With what uuequal throbs his bosom heaved; As though mad thoughts were wrestling within, And trampling down his soul! what heart. born groans Came on his hurried breath !-but, what he felt, Oh! that we scarce can think and cannot tell! Now the stern jailors urge him through the drear, REMARKS ON THE SATIRE OF EMINENT ENGLISH AUTHORS. WHAT a noble Poem would that be which did justice to its name of " London a Satire!" The highest kind of satire belongs to the highest kind of poetry. Isaiah and Jeremiah were satirists-and is London not another Babylon? But those bards were prophets-the generations now are the uninspired sons of little men. Yet Dark passages the prison-walls enclose; liberty, To him the liberty of death!- -a murmur'd buzz with a long pole the wild beasts in that den of many cages, whether he desires to Comes from the crowd beneath, and wakes show up and off lions, bears, tigers, pan him strait From the half-sleep of fevered agony !- sun Sweeter than ever to his last sad look! thers, ounces, jaguars, hyenas, wolves, asleep or feeding or desires, by some gentler touch, to exhibit in their natural attitudes and postures zebras, quagas, nylghaus, antelopes, kangaroos, opossums, apes, and monkeys standing boldly or gracefully as if in their own African or Asiatic deserts, or sitting anomously on their hurdies, as if in New Holland or Van Diemen's Land, or swinging all a-grin and a-chatter over bar considerable snatch of nuts, and to wire, as if gathering a 66 pretty guess,' the woods of the New World," and then right slick away," in terror of Jonathan's rifle, paid for at five dollars a-day by a naturalist in Philadelphia. in Dr. Johnson's "London, a Satire," is a noble poem. But his great moral genius was constrained in composition by the perpetual parody on his powerful prototype Juvenal. To have shewn so much genius and so much ingenuity at one and the same time, to have been so original even in imitation, places him in the highest order of minds. But his range was here circumscribed; for he had to move parallel with the Roman,-finding out in every passage corresponding and kindred sins, and in order to preserve-which he did wondrously-the similitude "To bridle in his struggling muse with pain, Which long'd to launch into a nobler strain." He had noble faculties and noble feelings -a hate high as heaven of wickedness, a scorn as high of all that was base or mean wide knowledge of the World, of London, of Life-severe judgment-imagination not very various, perhaps, but very vivid, and, when conjoined with such an intellect, even wonder-working in realms that seemed scarcely of right to belong to the solemn sage-witness the Happy Valley of Rasselas, and indeed all that as yet unsurpassed Story, where, on the wings of fancy and feeling, you are wafted along over the earth, yet never lose sight of its flesh-and-blood inhabitants working and weeping, yet not unhappy still in their toils and their tears, and dying but to live again in no cold, glittering, poetic heaven, but in the abodes of bliss, seen by the eyes of nature through the light of religion, builded in the skies. Dryden was a fine, bold, stout, strong, and sweeping satirist; but, vacillating in his own principles and practice, in many of the highest affairs which a man has to discuss and settle with his own soul, "Glorious John," with the native strength of a giant, sometimes felt his own knees smiting against one another, his legs tottering, his footing unsure; and therefore he not unfrequently failed to pour out the whole force of his fury, often most wordy when weakest far-for surely, had it been otherwise, he needed not to have feared or at least not to have fancied-such a sumph as Shadwell. Dryden seems to have been a man of wavering principles, but warm and generous feelings; so he had one of the best, and one of the worst qualities, which a satirist can possess. But then, what an ear for music! "The long resounding march, the energy divine !" What clearness too of diction, through all his easy-flowing versification of various murmur! So that you are never wearied with the delight of listening to the voice of the stream on which you float down between majestic banks. Even when the satire languishes, the poetry is magnificent; and you are brought back, with a refreshed appetite, to devour the castigation of the knave or fool whom you and the poet had for a while forgotten. But we shall have an article ere long on Dryden, possibly, nay probably, not much inferior in talent, and most certainly greatly superior in truth, to that able and eloquent one in the last Number of the Edinburgh Review by Commissioner Macaulay. Pope was an exquisite satirist—but it is not an exquisite satirist that is to show up such a City as London to scorn. His pigmy and puny body did somewhat affect the character of his mind. We fear that poor Pope was often ailing-that perhaps he never in all his life enjoyed one day of perfect health. This gave something, at times, touching to his character-and to his