spring, and often pours
A chilling flood on summer's drooping flowers;
Unwelcome vapeurs quench autumnal beams,
Ungenial blasts attending curl the streams:
The peasants urge their harvest, ply the fork
With double toil, and shiver at their work;
Thus with a rigour for his good designed,
She rears her favourite man of all mankind.
His form robust and of elastic tone,
Proportioned well, half muscle and half bone,
Supplies with warm activity and force

A mind well lodged, and masculine of course.
Hence Liberty, sweet Liberty inspires
And keeps alive his fierce but noble fires.
Patient of constitutional control,

He bears it with meek manliness of soul;
But if Authority grow wanton, wo
To him that treads upon his free-born toe;
One step beyond the boundary of the laws
Fires him at once in Freedom's glorious cause.
Thus proud Prerogative, not much revered,
Is seldom felt, though sometimes seen and heard;
And in his cage, like parrot fine and gay,
Is kept to strut, look big, and talk away.

Born in a climate softer far than ours,

Not formed, like us, with such Herculean powers,
The Frenchman, easy, debonair, and brisk,
Give him his lass, his fiddle, and his frisk,

The mind attains beneath her happy reign,
The growth, that Nature meant she should attain;
The varied fields of science, ever new,
Opening and wider opening on her view,
She ventures onward with a prosperous force,
While no base fear impedes her in her course.
Religion, richest favour of the skies,
Stands most revealed before the freeman's eyes;
No shades of superstition blot the day,
Liberty chases all that gloom away:
The soul emancipated, unopprest,
Free to prove all things, and hold fast the best,
Learns much; and to a thousand listening minds
Communicates with joy the good she finds:
Courage in arms, and ever prompt to show
His manly forehead to the fiercest foe;
Glorious in war, but for the sake of peace,
His spirits rising as his toils increase,
Guards well what arts and industry have won,
And Freedom claims him for her first-born son.
Slaves fight for what were better cast away-
The chains that binds them, and a tyrant's sway'
But they that fight for freedom, undertake
The noblest cause mankind can have at stake:
Religion, virtue, truth, whate'er we call
A blessing-freedom is the pledge of all.
O Liberty! the prisoner's pleasing dream,
The poet's muse, his passion, and his theme;
Genius is thine, and thou art Fancy's nurse:
Lost without th' ennobling powers of verse;
Heroic song from thy free touch acquires
Its clearest tone, the rapture it inspires:
Place me where Winter breathes his keenest air,
And I will sing, if Liberty be there;