herefore, rated him as roundly as we decently could
do, for the flagrant affectations of those early productions of his. In
the last volume he has published, we find more beauties than in the
former, both of language and of thought, but we are sorry to say, we
find abundance of the same absurd affectations also, and superficial
conceits, which first displeased us in his writings;--and which we are
again very sorry to say, must in our opinion, if persisted in, utterly
and entirely prevent Mr. Keats from ever taking his place among the pure
and classical poets of his mother tongue. It is quite ridiculous to see
how the vanity of these Cockneys makes them overrate their own
importance, even in the eyes of us, that have always expressed such
plain unvarnished contempt for them, and who do feel for them all, a
contempt too calm and profound, to admit of any admixture of any thing
like anger or personal spleen. We should just as soon think of being
wroth with vermin, independently of their coming into our apartment, as
we should of having any feelings at all about any of these people, other
than what are excited by seeing them in the shape of authors. Many of
them, considered in any other character than that of authors are, we
have no doubt, entitled to be considered as very worthy people in their
own way. Mr. Hunt is said to be a very amiable man in his own sphere,
and we believe him to be so willingly. Mr. Keats we have often heard
spoken of in terms of great kindness, and we have no doubt his manners
and feelings are calculated to make his friends love him. But what has
all this to do with our opinion of their poetry? What, in the name of
wonder, does it concern us, whether these men sit among themselves, with
mild or with sulky faces, eating their mutton steaks, and drinking their
porter at Highgate, Hampstead, or Lisson Green? What is there that
should prevent us, or any other person, that happens not to have been
educated in the University of Little Britain, from expressing a simple,
undisguised, and impartial opinion, concerning the merits or demerits of
men that we never saw, nor thought of for one moment, otherwise than as
in their capacity of authors? What should hinder us from saying, since
we think so, that Mr. Leigh Hunt is a clever wrong-headed man, whose
vanities have got inwoven so deeply into him, that he has no chance of
ever writing one line of classical English, or thinking one genuine
English thought, eithe