The poets of antiquity loved villas, and the poets of modern times are not without yearnings after retired spots. Necessity, indeed, drove Shakspeare to the crowded mart, but inclination urged him back to his native hamlet. In seclusion Milton laid up his immense stores of learning, and his admirers associate Forest Hill with his memory. We may see through the medium of biography, how Pope delighted in Twickenham, and Young was cheerful at Welwyn. But we can only groupe the rural abodes of the bards. See Prior at Down Hall, Drummond at Hawthornden, Walpole at Strawberry Hill, Thomson at Hagley Park, Shenstone at the Leasowes, Johnson at Streatham, Sir Richard Steele at Llangunnor, Cowper at Olney, Hayley at Eartham, Voltaire at Ferney, Byron at Newstead, Scott at Abbotsford, and Wiffen at Woburn Abbey.† Byron dwelt in his country house, amid the scenery of the Lake of Geneva, and in his skiff repaired to Copet, and became a listener in the hall of philosophy. Pollock wrote his distinguished work under the fir trees of a farm house, and then ungirdled his mind, that he might expatiate among rural scenes. To this glance at the retirement of the poets, we may add the love of description, which pervades their works. They woo nature with the passion of enthusiasts. Camoens§ and Tasso pourtray the scenery of Oriental climes. Petrarch writes sonnets for the fountain of Vaucluse. Chaucer and Spenser, Shakspeare and Milton, Pope, Gay, Addison, and all the minor Poets in * Walpole was not much of a poet, but he established a press at Strawberry Hill, from which several valuable publications were issued. + Woburn Abbey, the seat of Lord Russell, but Russell seems to be the patron of the poet. Then the residence of Baroness de Stael. dulge in pastoral views. In Scott's Amwell, Darwin's Botanic Garden, Mason's English Garden, Collins's Oriental Eclogues, H. K. White's Clifton Grove, Dyer's Fleece, Dodsley's Agriculture, Prior's Solomon, Gray's Elegy, and Goldsmith's Deserted Village, Brown's Pastorals, Somerville's Chase and Field Sports, and Human Life by Rogers, we see what influence country objects exercise over the heart of sensibility. In the rugged climate of Scotland, the same feeling prevails among her gifted men. James the First, in his romantic Poems, breaks forth into rural description. James V. another royal poet, often sounded his bugle in the ear of his peasantry. Allan Ramsay is justly called the Scottish Theocritus. In the Gentle Shepherd, in the Minstrel, the Lochleven of Bruce, in Wilson's Isle of Palms, in Mallett's Excursion, in the Art of Health by Armstrong, in Thomson's Seasons, in the works of Drummond and Grahame, rural imagery appears without cessation. Last, but not least, we name Burns. He could not, indeed, conduct an extended poem with any thing like the skill of Allan Ramsay, but Burns has thrown enchantment over the humble life of the Scottish peasant. Rural life blends itself with all the productions of his mind; and the marble reared over his ashes by the ingenuity of the statuary, is justly made to display implements of husbandry. The fancy of most men clothes rural life in imaginary charms. The feeling is not confined to the painter when his pencil groups still-life scenes, among which he sends flocks to find repose; nor is it confined to the statuary, when he chisels in blocks of Parian stone, the reaper binding his sheaves, the gleaner in his wake, the milkmaid, chanting her evening hymn, or the shepherd boy He finished the Lusiad in a garden folding his flock. We question grotto in the East. whether any man can be found so entirely destitute of this feeling, as not at some time or other to lay the scene of his last years in retirement, where he expects knotted osiers to be cast on his grave by the hands of friendship, or of filial affection. Such desires will partly account for the toils of the merchant, the vigils of the statesman, the perils of the mariner, and the fatigues of the soldier. Such anticipations are sometimes fulfilled. The consolations of old age have been analysed by the philosopher, and sung by the poet. We have beheld the pious patriarch in the midst of scenes where "Beneath his old, hereditary trees, Trees he had climbed so oft in youth, he But human calculations are often liable to sad disappointments. Even our favourite pursuits cease at times to give satisfaction. The botanist sometimes shuts his herbal, and the painter his sketch-book. The Zoographer turns from his menagerie, and the ornithologist from his aviary. Even kings sometimes look with aversion on their thrones, and envy their own hedgers, as they hie them home, or their own herb women, as they cull among the squares and circles of regal gardens. "Yields not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shada To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep, Than does the rich, embroidered canopy To kings, that fear their subjects' treachery p The writer having named numerous mention of them will not be construed into an indiscriminate approbation of their works. Some of the works of Prior, the writer exceedingly admires; but there are others he cordially disapproves. The same admiration he inspired as a wit. Pope, may be said of Gay; but Gay lived for the like Voltaire, was probably a Romish infidel, and the Bishop of Gloucester was not cede that Darwin was a deist. Certain it much better. Miss Seward seems to conis, he was no poet, and yet he had the audacity to say that Cowper was not a poet. But, wonderful to tell, Miss Seward disagrees with him, in this last opinion.-A man is known by the company he keeps, and Byron was always at home among the pirates of the Egean. Joanna Baillie is a talented woman, but it is a pity that her talents should be thrown away, into the but an Unitarian. Shakspeare was probaUnitarian scale. Dr. Parr was a scholar, bly a Catholic, and he must have often needed absolution. The same of Massinger, Ben Jonson, &c.-Dryden turned Restoration did not line his pockets.— Catholic after being a Protestant; but the Rousseau was sometimes Catholic, sometimes Protestant, and at all times a libertine. Akenside disputed against Revelation with Doddridge; but the Northampton divine was too hard for the Newcastle bard. What Burns was, every one knows, who has an understanding to admire talents, or a heart to deplore their perversion. Since the publication of Milton's theology, it is said that he was Unitarian. This, however, is adhuc sub judice. But he certainly held a doctrine by which a man might have the same number of wives the king of Ashantee. The number of as one of the African kings-I think it is authors, in this essay, he hopes the bare his wives is 3,333.-Will Dr. Channing look at this. But, after all, we cannot think there is any thing in poetry better calculated to than absorption in the delightful science take off the heart from serious pursuits, of mathematics. Madame de Stael made a sagacious remark when she said, that he is in danger from no book, who reads all books. He may find poison, but he will find an antidote. By poetry, however, we do not mean the versification of the present day. In the march of intellect, men march away from some good things, and among these things are the good old standard writers. Many of the modern poets seem to be made men-artificial and imitative. Their songs are feeble; whereas, THE GREAT PLAGUE IN LONDON. The following article was published in the Christian Observer, shortly after the appearance of the Asiatic Cholera in Britain. If its publication there was at that time peculiarly seasonable—as we think it was-it must be so here, at the present time, when the awful scourge has reached our shores, and none but He who has sent it, and who alone can stay its progress, can tell to what extent its desolations are to reach. We took up De Foe's work, saying, that we could not quote it as authority, nor could we; but it is easier to take up De Foe than to lay him down. In alluding to his mixture of fact and fiction, with a view to reprobate such a mode of making history itself doubtful, we have been led to quote a few passages which bear upon our general subject. But we have a more veracious, though brief, history of that awful calamity in Vincent's "God's terrible Voice in the City," printed in 1667, and reprinted at different periods; among others, at the time of the pestilence at Marseilles, and now recently, on occasion of the present season of visitation. We copy from this interesting chronicle the following affecting particulars: "In June, the number increased from 43 to 112; the next week to 168, the next to 267, the next to 470; most of which increase was in the remote parts, few in this month within or near the walls of the city and few that had any note for goodness or religious profession were visited at the first. God gave them warning to bethink and prepare themselves; yet some few that were choice characters the music of the old minstrels was like the birds of New Zealand, of whose notes a navigator says, that they sounded to him like finely toned bells. were visited pretty soon, that the best might not promise to themelves a supersedeas, or interpret any place of Scripture so literally, as if the Lord had promised an absolute general immunity and defence of his own people from this disease of the plague. "Now the citizens of London are put to a stop in the career of their trade; they begin to fear whom they converse withal, and deal withal, lest they should have come out of infected places. Now roses and other sweet flowers wither in the gardens, are disregarded in the markets, and people dare not offer them to their noses, lest with their sweet savour that which is infectious should be drawn in. Rue and wormwood are taken into the hand; myrrh and zedoary into the mouth: and without some antidote few stir abroad in the morning. Now many houses are shut up where the plague comes, and the inhabitants shut in, lest coming abroad they should spread infection. It was very dismal to behold the red crosses, and to read in great letters, Lord have mercy upon us! on the doors, and watchmen standing before them with halberts; and such a solitude about those places, and people passing by them so gingerly, and with such fearful looks, as if they had been lined with enemies in ambush that waited to destroy the passengers. "Now rich tradesmen provide themselves to depart. If they have no country-houses, they seek lodgings abroad for themselves and their families: and the poorer tradesmen, that they may imitate the rich in their fear, stretch themselves to take a country journey, though they have scarce wherewithal to bring them back again. The ministers also, many of them, take occasion to go to their country places for the summer time; or, it may be, to find out some few of their parishoners that were gone before them, leaving the greater part of their flock without food or physic, in the time of their greatest need. I do not speak of all ministers: those which did stay out of choice and duty deserve true honour. Possibly some might think God was now preaching to the city, and what need of their preaching? Or rather, did not the thunder of God's voice affrighten their guilty consciences and make them fly away, lest a bolt from heaven should fall upon them. I do not blame any citizens retiring, when there was so little trading, and the presence of all might have helped forward the increase and spreading of the infection; but how did guilt drive many away, where duty would have engaged them to stay in the place? Now the highways are thronged with passengers and goods, and London doth empty itself into the country. Great are the stirs and hurries in London, by the removal of so many families. Fear puts many thousands on the wing, and those think themselves most safe that can fly furthest from the city. "In July, the plague increaseth, and prevaileth exceedingly. The number of 470, which died in one week by the disease, ariseth to 725 the next week, to 1089 the next, to 1843 the next, to 2010 the next. Now the plague compasseth the walls of the city like a flood, and poureth in upon it. Now most parishes are infected; yet there are not so many houses shut up by the plague as by the owners forsaking them for fear of it. But, though the inhabitants be so exceedingly decreased by the departure of so many thousands, the nnmber of dying persons increaseth fearfully. Now the countries keep guard, lest infectious persons should from the city bring the disease unto them. Most of the rich are now gone, and the middle sort will not stay behind; but the Ch. Adv.