from which the mild radiance of returning peace looked down-that he should have bent over the slumbering infant, until his imagination wandered from the innocence of earth to the purity of heaven-that he should have contemplated female beauty in its loveliest, holiest form, and then by a slight transition, passed in amongst the angelic choir, and tuned his harp to celebrate its praise, where beauty is the least of the attributes of excellence-in fine, that he should have bathed in the fount of nature, and tasted of the springs of feeling at their different sources, choosing out the sweetest, the purest, and the most invigorating, for the delight of mankind, and the perpetual refreshment of his own soul. has been possessed, in an eminent degree, of the faculty of receiving and remembering impressions. IMAGINATION. IMAGINATION is the next qualification essential in the poetic art. As a faculty, imagination is called creative, because it forms new images out of materials with which impression has stored the mind, and multiplies such images to an endless variety by abstracting from them some of their qualities, and adding others of a different nature; but that imagination does not actually create original and simple ideas, is clear, from the fact that no man by the utmost stretch of his rational faculties, by intense thought, or by indefatigable study, can imagine a new sense, a new passion, or a new creature. Imagination, therefore, holds the same relation to impression, as the finished picture does to the separate colours with which the artist works. Judiciously blended, these colours produce all the different forms and tints observable in the visible world; and by arranging and combining ideas previously impressed upon the mind, and shaping out such combinations into distinct characters, imagination produces all the splendid imagery by which the poet delights and astonishes mankind. When he describes an object new to his readers, it is seldom new to himself, or if new as a whole, it is familiar in its separate parts. If for instance he sings the praises of maternal love, he refers As in society it is impossible to know whether any particular language has been learned until we hear it spoken, so it would be difficult to single out individual instances of the existence or the absense of deep impressions; because a mind may be fully endowed with this first principle of poetry, and yet without the proper medium for making it perceptible to others, we may consequently never be aware of the presence of such a capability even where it does exist. It will, however, eminently qualify the possessor for feeling and admiring poetry, and thus it is but fair to suppose, that there are many individuals undistinguished in the multitude, who possess this faculty in the same degree as the most celebrated poet, but who for want of some or all of the three remaining requisites, have never been able to bring their faculty to light. Where, amongst the four requisites for writing poetry, this alone is wanting, however highly cultivated the mind of the writer may be, and how-to the memory of his own mother, and the ever mature his judgment, this single deficiency will have the effect of rendering his poetry monotonous and unimpressive, even where it is, critically speaking, free from faults; because it is impossible that he should be able to convey to others clear or forcible ideas of what he has never felt clearly or forcibly himself. Dr. Johnson was a poet of this description; and on the other hand, instead of pointing out instances, we have no hesitation in asserting that every man who has written impressively, ingeniously, powerfully, and with good taste, strong impression left upon his mind, by her solicitude and watchful care-if the song of the nightingale, he recalls the long summer nights, ere forgetfulness had become a blessing, when to listen was more happy than to sleep-if the northern wind, he hears again the hollow roar amongst the leafless boughs, that was wont to draw in the domestic circle around his father's hearth-if the woodland music of the winding stream, he knows its liquid voice by the rivulet in which he bathed his infant feet-if the tender offices of friendship, he has enjoyed them too feelingly to forget their influence upon the soul-or if the anguish of the broken heart, who has not the transcript of sorrow written even on the earliest page of life? These are instances in which the poet draws immediately from experience, and where his task is only to transmit to others the impression made upon his own mind; but there are other cases where the idea conveyed is derived from a combination of impressions, and this is more exclusively the work of imagination. The poet who has never seen a lion may use the image of one in his verses, with almost as much precision as the poet who has; because he knows that its attributes are courage, ferocity, and power, and he has been impressed with ideas of these attributes in other objects. He knows that its roar is loud, and deep, and terrific, and he has distinct impressions of the meaning of these words also. Its colour, form, and | general habits, he becomes acquainted with by the same means; and thus he makes bold to use the name and the character of the lion to ornament his verse. In the same manner he describes the sandy desert, and with yet greater precision; because he has only to add to the sands of the sea shore, with which he is perfectly familiar, the two qualities of extent and burning heat, and he sees before him at once the wide and sterile wastes of Arabian solitude. Or if the human countenance be the subject of his muse, and he endeavours to invent one that shall be new to himself as well as to his readers, it is by borrowing different features from faces which have left their impress on his mind: and upon the same principle he proceeds through all that mental process, which is called creating images, and which gives to the works of the highly imaginative, the character of originality; because from the wide scope and variety of their impressions, they are able to select such diversified materials, that when combined, we only see them as a whole, without being