ARGUMENT.

Education necessary to give Genius its full power and usefulness-Beattie's Edwin described-Genius, though daring, excels also in subjects of the most soft and pleasing kind-Virgil's Eclogues.-Petrarch.-Gray.-Cowper.The force of Fiction.-Rousseau.-Richardson.-Fielding. -Burney.-Radcliffe.—The varied direction of Genius.

GENIUS.

THO' in the dreary depths of Gothic gloom,
Genius will burst the fetters of her tomb;
Yet education should direct her way,

And nerve, with firmer grasp, her powerful sway.
The comet's glare enlightens not the world,
Which flies thro' heaven, in wild confusion hurl'd;
But 'tis the sun that holds his stedfast sphere,
And crowns the seasons of the rolling year.
The marble buried, in its native mines,
Conceals the beauty of its clouds and lines;
The sculptor's polish can each beauty give,

And even make the rugged marble live!

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Thus Genius, in the night of Darkness born,
May wind, unnotic'd, her resounding horn,
Unless some power shall, to her wondering soul,
The page of knowledge and of art unrol.
Young Edwin* wandered in his native dell,
And woke the music of his simple shell;
With pondering awe, he from the giddy steep,
"Like shipwreck'd mariner," o'erhung the deep,
And listen'd to the billow's solemn roar,

Which rolling fell upon the winding shore.
With morning dawn, he left his lowly shed,
And, led in wonder, sought the mountain head,
Where, hid in trees, and seated on the ground,
He listen'd to the far-off curfew's sound.
His thoughtful mind unlettered, would explore
And muse in sadness that he knew no more;
At length an hermit, to his longing eyes,
Bade the sad visions of the world arise;
To his attention all his lore express'd,
And rous'd the Genius kindled in his breast.

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* See Beattie's Minstrel-a work of the justest sentiment, of the finest painting, and which gives to the world a picture in Edwin that can never be too much admired.

Tho' Genius mostly loves some daring theme,
Yet she can warble with the tinkling stream;
Tho' her bold hand strikes the hoarse thundering
strings,

Yet not the nightingale more sweetly sings.
Hush! every sound-let not a zephyr move;
O let me listen to those notes of love!

For tender Virgil* breathes his softest strain,
And Amaryllis fills the shady plain:

His voice of music lulls the stilly scene,

And not a whisper flits across the

green.

In transport toss'd, I tread some fairy shade,
And hear the accents of my peerless maid!

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The Eclogues of Virgil have been the models of the most finished pastorals, that have since been written. Pope's pastorals have little more to recommend them than their smoothness of versification. The writer who approaches nearest to the great master of this species of poetry, is Gessner. His idyls observe a style peculiar to themselves. He is happy in his selection of simple and affecting incidents; of such as have great force upon the heart. Dr. Johnson in his criticism upon Virgil's Eclogues, after noticing the beauties and defects of each one, gives the preference to the first. In this decision he has been generally followed.

Her silent footsteps thro' the glade I trace,
And seem to clasp her in my fond embrace;
Around me flows the breath of every flower,
And wildest music breaks from every bower.

Thou murmuring breeze! O bear upon thy wing That strain, which flows from Petrarch's* mournful string.

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This singular character was born at Arezzo, in the beginning of the fourteenth century, when Europe began to shake off the long slumbers of Gothic night, and to hail the morning of Literature. Early in life he received the patronage of the noble family of Colonna, under whose shelter he was enabled to prosecute his studies, and to obtain stores of information unequalled in that day. His romantic attachment for Laura, who was the wife of the young Hughes de Sades, is well known. He first saw this lady, at the time of matins, in the monastery of St. Claire. He was instantly struck with her face, her air, her person, her dark and tender eyes, "her ringJets interwoven with the hands of love," her gentle and modest carriage, and the melting sound of her voice. Unhappy in his passion, and unable to banish it from him, he mourned over it in his sonnets with the most inimitable tenderness, and sought for its alleviation in the solitary shades of Vaucluse; but all his efforts to forget the object of his affection were in vain. Though he concealed himself in solitude from the observation