e smile of the planter;--while the meadow may be visited again and again
with renewed delight; its beauty is innate in the soil, and its bloom is
of the freshness of nature.

The next ground of critical judgment, and point of comparison, will be as
to how far a given poet has been influenced by accidental circumstances.
As a living poet must surely write, not for the ages past, but for that in
which he lives, and those which are to follow, it is on the one hand
natural that he should not violate, and on the other necessary that he
should not depend on, the mere manners and modes of his day. See how
little does Shakespeare leave us to regret that he was born in his
particular age! The great aera in modern times was what is called the
Restoration of Letters;--the ages preceding it are called the dark ages;
but it would be more wise, perhaps, to call them the ages in which we were
in the dark. It is usually overlooked that the supposed dark period was
not universal, but partial and successive, or alternate; that the dark age
of England was not the dark age of Italy, but that one country was in its
light and vigour, whilst another was in its gloom and bondage. But no
sooner had the Reformation sounded through Europe like the blast of an
archangel's trumpet, than from king to peasant there arose an enthusiasm
for knowledge; the discovery of a manuscript became the subject of an
embassy; Erasmus read by moonlight, because he could not afford a torch,
and begged a penny, not for the love of charity, but for the love of
learning. The three great points of attention were religion, morals, and
taste; men of genius, as well as men of learning, who in this age need to
be so widely distinguished, then alike became copyists of the ancients;
and this, indeed, was the only way by which the taste of mankind could be
improved, or their understandings informed. Whilst Dante imagined himself
a humble follower of Virgil, and Ariosto of Homer, they were both
unconscious of that greater power working within them, which in many
points carried them beyond their supposed originals. All great discoveries
bear the stamp of the age in which they are made;--hence we perceive the
effects of the purer religion of the moderns visible for the most part in
their lives; and in reading their works we should not content ourselves
with the mere narratives of events long since passed, but should learn to
apply their maxims and conduct to ourselves.

Having in