In the following stanza, Rome is still the

subject.

The double night of ages, and of her

Night's daughter, Ignorance, hath wrapt and wrap* All round us; we but feel our way to err; The ocean hath his chart, the stars their map, And Knowledge spreads them on her ample lap ; But Rome is as the desert, where we steer, Stumbling o'er recollections; now we clap Our hands, and cry Eureka?' it is clearWhen but some false mirage of ruin rises ne

Here, again, we have, as it were, an Egyptian mausoleum for the remains of a deified animal. The rich poetical language rather conceals than expresses the meaning, which, when discovered, is nothing more, than that the antiquaries are in doubt about the original names and purposes of some of the ruins of Rome; that it is a question, for

Wraps is required by grammar.

I

instance, whether the remains of a portico belonged to a Temple of Mars, or a Basilie of Antoninus Pius. This is not a fact to be announced with such elaborate solemnity.

In some passages, the poverty of sentiment is such, that there is only the shadow of a thought; nothing real and palpable.

The lightning rent from Ariosto's bust
The iron crown of laurel's mimic'd leaves;
Nor was the ominous element unjust,

For the true laurel-wreath which Glory weaves

Is of the tree no bolt of thunder cleaves,
And the false semblance but disgraced his brow;
Yet still, if fondly Superstition grieves,

Know, that the lightning sanctifies below
Whate'er it strikes; yon head is doubly sacred now.

The semblance of meaning in this passage must disappear in any attempt to express it prose. We can only arrange the thoughts

in

in succession. "It was not unjust in the

lightning which is ominous, to strike the iron crown from the bust of Ariosto, for Ariosto himself was entitled, metaphorically speaking, to a laurel crown; and there is a fable, that the laurel is not struck by lightning. Therefore, the crown on his bust, being only made of metal, in imitation of laurel, disgraced it.. But if the superstitious are still troubled, it may be added, that it was the custom of the ancients to consecrate to the gods what had been struck with lightning, therefore the bust of Ariosto is now doubly sacred." The want of any proper relation between the thoughts thus forced together, renders the whole passage unmeaning.

In the expression of abstract sentiment, in all which might imply a philosophical spirit, or just and comprehensive habits of thinking,

Byron is equally deficient. He had no fixed principles of belief or action; and, in consequence, there is much opposition and incongruity of opinion and feeling, expressed throughout his works. There is scarcely any subject on which he appears to have thought consistently or correctly. It may be doubted, whether there is a single passage in his writings, adapted to fix itself in the memory, as a striking expression of any general truth. The following is one of his most laboured efforts.

But quiet to quick bosoms is a hell,

And there hath been thy bane; there is a fire
And motion of the soul which will not dwell
In its own narrow being, but aspire
Beyond the fitting medium of desire;
And, but once kindled, quenchless evermore,
Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire
Of aught but rest; a fever at the core,

Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever bore.

This makes the madmen who have made men mad
By their contagion; Conquerors and Kings,
Founders of sects and systems, to whom add
Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet things
Which stir too strongly the soul's secret springs,
And are themselves the fools to those they fool;
Envied, yet how unenviable! what stings

Are theirs! One breast laid open were a school, Which would unteach mankind the lust to shine or rule;

Their breath is agitation, and their life
A storm whereon they ride, to sink at last,
And yet so nursed and bigoted to strife,
That should their days surviving perils past,
Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast
With sorrow and supineness, and so die;
Even as a flame unfed, which runs to waste
With its own flickering, or a sword laid by
Which eats into itself, and rusts ingloriously.

He who ascends to mountain tops, shall find
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind,

Must look down on the hate of those below.
Though high above the sun of glory glow,
And far beneath the earth and ocean spread,
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow