which runs through the whole, betrays itself in the concluding line of one of them; Look back! Lo! where it comes like an eternity, As if to sweep down all things in its tract, 1,—a matchless cataract. A passage relating to the Appenines, immediately follows the description of the cataract of Velino. It consists, with one exception, in a not very forcible dilation of the thought, that the author would have admired these mountains more, if he had not beheld others of greater sublimity. The following is a part I have looked on Ida with a Trojan's eye, The exception referred to, is a figure in the highest degree picturesque; "lone Soracte's height" from out the plain, Heaves like a long swept wave about to break, The following is another specimen of Byron's powers of description, from Manfred. It is not noon-the sun-bow's rays still arch This passage, which has been admired, would be finer, if it were more intelligible. It is often easy to discover a writer's meaning, even where he does not express it correctly; but this is not the case with the lines before us. What is said is, that the sun-bow's rays roll the waving column, and fling its lines of foaming light along; what was intended to be said, we cannot conjecture. It is clear, however, that the waterfall is first described as a column of sheeted silver, arched by a rainbow; and, afterwards, compared to the Pale courser's tail, The giant steed [steed's], to be bestrode by Death. But this does not seem to be the language of an accurate observer of nature. It may be doubted, whether the appearances supposed can coexist at the same point of view. At a distance from a waterfall, where its white foam, in apparently retarded motion, and spreading as it descends, is alone visible, the comparison may be admitted; but at such a distance, we see nothing of rainbows, or of sheeted silver, glittering in the sunbeams. * The effect of what is beautiful and grand in nature, depends so much upon the purest moral and religious associations, that he whose mind is destitute of these, can have but little sensibility to her power. It is . nature, as animated by the imagination, and endued with moral life; it is nature, as peopled with real and imaginary inhabitants, whose joys and interests are blended with the visible scene before us; it is nature, as the work of God, penetrating us with a feeling of his love, and connecting us with his infinity; it is nature in her eternal magnificence, calling up images of what is past and what is to come, and raising us above the passions of the present hour; it is nature thus contemplated, and thus acting upon us, that inspires the poet, and elevates the philosopher. There is no harmony between her and the misanthropist, the disbeliever in virtue, the man who is the slave of his lusts, or haunted by remorse, or harassed by bitter and angry passions; him who can talk of the "skies" as as "raining plagues on men like dew." It was with a very different character from that of Byron, that another poet thus expressed himself: "I am growing fit, I hope, for a better world, of which the light of the sun is but a shadow; for I doubt not but God's works here are what come nearest to his works there; and that a true relish of the beauties of nature is the most easy prepa |