aware of any previous acquaintance with their particular parts. Where distinct impressions, power, and taste are present in full force, and imagination alone, out of the four requisites, is wanting, we speak of the poet as one who | Deficiency of imagination is the reason why some, who would otherwise have been they may be so from partiality, almost our best poets, are mannerists. It is true amounting to affection, for some peculiar character or style of writing; but that they are blindly addicted to this fault, is much more frequently owing to their want of capability to conceive any other mode of conveying their ideas. Lord Byron was unquestionably a writer of the former class. From the variety of his style, the splendour of his imagery, and the brilliant thoughts that burst upon us as we read his charmed lines, it is impossible to believe that his imagination was incapable of any scope, of any height, or any depth, to which it might be directed by inclination ; but in the characters he portrayed he may justly be called a mannerist, because he evidently preferred the uniformly dark and melancholy; and chose out from the varied impressions of his own life, that sombre hue, gloom, which he spread over every object so deeply harmonizing with majesty and in nature, like the lowering thunder clouds above the landscape; varying at times the wide waste of brooding darkness, with shortlived but brilliant flashes of sensibility, and wit, and lively feeling, like the lurid streaks that shoot athwart the tempestuous sky, lighting up the world for one brief moment with ineffable brightness, and then leaving it to deeper-more impenetrable night. As instances of mannerism arising from the actual want of imagination, we might bring forward a long list of minor poets, as well as inferior writers of every description, without however descending so low as to those who have not consistency of mind sufficient for maintaining any particular sys tem of thought, or style of composition. all its varied parts it consists of the ordinary Yet of imagination, as well as impression, we are unable to say decidedly that it does not exist, because, like impression, it only becomes perceptible to us through the medium of words; and as all individuals are not able to use this medium with force and perspicuity, we necessarily lose many of the brilliant conceptions of those around us. We may however assert as an indisputable fact, that poetry of the highest order was never yet produced without the powerful exercise of the faculty of imagination. As a wonderful instance of the force and efficacy of imagination, as well as of impression, power, and taste, we might single out Milton, were it not that power is more essentially the characteristic of his works. He has equals in the other requisites of a poet, while in power he stands unrivalled. and familiar features of humanity; and in thinking of this wayward and capricious being, whose accumulated wrongs and miseries have almost stupified his energies, whose melancholy, natural or induced, has converted the "brave, o’erhanging firmament" into "a pestilent congregation of vapours," we feel with him in all his weakness, as with a man; and for him with all his faults, as for a brother. In memory too, how distinct is Hamlet from all the creations of inferior minds! He seems to occupy a place in history, rather than in fiction; and in searching out the principles of human feeling, we refer to him as to one whose existence was real, rather than ideal. This may be said of all Shakespeare's characters, and so powerful is the evidence of truth impressed upon them, that where he chooses to depart from circumstantial fact, our credence clings to him in preference to less imaginative histo Perhaps the most remarkable fact in connection with the genius of this wonderful writer, is the immense variety of his characters. In almost all other fictitious writings, we recognize the same hero, appearing in different forms-sometimes seated on an eastern throne, and sometimes presiding over the rude ceremonial of an Indian wigwam ; while the same heroine figures in the "sable stole" of a priestess, or in the borrowed ornaments of a bandit's bride. But the people of Shakespeare amongst whom we seem to live, are in no way beholden to situation or costume, for appearing to be what they really are. They have an actual identityan individuality that would be distinctly perceptible in any other circumstances, or under any other disguise. But, supreme in the region of imagination is our inimitable Shakespeare; and that he is inimitable is perhaps the greatest proofrians. of the perfection of his imaginative powers. The heroes of Byron have been multiplied through so many copies that we have grown weary of the original; but who can imitate the characters of Shakespeare? And yet how perfectly human is every individual of the multitude which he has placed before us-so human as to be liked and disliked, according to the peculiar cast of mind in the persons who pronounce upon them; just in the same manner as characters in ordinary life attract or repel those with whom they come in contact. Every one forms the same opinion of the Corsair, because he has a few distinctive qualities, by which he is known and copied; while no two individuals agree upon the character of Hamlet-a character of all others perhaps least capable of imitation. Yet let us ask, is Hamlet less natural than Conrad? Quite the reverse. If ever the poet's mind conceived a perfectly original man, it is Hamlet, in whose mysterious nature is displayed the most astonishing effort of imagination; and yet so true is the dark picture to the principles of human nature, that we perceive at once the representation of a creature formed after the similitude of ourselves. The fact is, that though as a whole it stands alone, even in the world of fiction, in One of the favorite painters of our day, or rather of yesterday, has but three heads, which serve all his purposes an old man with white hair and flowing beard, a Grecian female, and a semi-roman hero; and in the same way many of our writers make use of three or more distinctions of character-a hero and a heroine-a secondary