expressions! Every word a picture! He was indebted to those prior geniuses, who had invented these expressions; and thus prepared the field in which his mind was to play in its own unbounded luxuriance. We must take something from the glory of Homer, and divide it with those perished names, which, like unseen roots, nourished the tree on which this Bird of the Muses, sat and sung. He could hang his apples of gold in a net-work of silver; while the Hebrew bards were obliged to provide not only the song, but the lyre and its strings. By the learned reader who appreciates their language, the strains must be read with perfect astonishment.

Let us take an example. I have already remarked that their language had very few abstract terms; not even those which seem absolutely necessary to describe the character of the Deity. What would a modern theologian do, if he were compelled to discourse on God, without using the words omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence? These seem to be absolutely necessary to communicate our simplest conceptions of the great Jehovah. Yet not one of these words can be translated into Hebrew. There is not a term in that restricted language, which answers to these essential ideas. The truth is, an infant people never abstract; and when they first approach these mighty conceptions, they approach them by circumlocution. Let us see how completely

the royal poet manages to communicate the omnipresence of God.

Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?
Whither shall I flee from thy face?
If I ascend into heaven,

There THOυ

If I make my bed in the nether world,
Behold THOU.

I take the wings of the east,
Or I dwell in the remotest west,
There thy hand shall lead me;

Thy right hand shall hold me up.

Ps. cxxxix. 7-10.

Thus in the most beautiful and graphic poetry, the omnipresence of God is brought out to the dullest conception. We must remember that the upper, the nether, and the middle world, was the whole universe to a Hebrew mind.*

It is true the sacred poets gather their contributions from all the stores which nature has spread out before them; they make the exterior world an illustration of the operations of the mind; and thus they have all the beauties of description, without missing that moral dignity, which mere description never can attain. I allow the powers of Thomson; I admire that mighty genius, which, like Antæus, gathers strength whenever it touches the earth; and yet the reader of the

* See Exodus xx. 4.

Seasons feels something wanting. He feels as the spectator at the theatre would, in seeing the shiftingscenes (most beautifully painted) of one of Shakspeare's tragedies, and none of the moral sentiments or actions with which these scenes should be filled. Let a man take one of Thomson's best descriptions, and compare it with one equally good in Milton, but where the description is made subservient to a higher result, and feel the difference.

As when from mountain tops the dusky clouds
Ascending, while the north-wind sleeps, o'erspread
Heaven's cheerful face, the lowering element
Scowls o'er the darkened landscape, snow or shower;
If chance the radiant sun with farewell sweet
Extend his evening beam, the fields revive,
The birds their notes renew, and bleating herds
Attest their joy, that hill and valley ring.

Never was there a more beautiful or complete scene brought to view. Had the author's object been mere description, it could not have been more finished; and yet it is only an incidental gem, which he picks up in his path, without going one step out of the way to find it. He has a higher object than mere poetry; he wishes to illustrate the dawnings of transient hope on fallen minds. We have the same dignity in the writings of the Hebrews. They make the material world play around the pedestals of those awful images with which their minds are filled. In

the thirty-fourth chapter of Ezekiel, if it had been the sole object of the prophet to describe pastoral life, it could scarcely have been more beautiful. In this respect, his description might rival one of the best pastorals of Theocritus. But at the same time the deepest moral beauty is spread over the whole. God is the shepherd; and he is watching over his people.

In a word, the beauties of biblical poetry, like all the severe beauties, must be acquired by study. They are so simple, so unlike modern sentimentalism, that, when first seen, they strike the eye with disappointment. But look again, and your attention will be arrested-a third time, and you will admire ; and once let the model impress your taste, and you will admire forever. It seems to me, for touching the deeper tones of the heart, the Hebrew poetry has an internal grandeur, compared with which, the songs of mythology, are cold and unmeaning.

THE PURITAN.

No. 35.

It is also obvious, that, though the description of a passion or affection may give us pleasure, whether it be described by the agent or spectator, yet, to those who would apply the inventions of the poet to the uses of philosophic investigation, it is far from being of equal utility with the passion exactly imitated. The talent of imitation, is very different from description, and far superior,

Richardson on Shakspeare.

MORALITY OF MACBETH.

I AM one of those who have no faith in the morality of the theatre. It is long since I have entered those dissolute walls; and I know not that I ever carried from a dramatic performance a salutary impression. A sarcastic friend tells me the fault was my own; he assures me, I wanted the finer feelings which these oblique instructions were designed to reach; and that it is only on the chords of a nicer sensibility, that the tones of the drama will act. He informs me that I never had wit enough to guess the riddle; and that