situation much that was even pathetic. In his serious poetry, sorrow is seen, we think, through many passages; and his mirth, which is rare, is seldom without a tinge-a dash of inelancholy. It was only when he gave vent to love or indignation that he was a great writer. Witness his Eloisa to Abelard-and his Elegy to the Memory of an 'Unfortunate Lady-and the glorious Dunciad. In the first of these poems, the Eloisa, Pope treated the bitterness of the passion of love, under circumstances so peculiar and strange, that none but such a man could ever have dreamt of meddling with them ;-poor unfortunate little fellow! And in the Dunciad, when his ire was kindled, on a subject where he felt himself strong as on the other he was weak-his literary, not his amatory powers-how in mud he drowned the dunces!-His love for "the Blount " was tender, passionate, undeserved, and ill-requited, by an ordinary woman, who could never help despising the very being of whom she was nevertheless proud-for the contempt was the more natural emotion of the two to such a creature-the pride was secondary and acquired. How bitterly he calumniated Lady Mary Wortley Montague, for reasons plain enoughtill her fair face grew as red as her petticoat, and as blue as her stockings. Then he became a courtier, in the feebleness of his person. He panegyrized such lords as Marchmont and Cobham, till they both must have blushed black;-but posterity heeds not their blushes, for posterity has forgotten them both, embalmed though they be in Epistles, which whether they be indeed poetry or not, you must consult the late Lord Byron and the present Mr. Bowles, the late Mr. Gilchrist and the present Mr. Roscoe-Mr. Campbell, whose opinion, even when wrong, is worth its weight in gold, and that immeasurable donkey, Mac Dermot on Taste and Tragedy, whose ears, casting their shadows before," have been known to frighten out of their wits children at play in the churchyard, where he had chanced to be on the look-out for thistles, and who were thus saved-poor dear innocents-by insensibility, from the prolonged horrors of his super-asinine bray. 66 Talking of churchyards, old big-wigged Dr. Young, author of the Night Thoughts, a Poem which will always be read by thoughtful people who have but few books, are poor, and live in the country, was no small shakes in satire. He was himself the prey of his own epigrammatic genius, that would never let him rest in ordinary speech, but kept pointing every line as it came up, often at the wrong end, so that the careless reader is sometimes unexpectedly stung, and loses his temper, like an old woman taking up without due caution a needle by the sharp nose, instead of the blunt eye-or a pin out of her mouth in like predicament. Yet the doctor had a clear far-seeing eye to vice and folly. He did not, however," shoot folly as it flies," for he was afraid of missing, but let bang at her in the seat, and it is funny to see her, like a hare shot in form, jumping up some six feet or so, and then down again to the ground with a thud, a quadrupedal sprawl, and then over on her back or side, stone-dead. The Doctor sometimes makes "much ado about nothing," and mouths as if in the pulpit. You always know that you are reading a satire written by a man in black, and with bands. He sometimes seems to be angry with sins solely because they insult. him in his character of a clergyman, and have no respect for the cloth. He writes, at other times, like a disappointed man who had no hopes of ever becoming a bishop; and perhaps in lawn sleeves he had been less truculent about trifles, for spiritual peers are in general more pompous than savage. To cut up poor curates and such small deer would be monstrous in a mitre. Men of the world used, we believe, to laugh at the doctor's satire, but we suspect on the left side of their mouths; for instead of tickling, he stabbed them in the midriff, and the Lorenzo of his Night Thoughts, who is there always a gentleman, was transmogrified in his regular satires into a mere vile and vulgar sceptic. All his writings, how ever, want keeping-are distinguished by exaggeration and disproportion. He hammers vice well when laid on the anvil, but he is not expert at hitting the right nail on the head; and often, when wielding his mace against a fly sticking to the wall, merely shatters the wainscot. But Young was a poet, nevertheless, of a high order. He had a fine imagination, and deep sensibilities, and has produced single lines, and passages, seldom if ever excelled, and in their meaning perhaps more profound than the poet himself knew, for he was subject to fits of inspiration. Churchill was a poor, low, unprincipled, vicious, coarse creature, with smartness that sometimes was almost strength; and what to us must in such a person always be a mystery, he had a command over the English language, as far as his mind enabled him to go in it, which made every thing he said tell, far beyond its native worth or power, and has secured him no contemptible place