erfection, by
blending it with the moral affections, with the picturesque imagery of the
olden time, with the magic of eastern or classical association. But none
of our poets--how great soever their genius, how varied their
materials--have exceeded, if they have equalled, the exquisite beauty of
his descriptions; and the purest taste in observation, as the utmost
beauty of expression, is still to be best attained by studying night and
day the poems of Virgil.

Modern epic poetry arose in a different age, and was moulded by different
circumstances. The mythology of antiquity was at an end, and with it had
perished the gay and varied worship which had so long amused or excited an
imaginative people. The empire of the Caesars, with its grandeur and its
recollections, had sunk into the dusk; the venerable letters, S. P. Q. R.,
no longer commanded the veneration of mankind. A new faith, enjoining
moral duties, had descended upon the earth: a holier spirit had come to
pervade the breasts of the faithful. An unknown race of fierce barbarians
had broken into the decaying provinces of the Roman empire, and swept away
their government, their laws, their property, and their institutions. But
the Christian faith had proved more powerful than the arms of the legions;
it alone had survived, amidst the general wreck of the civilized world.
Mingling with the ardent feelings and fierce energy of the barbarian
victors, it sat

----"a blooming bride
By valour's arm'd and awful side."

Incorporating itself with the very souls of the conquerors--descending on
their heads with the waters of baptism, never leaving them till the moment
of extreme unction--it moulded between these two extremes their whole
character. A new principle superior to all earthly power was introduced--a
paramount authority established, to which even the arm of victorious
conquest was compelled to submit--ruthless warriors were seen kneeling at
the feet of unarmed pontiffs. The crown of the Caesars had more than once
been lowered before the cross of the head of the faithful.

From the intensity and universality of these religious emotions, and the
circumstance of the Holy Land being in the hands of the Saracens, with
whom Christendom had maintained so long, and at times so doubtful, a
struggle, a new passion had seized upon the people of modern Europe, to
which no parallel is to be found in the previous or subsequent history of
mankind. The desire to rec