"Bright as the pillar rose at Heaven's command.
When Israel march'd along the desert land,
Blazed through the night on lonely wilds afar,
And told the path—a never-setting star:
So, heavenly Genius, in thy course divine,
Hope is thy star, her light is ever thine."
Can you now admit, with the critic, "That in this catalogue there is not one circumstance which could be selected as a manifest violation of probability; and yet the reader feels throughout that it is a collection of topics gathered from remote sources, not the result of a strong realization in the poet's mind?" Can you now tolerate his insulting interrogatory—"There is here much skilful verse, but is there one glow of honest enthusiasm?" It is "instinct with spirit." Why should Campbell alone, of all our poets, be blamed for personifying Hope? It surprises and grieves us to hear a Quarterly Reviewer ask, "Was Mr Campbell's imagination so inextricably involved in the mythology of Greece, that he could not put into her mouth an address to the young poetical aspirant somewhat nearer to our feelings than such as this?" Are "Wisdom's walks," the "sacred Nine," the "Delphian height," "Harmonia's daughters," the "Loxian murmurs," "Pythia's awful organ," all remote from his feelings—and from those of all the young poetical aspirants now musing by the Isis and the Cam? Then, we need say nothing of the unfairness of selecting eight lines from eighty, to prove that Mr Campbell's imagination was "so inextricably involved in the mythology of Greece." They who, like the Quarterly Reviewer, care nothing about the mythology of Greece, may behold in that splendid passage, as it now moves before them in "long resounding march and energy divine," crowds of glorious images awakening thoughts and sentiments most ennobling to humanity—and most "auspiciously" flowing from the lips of Hope, as she stands "on yon proud height," hand in hand with Genius, "the child of Heaven!"
"The next theme is the Hope of a poor but reputable couple, who trust that their rising offspring will one day relieve their anxieties and administer to their wants. Who does not wish that the hope may be realized? but who that had the wish would talk of 'Hybla sweets,' and 'bloomy vines,' and bid 'prophetic Hope' tell the solicitous parent,—
'Tell, that when silent years have pass'd away,
That when his eye grows dim, his tresses grey,
These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build,
And deck with fairer flowers his little field,
And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe
Arcadian beauty on the barren heath.'
So far the Reviewer; but the whole passage is short, so let us quote the whole.
"Propitious Power! when rankling cares annoy
The sacred home of Hymenean joy;
When doom'd to Poverty's sequestered dell,
The wedded pair of love and virtue dwell,
Unpitied by the world, unknown to fame,
Their woes, their wishes, and their hearts the same—
Oh! there, prophetic Hope! thy smile bestow,
And chase the pangs that worth should never know—
There, as the parent deals his scanty store
To friendless babes, and weeps to give no more,
Tell, that his manly race shall yet assuage
Their father's wrongs, and shield his latter age.
What though for him no Hybla sweets distil,
Nor bloomy vines wave purple on the hill;
Tell, that when silent years have pass'd away,
That when his eye grows dim, his tresses grey,
These busy hands a lovelier cot shall build,
And deck with fairer flowers his little field,
And call from Heaven propitious dews to breathe
Arcadian beauty on the barren heath;
Tell, that while Love's spontaneous smile endears
The days of peace, the sabbath of his years,
Health shall prolong to many a festive hour
The social pleasures of his humble bower."
What care you now for the critic's sneer? "A poor but reputable couple!" They were so—but "something more;" and as the Husband and Father was "a scholar and a gentleman," and a dear friend of Mr Campbell's, it was natural and proper, and graceful, and not a little affecting, for the Poet to represent Hope as