among English satirists. His style certainly is pure and idiomatic. He was the terror of pimps and players, and his ghost probably haunted Garrick, although it was hardly worth its while to come up for such a purpose. Let a thing be but well executed,-poor, paltry, and pitiful, as in its own nature it may be,-and it lasts. It is so with the Rosciad. The splendour of that farthing candle burned bright during Garrick's life,-not only illuminating the green-room, but all London, all England; long after his decease, it continued to glimmer, away very respectably, and we have heard elderly gentlemen within these twenty years, (one of them lived in Ludlow,) belonging to the school whose day was just wearing out, quote the Rosciad by screeds; lines in it are still recognised when they meet the ear or the eye; and possibly the entire affair may never be, from beginning to end, utterly forgotten as long as there are theatres. ex uno "That Davies has a very pretty wife." was reckoned one of the severest and happiest lines ever written, and " Oh dear! but a little wit disce omnes." goes a long way in this stupid world. Then Churchill had much rancour, and a large spleen, which is always in an inverse ratio to the size of the heart. This gave him spirit for a spurt. But he had no bottom. He was also a coward; and like a coward, liked to frighten the feeble into fits of fear. Had Hogarth, instead of caricaturing him badly, floored him by a right-handed facer, or lunge in the kidneys,-John Bee is our authority for saying that Hogarth could spar a bit,Churchill had been cowed, and bit his nail and pen in insolent malice. Why, Dr. Johnson, whom he libelled as Pomposo, did not break his bones, we cannot conjecture; perhaps because the scamp was a parson; and Samuel had such a respect for the Church, that he would not even inflict personal chastisement on a blackguard who had once preached from Yet we believe an Episcopalian pulpit. he once threatened to drub Churchill; and probably forbore carrying the threat into execution, because he had attacked Scotland. Some of the lines in his phecy of famine, about the poverty of Scotland, are well turned; but the satire and after the first common-place; pleasure of surprise arising from the image, images from natural history always please is pro "Where half-starved spiders feed on halfstarved flies," it is felt that such grotesque exaggera- tearing tripe, and to morrow eyeing an empty trencher; but still, on Saturday and Sunday alike, no better than a thief. Scotland must have been very stupid in those days, not to have settled the hash of such a scribbler-for, after all, he was not much better; and had he lived now, we would have gagged him in a single number, and made him for life a dummy. If any one of his admirers scoff at us for thinking and saying so, why let him play a similar part-put himself into Churchill's shoes-publish a satire on Scotland-and await a month or six weeks for the result. We will so Scourge his posteriors with the original of the pretty picture of the Scotch Thistle on the cover of the Magazine, that he shall not be able to take his seat among the satirists, though with a seven-fold shield of diaculum plaster. Tarring and feathering would be a joke to our pastime-to have no resting place for the sole of your foot must be very wearisome indeed; but oh! worse, many million times, to have chairs, and sofas, and ottomans, pressed upon you in all parties, in parlour and dining room; and yet not to dare to sit down for one moment, in fear of perishing of prickles! The very corpse of such a culprit would need to be laid out on its face. Such, as a satirist—and he was nothing else, was Churchill. (To be Continued.) YEARNING FOR POPULARITY. Could I in popular arts be skill'd, Would occupation, better fill'd, So dull's my genius, scarce 'twill make I cannot, like Curioni sing, Or Porto's deep notes mutter ; Make wines like Wright with apis wing, I cannot drive my Lady's carriage And slip in first to Court; Nor make St. Alban's bright with marriage, I can make nought and want the nous, McAdam, Rhodes' Colossus reigns, Lord Byron's scribe, Leigh Hunt; The stranger immediately began talking most fluently, but continually shifted the subject, and at length coming to a full stop, he suddenly asked me what was my opinion of all this? I, who had been dreadfully afflicted by the cold, so as to have been disabled from giving any attention, felt quite at a loss what to say :at length, as well as I was able, (for my teeth chattered so much that I could scarcely speak plain), I stammered out, "whether he did not think it was very cold?" Immediately his dull eyes lighted up, and I shall never forget their fiery and unnatural light, as, turning suddenly round, he stared me full in the face, saying, in the most joyous, mild, and melodious tone of voice, "Perhaps you will accept of my cloak?" and adding, with peculiar emphasis, " he was sure I should be warm enough then," instantly began to unstrap it from behind him. In vain I