THE PURITAN. No. 34. But those frequent songs throughout the law and prophets beyond all these, not in their divine argument alone, but in the very critical art of composition, may be easily made to appear, over all the kinds of lyric poesy, to be incomparable. Milton against Prelaty, Book II., Introduction. ONE of the pleasures of poetry, is the skill and facility with which the author overcomes certain difficulties, which the rules of the art impose upon him. It is not copying nature, or painting the passions solely, which gives us delight; but it is the adroitness with which these things are done, though the work was hampered by certain laws. In certain kinds of verse, this is the chief pleasure. It is peculiarly so in the Spenserian stanza, and in the sonnet; and in those artful involutions and balanced periods, which some writers use. For example, in these lines in Pope's Windsor Forest, which he has copied from Not half so swift the trembling doves can fly, When through the clouds he drives the trembling doves. In this case, we admire not only the smooth versification, and the beautiful image, but the art with which the poet has involved his eagles and doves in the melodious illustration. The above is not, perhaps, the highest beauty; it lacks simplicity, and is perfectly Ovidian. Nevertheless, in the simplest poetry of Cowper and Milton, there is a secret reference to the difficulties overcome; and we never should admire nature or passion in poetry, (for these may exist in prose,) were there not a secret reference to the skill of the poet. In easy poetry, we admire that the bard can be so easy under so many restraints. At first view, it might be supposed that there was very little of this beauty among the Hebrew bards. Nothing can be more simple than the structure of their sentences; they have neither measure nor rhyme. They have only to pour out their rhapsodies; to communicate their feelings, and be admired. They have only to indulge in the rantings of McPherson, who has passed for Ossian ; -per audaces nova dithyrambos Verba devolvit, numerisque fertur Lege solutis. They may have the praise of simplicity, but cannot aspire to the victories of art; and yet, I hope to show that a conquest over difficulties is one of the chief beauties of their admirable odes. The Hebrew is one of the most material languages ever spoken. There is hardly an abstract term in its whole vocabulary. In its entire formation, it seems to be made by a people who are as far from spiritual ideas, as we can possibly conceive. It has no tenses, (those which have been called past and future, are certainly aorists ;) no scientific or scholastic terms; no particles to express the nicest transitions of thought; very few adjectives, very few intellectual expressions of any kind. Almost all its words which express mental operations are material in their origin. Let us mention a few instances without the formality of quoting the original. The word to judge, comes from the causative of to cut. I seem to see a tribe of primitive hunters, who, having run down and taken a deer, appoint one of the wisest of their number, to cause it to be cut up in equal .portions; and thus comes the idea of judging The word to mourn, comes from the withering of a plant. The first man who hung down his head in sorrow, was likened to a plant blasted by the sun, and failing for want of water. These instances might be multiplied; but they are sufficient to show that the language was formed in very early times; it bears all the marks of the poverty and simplicity of a primitive age. It is well worthy of being studied as a beautiful specimen of the infant efforts of men at expression and thought. It completely transfers you to the ancient world, and associates you with the intellectual habits of these primitive beings. Its lexicon is a magazine of material forms, and you might look in vain for such terms as decorum, grace, legislation, magnanimity, or any other word that expresses the nicest shades of thought. Le Clerc, in relating the dogmas of the Pharisees, shows that they could not believe in the fate of the Stoics, because there was no word in their language, even in that late age, which could express that notion. Such was their speech-a tongue which seemed to be formed by beings immersed in the material world. Yet when we pass to their themes, we find them the most vast and intellectual that can possibly meet the human mind. When they engage in their subjects, they seem to leave sublunary nature behind them; and soar into the darkest regions of the closest thought. They describe not battles and cities; but the conflicts of mind; the agonies of conscience; the mysterious intercourse of man with his Maker. They paint the sorrows of repentance; the hopes of faith, and the windings and snares through which the errant soul returns to God. They are every where like painters with the pencil put into their hands, and compelled to draw only allegorical forms. They must not go to the landscape, and copy its lilies and They are not to dwell on the lakes. Sweet interchange Of hill and valley, rivers, woods and plains, Now land, now sea, and shores with forest crowned, They are to transcribe only the moral landscapethey speak to the inner man. They sometimes pass the flaming bounds of space and time, and deal with the mysterious essence of the Deity; and all this with a language which seems at first view, entirely inadequate to the object. It is impossible to conceive of a greater contrast, than the materialism of the Hebrew language, and the unembodied and exalted nature of their favorite themes. This, then, was their difficulty; and they have conquered it nobly. This contrast, was a far greater obstacle to a Hebrew bard, than the hexameter verse was to the heroic poets among the Greeks. The critics have been in raptures at the invention of Homer; and all must allow that he has rolled through every melodious note in his own beautiful language; and laid a contribution on all the stores of nature, to enrich and adorn his theme. But every one must see that he had previous facilities prepared at hand. He collected his flowers in a garden; while the Hebrew poets collected them from a wilderness. What a rich language did he inherit! What charming |