hero to thwart their loves-a secondary heroine to assist either one party or the other-perhaps to play at cross purposes with her mistress or her friend: and a fool or buffoon, (who varies least of all,) to rush upon the stage when more important personages are likely to be reduced to a dilemma. But in Shakespeare even the fools are as motley as the garb they wear; and the women, who with other writers vary only from the tender to the heroic, are of all ages, and of all distinctions of character and feeling; while amongst the immense number of men whom he introduces to our acquaintance, there is no single instance of greater resemblance than we find in real life. Perhaps the nearest approach to similarity is in the blundering absurdities of justices of the peace, or country magistrates, a class of people with whom ("if ancient tales say true") it is probable the poet may have been brought into no very pleasing kind of contact, and hence arises the vein of satire which flows through every description of their conduct and conversation. Beyond this, there is another striking proof of the wonderful extent of Shakespeare's imaginative powers. Throughout the whole of his plays we never recognize the man himself. In the works of almost every other writer, the author appears before us, and we become in some measure acquainted with his peculiar tone of mind and individual cast of character; but Shakespeare is equally at home with the gloomy or the gay, the licentious or the devout, the sublime or the familiar, the terrific or the lovely. We never detect him identifying himself either with the characters, or the sentiments of others; and though we wonder, and speculate upon the mind that could thus play with all the feelings of humanity, Shakespeare himself remains invisible and unknown, like a master magician regulating the machinery which at the same time conceals his own person, and astonishes the world. The Tempest is generally considered the most imaginative of Shakespeare's plays, and certainly it contains little, in scenery, or circumstance, that can be associated with ordinary life. In the character of Prospero, we are forcibly struck with the originality of the conception; because it combines what is not to be found elsewhere-the art of a necromancer with the dignity of a man of honour and integrity; and when he lays down his magic wand, "unites the spell," and doffs the mantle of enchantment, he stands before us, not debased and powerless, but full of the native majesty of a nobleman and a prince. To his daughter, the pure and spiritual Miranda, one of our most talented, yet most feminine writers,* has so lately done, perhaps more than justice, that nothing can be added to her own exquisitely poetical description of the island nymph, who has "sprung up into beauty beneath the eye of her father, the princely magician; her companions the rocks and woods, the many-shaped, many-tinted clouds and the silent stars; her playmates the ocean billows that stoop their foamy crests, and run rippling to kiss her feet." Of Ariel, the "delicate Ariel," that most ethereal essence that ever assumed the form of beauty in the glowing visions of imagination, what can we say? so entirely and purely spiritual is this aerial being, that we know not whether to speak of him as calling up "spirits from the vasty deep," rolling the thunder clouds along the stormy heavens, whelming the helpless mariners in the foaming surge, and dashing their "goodly bark" upon the echoing rocks; or if her, gentle, willing, and obedient, hastening on ready service at a moment's bidding, and asking for the love, as well as the approbation, of the island lord. We know of nothing within the range of ordinary thought from which the character of Ariel can be borrowed, and certainly it is the nearest in approach to a perfectly original conception, of any which in our literature adorns the page of fiction. Of Caliban, too monstrous for a mantoo fiendish for a beast, it may also be said that he is entirely the creature of imagination; and indeed throughout the whole of this astonishing drama, the mind of the author seems to have taken the widest possible range of which human genius is capable. The very existence of these beings upon a solitary island, isolated and shut out from human fellowship, involves, in difficulties as strange as insurmountable to ordinary powers, the usual course of thought and action, and renders it infinitely more reconcilable to our prejudices, that Prospero, in such a situa tion, "with the stars, And the quick spirits of the universe" should hold “his dialogues.” How beautiful, amidst all the complicated machinery of her father's magic, is the delicate simplicity of Miranda! She wonders not at the prodigies around her, because her trust and her love are centered in her father, and she believes him to have power to dissolve as well as to enforce the spell; yet why he should exercise this power for any other than humane and gracious purposes, she is at a loss to conceive, and therefore she ventures to call his attention to the wreck of a "brave vessel" which she has first seen dashed amongst the rocks, and then she adds "Had I been any God of power, I would Have sunk the sea within the earth, or e'er Finding the natural disposition to wonder and inquire, just dawning in her mind, Prospero thinks it time to explain the mystery of their situation, and then follows that touching and beautiful description of their former life, their wrongs, and sufferings, which, occasionally interrupted by the jealousy of the narrator, lest the attention of his child should wander, and by her simple ejaculations of wonder and concern, is unparalleled alike for its imaginative charm, and for its accordance with the principles of nature. For instance, when Miranda is questioned by her father whether she can remember a time before she came into that cell, and whether she can recall such by any other house, or person, or image, she To every article. I boarded the king's ship: now on the beak, After all this, the imperative magician requires yet farther service, when Ariel, in language true to a nature more human than his own, meekly reminds his master of the |