declared I could not think of ac, cepting it, especially as he was more thinly clad than myself: he began to inform me, with the same peculiar expression, "that he never felt cold,"-and that he would be most happy if I would do him the honour to put it on. I kept refusing, and he persisting, till at last he became so importunate, that I rudely pushed it from me, saying, "that I would not accept of it." O! if you could have seen the change in his manner and appearance! instead of the mild, placid look he had hitherto worn, his face was contracted by the strongest feelings of rage and disappointment; his eyes flashed fire from under his heavy knit brows; his mouth was curled with a kind of sardonic " grin; and, hastily adjusting the cloak about him, he said with the most sinister expression," Perhaps I would do him the honour another time?" Then dashing the spurs into his beast, he was out of sight in a moment. I felt much relieved by his departure. he was no sooner gone, than I got by degrees warmer and warmer; even my horse appeared to feel a difference, for he pranced and neighed, as if freed from some restraint, and in a very little time was as warm as myself. I began to think there was something there was really something-horridly unnatural about the stranger;-his hollow voice, pale complexion, and heavy eye, -above all, the strange coldness that came over me! I felt rejoiced that I was thus rid of him; and that I had not accepted his offer of the cloak (as then, in all probability, we should not have parted so soon); and now, so little did I need it, that I was compelled to unbution my coat, and take my thick lambs' wool comforter from my neck. Who could the stranger be? I remembered to have heard, that the German who was hung in chains, and whose gibbet I had passed, had suffered the sentence of the law, for having burnt a house, and murdered in the most cruel and shocking manner, a person, whom he strangled with his cloak. Now, it was also currently reported, (but only believed by the idle and superstitious,) that this man did not then die :-for it was said, that the devil, to whom after his condemnation, he had sold himself, had, while he was suspended, in some way or other, supported him; and had afterwards fed him on the gibbet in the form of a raven, until the fastenings decayed, so that he could release himself, when he substituted the body of a person whom he murdered for the purpose! There were many persons now alive who had sworn to having seen the raven there, morning, noon, and to have heard its croaking even at midnight. Many accounted for this, by saying it came here to feed on the body; but one of the villagers, who was known to be a stout fellow, having occasion to go by the gibbet one twilight, declared, that he heard the man talking with the raven, but in a language he could not understand; that at first he supposed he was deceived by his own fancy, or the creaking of the iron fastenings, but on approaching nearer, he distinctly saw the eyes cf the man looking intently at him; and he verily believed had he stopped he would have spoken to him, but that he was so alarmed he took to his heels, and never once looked behind or stopped to take breath, until he reached the end of the plain, a distance of above five miles. And it was further said, the German, when released from the gibbet, was obliged, in fulfilment of his vow, to do the devil's will on earth-that he was most dreadfully pale, owing to the blood never having flowed into his face since his strangulation, for the devil, it is said, had only just kept his word; that the German, as he was called, had since often been seen riding up and down the road, and that he entered very freely into conversation, and endeavoured to entrap the unwary to put them into the power of his master. Could it be possible that this was the German ? Tut! an idle thought; and yet-I remember there was something foreign in his accent ;-then the paleness of his face,-the strange circumstances that accompanied his presence,—the pressing and extraordinary manner in which he offered his cloak, which might have been some device to get me within his power, the extreme cold with which I was afflicted, the ominous beckoning, too, of the figure on the gibbet ;-each circumstance came forcibly before me; and were he the German or not, I more than ever rejoiced that I had thus easily got rid of him. I now rode briskly on to a small inn, that was situated about half-w -way between the commencement and end of my journey and arrived there about half-past eight o'clock. On alighting, the host, a fat jolly fellow, with a perpetual smile on his face, came out and welcomed me. "Shew me into a private room," said I, "and bring me some refreshment;" the landlord replied he was very sorry his only room was at present occupied by a gentleman who had been there about ten minutes, but he was sure he would have no objection to my company. He departed to obtain his permission, and returned with the gentleman's compliments, and |