not partake of
earthly coarseness.

It may be asked, _cui bono?_ what is the moral use of such poems as
these? Whatever refines the intellect improves the heart; whatever
augments and fortifies the spiritual part of our nature raises us in the
rank of created beings. And what poems are more calculated to refine our
intellect, and increase our spirituality, than the poems of Collins? To
embody, in a brilliant manner, the most beautiful abstractions, to put
them into action, and to add to them splendour, harmony, strength, and
purity of language, is to complete a task as admirable for its use and
its delight, as it is difficult to be executed. No one can receive the
intellectual gratification which such works are capable of producing
without being the better for it. The understanding was never yet roused
to the conception of such pure and abstract thinking without an
elevation of the whole nature of the being so roused. The expression of
subtle and evanescent ideas, carried to its perfection, is among the
very noblest and most exalted studies with which the human mind can be
conversant.

It has been the fashion of our own age to beat out works into twentyfold
and fiftyfold the size of those of Collins. I do not quarrel with that
fashion; each fashion has its use: and my own taste induces me to
perceive the value and many attractions of long narrative poems, full of
human passions and practical wisdom. The matter is more desirable than
the workmanship; and much of occasional carelessness in the language may
be forgiven, for fertility of natural and just thought and interest of
story. But this in no degree diminishes the value of those gems, which,
though of the smallest size, comprehend perfections of every kind. It is
easier to work upon a large field than a small one,--one where is

"Ample room and verge enough
The characters of hell to trace."

But these diffuse productions are not calculated to give the same sort
of pleasure as the gems. How difficult was the path chosen by Collins
is sufficiently proved by the want of success of all who have entered
the same walk: Gray's was not the same, as I shall endeavour presently
to show. In the miscellany of Dodsley and other collectors will be found
numerous attempts at Allegorical Odes: they are almost all nauseous
failures--without originality or distinctness of conception; bald in
their language, lame in their numbers, and repulsive from their
insipidity of ideas.