Microsoft Word Byron and Scott 1809-1824

108: PoC ll.164-75. 
109: PoC ll.235-50. 
110: PoC ll.337-50.
111: See Dante, Inferno XXXII-III. 

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that last quoted, for example,—which strongly remind us of Wordsworth. There is another, called 
‘Churchill’s Grave,’ for which Southey seems to afford the model, not in his epic strains, but in his 
English eclogues, in which moral truths are expressed, to use the poet’s own language in ‘an almost 
colloquial plainness of language,’ and an air of quaint and original expression, assumed to render the 
sentiment at once impressive and piquant. The grave of Churchill, however, might have called from 
Lord Byron a deeper commemoration; for though they generally differed in character and genius, there 
was a resemblance between their history and character. The satire of Churchill flowed with a more 
profuse, though not a more embittered stream; while, on the other hand, he cannot be compared to Lord 
Byron in point of tenderness or imagination. But both these poets held themselves above the opinion of 
the world, both were followed by the fame and popularity which they seemed to despise. The writings 
of both exhibit an inborn, though sometimes ill regulated generosity of mind, and a spirit of proud 
independence, frequently pushed to extremes. Both carried their hatred of hypocrisy beyond the verge 
of prudence, and indulged their vein of satire to the borders of licentiousness. In the flower of his age 
Churchill died in a foreign land,— [p.204] here we trust the parallel will cease, and that the subject of 
our criticism will long survive to honour his own. 
Two other pieces in this miscellany recal to our mind the wild, unbridled, and fiery imagination of 
Coleridge. To this poet’s high poetical genius we have always paid deference; though not uniformly 
perhaps, he has, too frequently for his own popularity, wandered into the wild and mystic, and left the 
reader at a loss accurately to determine his meaning. Perhaps in that called the ‘Spell’ the resemblance 
may be fanciful, but we cannot allow it to be so in the singular poem called ‘Darkness,’ well entitled 
‘A dream which is not all a dream.’ 
In this case our author has abandoned the art, so peculiarly his own, of shewing the reader where 
his purpose tends, and has contented himself with presenting a mass of powerful ideas unarranged, and 
the meaning of which we certainly confess ourselves always to attain. A succession of terrible images 
is placed before us flitting and mixing, and disengaging themselves as in the dream of a feverish man—
Chimeras dire, to whose existence the mind refuses credit, which confound and weary the ordinary 
reader, and baffle the comprehension even of those more accustomed to the flights of a poetic muse. 
The subject is the progress of utter darkness, until it becomes, in Shakespeare’s phrase, the ‘burier of 
the dead,’
112
and the assemblage of terrific ideas which the poet has placed before us only fail in 
exciting our terror from the extravagance of the plan. These mystical prolusions do indeed produce 
upon us the effect described in Henry Muir’s lines quoted in Southey’s Omniana— 
‘A lecture strange he read to me; 
And though I did not rightly understand 
His meaning, yet I deemed it to be 
Some goodly thing.’
113
But the reverence of feeling which we entertain for that which is difficult of comprehension, gives 
way to weariness whenever we begin to suspect that it cannot be distinctly comprehended by any one. 
To speak plainly, the framing of such phantasms is a dangerous employment for the exalted and 
teeming imagination of such a poet as Lord Byron, whose Pegasus has always required rather a bridle 
than a spur. The waste of boundless space into which they lead the poet, the neglect of precision which 
such themes may render habitual, make them, in respect to poetry, what mysticism is to religion. The 
meaning of the poet as he ascends upon cloudy wing becomes the shadow only of a thought, and 
having eluded the comprehension of others, necessarily ends by [p.205] escaping from that of the 
author himself. The strength of poetical conception, and beauty of diction, bestowed upon such 
prolusions, is as much thrown away as the colours of a painter, could he take a cloud of mist, or a 
wreath of smoke for his canvas. 
Omitting one or two compositions of less interest we cannot but notice the ‘Dream,’ which, if we 
do not misconstrue it, has a covert and mysterious relation to the tale of Childe Harold. It is written 
with the same power of poetry, nor have we here to complain of obscurity in the mode of narrating the 
vision, though we pretend not to the skill or information necessary to its interpretation. It is difficult, 
however, to mistake who or what is meant in the conclusion, and more especially as the tone too well 
agrees with similar passages in the continuation of Childe Harold.