-VOL. X. poor are forced to stay and abide the storm. Now most faces gather paleness; and what dismal apprehensions do then fill their minds; what dreadful fears possess the spirits, especially of those whose consciences are full of guilt, and have not made their peace with God. The old drunkards, and swearers, and unclean persons, are brought into great straits: they look on the right hand and on the left, and death is marching towards them from every part, and they know not whither to fly that they may escape it. Now the arrows begin to fly very thick about their ears, and they see many fellow sinners fall before their faces, expecting every hour themselves to be smitten: and the very sinking fears they have had of the plague, brought the plague and death upon many. Some by the sight of a coffin in the streets have fallen into a shivering, and immediately the disease has assaulted them, and death hath arrested them, and clapped the doors of their houses upon them; from whence they have come forth no more, till they have been brought forth to their graves. We may imagine the hideous thoughts, the horrid perplexity of mind, the tremblings, confusions, and anguish of spirit, which some awakened sinners have had when the plague hath broken in upon their houses, and seized upon near relations, whose dying groans sounding in their ears, have warned them to prepare; when their doors have been shut up and fastened on the outside, and none suffered to come in but a nurse whom they have been more afraid of than of the plague itself; when lovers. and friends, and companions in sin, have stood aloof, and not dared to come nigh the door of the house lest death should issue forth from thence upon them; especially when the disease hath invaded themselves, and first begun with a pain 2 P and dizziness in their head, then trembling in their other members; when they have felt boils to arise under their, arms, and seen blains to come forth in other parts; when the disease had wrought in them to that height, as to send forth those spots, which most think are the certain tokens of near approaching death. And now they have received the sentence of death in themselves, and have certainly concluded that within a few hours they must go down into the dust, and their naked souls, without the case of their body, must make their passage into eternity, and appear before the Highest Majesty, to render their accounts and receive their sentence. None can utter the horror which hath been upon the spirits of such, through the lashes and stings of their guilty consciences, where they have called to mind a life of sensuality and profaneness; their uncleanness, drunkenness, and injustice; their oaths, curses, derision of saints and holiness, and neglect of their own salvation; and when a thousand sins have been set in order before their eyes, with another aspect than when they looked upon them in the temptation; and when they find God to be irreconcilably angry with them, and that the day of grace is over, the door of mercy shut, and that pardon and salvation, which before they slighted, now unattainable: that the grave is now opening its mouth to receive their bodies, and hell opening its mouth to receive their souls; and they apprehend that they are now just entering into a place of endless wo and torment, and must take up their lodgings in the regions of utter darkness, with devils, and their damned fellow sinners, and there abide for evermore in the extremity of misery, without any hopes or possibility of a release: and that they have foolishly brought themselves into this condition, and been the cause of their own ruin. We may guess that the despairful agonies and anguish of such awakened sinners have been of all things the mostinsupportable; except the very future miseries themselves, which they have been afraid of. "In August, how dreadful is the increase! From 2010, the number amounts to 2817 in one week; and thence to 3880 the next; thence to 4237 the next; thence to 6102. the next; and all these of the plague, besides other diseases. "Now the cloud is very black, and the storm comes down upon us very sharp. Now death rides triumphantly on his pale horse through our streets, and breaks into every house almost, where any inhabitants are to be found. Now people fall as thick as leaves from the trees in autumn, when they are shaken by a mighty wind. Now there is a dismal solitude in London streets: every day looks with the face of a Sabbath observed with greater solemnity than is used to be in the city. Now shops are shut in, people rare, and very few that walk about; insomuch that the grass begins to spring up in some places, and a deep silence almost in every place, especially within the walls: no rattling coaches, no prancing horses, no calling in of customers, no offering of wares; no London cries sounding in the ears. If any voice be heard, it is the groans of dying persons breathing forth their last; and the funeral knells of them that are ready to be carried to their graves. "It was generally observed that God's people, who died by the plague amongst the rest, died with such peace and comfort as Christians do not ordinarily attain unto, except when they are called forth to suffer martyrdom for the testimony of Jesus Christ. Some who have been full of doubts, and fears, and complaints, whilst they have lived and been well, have been fill |