Fair Sleep! so long in thy beauty woo'd, Be mine, my love! and we two will lie Dear Sleep! farewell!-hour, hour, hour, hour, GENIUS CONSECRATED TO RELIGION. How beautiful is genius when combined With holiness! Oh, how divinely sweet The tones of earthly harp, whose chords are touch'd By the soft hand of Piety, and hung Upon Religion's shrine, there vibrating With solemn music in the ear of God! And must the bard from sacred themes refrain? Or on some moonlight hill, the shepherd pour'd More touching far than ever poet breathed Amid the Grecian isles, or later times Why therefore are ye silent, ye who know The trance of adoration, and behold Upon your bended knees the throne of Heaven, Believe it not, That poetry, in purer days the nurse, Yea, parent oft of blissful piety, Should silent keep from service of her God, From Lines Sacred to the Memory of the Rev. James Grahame, literary enterprises which he wanted industry to achieve. The subject remained unoccupied until it fell into the hands of Milman, who converted it into a sacred drama, in which, attentive to dramatic unities, he has confined the time of action to thirty-six hours; but within that brief space he has collected such an amount of description and incident, as leaves us little to regret for the non-appearance of the promised epic. His other productions were Anne Boleyn, a dramatic poem, in which the characters of Henry VIII., and the Jesuit, Angelo Caraffa, are delineated with great power of description-The Martyr of Antioch, where we have the lovely picture of a young female only a little lower than the angelsand Belshazzar, in which he has contrasted, with the strongest light and shade, the last night of pomp and revelry in Babylon, and the tremendous ruin in which it was closed. Besides these productions, Milman wrote an epic poem in twelve books, entitled, Samor, Lord of the Bright City; but this work, although exhibiting many passages of great power and richness, is defective in clearness and interest as a narrative, and has never become a favourite with the public. Although the drama has been his chosen department, Milman is defective in that quality which is the most essential element in dramatic writing-the sweeping vehemence and passion which are so necessary to convert poetical abstractions into living realities. But if he is somewhat cold and artificial as a mere dramatist, he atones for this defect by his high qualities as a poet-grandeur of imagery, depth of thought, and rich melody of language, by which the lyrical passages of his plays are among the noblest specimens of our modern poetry. We may add, that he is a bright refutation of Dr. Johnson's idea, that Religion is unfitted for poetical purposes. A single page of any of Milman's sacred dramas is a conclusive argument upon this head. It is enough, for instance, to allude to the hymn of Miriam, in The Fall of Jerusalem. There have been tears from holier eyes than mine Pour'd o'er thee, Zion! yea, the Son of Man This thy devoted hour foresaw and wept. I feel it now, the sad, the coming hour; Her tale of splendour now is told and done: And all is o'er, her grandeur and her guilt. THIS eminent dramatic poet was born in London, on the 10th of February, 1791, and was the youngest son of Sir Francis Milman, a physician of high repu tation. He was first sent to school at Greenwich, where he had for his early instructor the talented Dr. Burney, under whose excellent tuition he made great proficiency in the elements of literature; after which he was removed to Eton, where he remained nine years. In 1810, he became a student of Brazen Nose College, Oxford, where his previous acquirements and continued diligence gained him the highest literary reputation, and there he obtained the greatest number of prizes that had ever fallen to the lot of any single scholar within these halls. One of them was for English, and another for Latin verse; and the third and fourth for English and Latin essays. After a career of such distinction, the path of life was open to the successful scholar, and, in 1815, he obtained a Fellowship in that College where his literary honours had been won. In 1817, he entered into holy orders, and was presented to the vicarage of St. Mary, in the town of Reading. Here he employed himself in the duties of his sacred calling until he was elected to an office which he was so well qualified to adorn; this was, the Professorship of Poetry in the University of Oxford, to which he was appointed in 1821. The life of the learned and reverend professor, as an author, notwithstanding this brief abstract, has been sufficiently distinguished by active exertion. Before he entered into orders, he wrote the Tragedy of Fazio, a work constructed upon the old English dramatic model; and the attempt was so successful, that the play was performed at Drury Lane to crowded houses, and still continues to be a favourite on the stage. The work itself exhibits a rich vein of poetry, and abounds in striking situations; so that it also pleases in the closet, notwithstanding the awkwardness of the plot, and occasional inconsistency of the characters. His next production, which appeared in 1820, was The Fall of Jerusalem. This magnificent topic had been brooded over by Coleridge for years, as the subject of an epic poem, in which the importance of the event, the thrilling nature of its incidents, and the grandeur of its antecedents and consequences, would have furnished materials only of secondary importance to those of Paradise Lost; but it was the misfortune of Coleridge to dream of great literary enterprises which he wanted industry to achieve. The subject remained unoccupied until it fell into the hands of Milman, who converted it into a sacred drama, in which, attentive to dramatic unities, he has confined the time of action to thirty-six hours; but within that brief space he has collected such an amount of description and incident, as leaves us little to regret for the non-appearance of the promised epic. His other productions were Anne Boleyn, a dramatic poem, in which the characters of Henry VIII., and the Jesuit, Angelo Caraffa, are delineated with great power of description-The Martyr of Antioch, where we have the lovely picture of a young female only a little lower than the angels— and Belshazzar, in which he has contrasted, with the strongest light and shade, the last night of pomp and revelry in Babylon, and the tremendous ruin in which it was closed. Besides these productions, Milman wrote an epic poem in twelve books, entitled, Samor, Lord of the Bright City; but this work, although exhibiting many passages of great power and richness, is defective in clearness and interest as a narrative, and has never become a favourite with the public. Although the drama has been his chosen department, Milman is defective in that quality which is the most essential element in dramatic writing-the sweeping vehemence and passion which are so necessary to convert poetical abstractions into living realities. But if he is somewhat cold and artificial as a mere dramatist, he atones for this defect by his high qualities as a poet-grandeur of imagery, depth of thought, and rich melody of language, by which the lyrical passages of his plays are among the noblest specimens of our modern poetry. We may add, that he is a bright refutation of Dr. Johnson's idea, that Religion is unfitted for poetical purposes. A single page of any of Milman's sacred dramas is a conclusive argument upon this head. It is enough, for instance, to allude to the hymn of Miriam, in The Fall of Jerusalem. MILMAN. LAMENTATION OVER THE APPROACHING RUIN OF JERUSALEM. There have been tears from holier eyes than mine Pour'd o'er thee, Zion! yea, the Son of Man I feel it now, the sad, the coming hour; Her tale of splendour now is told and done: |