n truth, the two styles
were often combined and, even when separate, had a kindred alliance with
each other. It is the business of the punster to discover and yoke
together two words, which, while they have some resemblance in sound,
the more exact the better, convey a totally different signification. The
metaphysical poet, on the other hand, piqued himself in discovering
hidden resemblances between ideas apparently the most dissimilar, and in
combining by some violent and compelled association, illustrations and
allusions utterly foreign from each other. Thus did the metaphysical
poet resemble the quibbler exercising precisely the same tyranny over
ideas, which the latter practised upon sounds only.

Jonson gave an early example of metaphysical poetry; indeed, it was the
natural resource of a mind amply stored with learning, gifted with a
tenacious memory and the power of constant labour, but to which was
denied that vivid perception of what is naturally beautiful, and that
happiness of expression, which at once conveys to the reader the idea of
the poet These latter qualities unite in many passages of Shakespeare,
of which the reader at once acknowledges the beauty, the justice, and
the simplicity. But such Jonson was unequal to produce; and he
substituted the strange, forced, and most unnatural though ingenious
analogies, which were afterwards copied by Donne and Cowley.[7] In
reading Shakespeare, we often meet passages so congenial to our nature
and feelings, that, beautiful as they are, we can hardly help wondering
they did not occur to ourselves; in studying Jonson, we have often to
marvel how his conceptions could have occurred to any human being. The
one is like an ancient statue, the beauty of which, springing from the
exactness of proportion does not always strike at first sight, but rises
upon us as we bestow time in considering it; the other is the
representation of a monster, which is at first only surprising, and
ludicrous or disgusting ever after. When the taste for simplicity
however, is once destroyed, it is long ere a nation recovers it; and the
metaphysical poets seem to have retained possession of the public favour
from the reign of James I. till the beginning of the Civil Wars silenced
the muses. The universities were perhaps to blame during this period of
usurpation; for which it may be admitted in excuse, that the
metaphysical poetry could only be practised by men whose minds were
deeply stored wi