During the whole of Cowper's residence at Olney, he retained the same sentiments of affectionate sympathy for the sufferings of the poor that he had evinced when he first came among them. And though he had experienced some painful proofs of their insensibility, ingratitude, and unkindness, yet his heart had often been made to rejoice with those whom either his own liberality or the liberality of his friends had enabled him to relieve. Aware that it afforded him so much pleasure to be employed

and accomplish a work of so great magnitude. To Lady Hesketh he thus discloses the state of his mind in this respect:-" Your anxious wishes for my success delight me, and you may rest assured that I have all the ambition on the subject that you can wish me to feel. I more than admire my author. I often stand astonished at his beauties. I am for ever amused with the translation of him, and I have received a thousand encouragements: these are all so many happy omens, that I hope will be verified by the event. I am not ashamed to confess that, hav-in communicating happiness to others, his friends ing commenced an author, I am most abundantly desirous to succeed as such. I have (what perhaps you little suspect me of) in my nature an infinite share of ambition. But with it I have, at the same time, as you well know, an equal share of diffidence. To this combination of opposite qualities it has been owing that, till lately, I stole through life without undertaking any thing, yet always wishing to distinguish myself. At last I ventured, ventured too in the only path that, at so late a period, was yet open to me, and am determined, if God have not determined otherwise, to work my way through the obscurity that has been so long my portion, into notice. Every thing, therefore, that seems to threaten this my favorite purpose, with disappointment, affects me severely. I suppose that all ambitious minds are in the same predicament. He who seeks distinction must be sensible of disapprobation, exactly in the same proportion as he desires applause. I have thus, my dear cousin, unfolded my heart to you in this particular, without a speck of dissimulation. Some people, and good people too, would blame me, but you will not; and they, I think, would blame without just cause. We certainly do not honor God when we bury, or when we neglect to improve, as far as we can, whatever talent he may have bestowed upon us, whether it be little or much, In natural things, as well as spiritual, it is a neverfailing truth, that to him who hath, (that is, to him who employs what he hath, diligently, and so as to increase it,) more shall be given. Set me down, therefore, my dear cousin, for an industrious rhymer, so long as I shall have ability. For in this only way is it possible for me, so far as I can see, either to honor God, or even to serve myself."

often placed at his disposal such things as they felt inclined to contribute. The following interesting extract from a letter to Mr. Unwin, proves how highly he was gratified in being thus benevolently employed:-"I have thought with pleasure of the summer that you have had in your heart, while you have been employed in softening the severity of winter, in behalf of so many who must otherwise have been exposed to it. You never said a better thing in your life than when you assured Mr. — of the expedience of a gift of bedding to the poor atolney. There is no one article of this world's comforts, with which, as Falstaff says, they are so heinously unprovided. When a poor woman, and an honest one, whom we know well, carried home two pair of blankets, a pair for herself and husband, and a pair for her six children, that you kindly placed at my disposal, as soon as the children saw them, they jumped out of their straw, caught them in their arms, kissed them, blessed them, and danced for joy. An old woman, a very old one, the first night that she found herself so comfortably covered, could not sleep a wink, being kept awake by the contrary emotions of transport on the one hand, and the fear of not being thankful enough on the other."

After the publication of Cowper's second volume, and previous to his removal from Olney, he had renewed his correspondence with some relatives and friends with whom he had formerly been on terms of intimacy, but who seemed almost to have forgotten him, until the popularity of his publications arrested their attention. Among these were General Cowper and Rev. Walter Bagot. Cowper's letters to the latter prove that his attachment to him was not slight and superficial, but deep and fervent. In In reply to the apprehensions expressed by some February, 1786, it pleased God to deprive Mr. Bagot of his correspondents, that the confinement and close of his amiable and accomplished wife, who was reapplication which this work necessarily required, |spected and beloved by all who knew her. On this would prove injurious to his health, and be likely melancholy occasion Cowper wrote to him as folto increase his depression, he made the following lows-"Alas! alas! my dear, dear friend, may God remarks:-"You may well wonder at my courage, himself comfort you! I will not be so absurd as to who have undertaken a work of such enormous attempt it. By the close of your letter, it should length; you would wonder more if you knew I seem that in this hour of great trial, he withholds translated the whole Iliad, with no other help than not his consolations from you. I know by experia Clavis. But I have since equipped myself for this ence that they are neither few nor small; and though immense journey, and am revising the work in com- I feel for you as I never felt for man before, yet do pany with a good commentator. I thank you for I sincerely rejoice in this, that, whereas there is but the solicitude you express on the subject of my pre-one comforter in the universe, under afflictions sent studies. The work is undoubtedly long and such as yours, you both know Him, and know where laborious, but it has an end, and proceeding leisure-to seek Him. I thought you a man the most happily ly, with a due attention to air and exercise, it is pos- mated that I had ever seen, and had great pleasure sible that I may live to finish it. Assure yourself of in your felicity. Pardon me, if now I feel a wish, one thing, that though to a bystander it may seem that, short as my acquaintance with her was, I had an occupation surpassing the powers of a constitu- never seen her; I should then have mourned with tion never very athletic, and, at present, not a little you, but not as I do now. Mrs. Unwin also sympathe worse for wear, I can invent for myself no em-thizes with you most sincerely, and you neither are, ployment that does not exhaust my spirits more. I nor will be soon forgotten, in such prayers as we will not pretend to account for this; I will only can make. I will not detain you longer now, my say that it is not the language of predilection for a poor afflicted friend, than to commit you to the merfavorite amusement, but that the fact is really so.cy of God, and to bid you a sorrowful adieu. May I have ever found that those plaything avocations which one may execute almost without any attention, fatigue me, and wear me away, while such as engage me much, and attach me closely, are rather serviceable to me than otherwise."

God be with you my friend, and give you a just measure of submission to his will, the most effectual remedy for the evils of this changing scene. I doubt not that he has granted you this blessing already, and may he still continue it."

CHAPTER XII.

Pleasure he enjoyed in his new residence. Sudden death of Mrs.
Unwin's son. Cowper's distress on the occasion. Experiences a

severe attack of illness. Is compelled to relinquish, for a time, his
labors of translation. Mr. Rose's first visit to him. His sudden re-
covery. Manner of spending his time. Peculiarities of his case.
Is dissuaded from resuming his translation. His determination to

persevere in it. Applies to it with the utmost diligence. Great care with which he translated it. His admiration of the original. Providential preservation of Mrs. Unwin. His painful depression

unremoved.

the hills near Olney, and which I have had the honor to celebrate, an affair of no consideration.

Wintry as the weather is, do not suspect that it confines me. I ramble daily, and every day change my ramble. Wherever I go, I find short grass under my feet, and when I have travelled perhaps five miles, come home with shoes not at all too dirty for a drawing-room."

Cowper was scarcely settled in his new abode, and had hardly had time to participate of its enjoyments, before an event occurred, which plunged both him By the end of November, 1786, Cowper was com- and Mrs. Unwin into the deepest distress. It pleasfortably settled in his new residence at Weston. ed God, who does every thing according to his will, The house was delightfully situated, very near that with angels as well as with men, all whose dispenof his friendly and accomplished landlord, Sir John sations, mysterious as some of them may appear, Throckmorton, with whom he was now on terms of are conducted on principles of unerring wisdom, intimacy, and who had given him the full use of and infinite benevolence, to remove from this scene his spacious and agreeable pleasure grounds. This of toil and labor, to regions of peace and happiness, afforded him an opportunity, at almost all seasons, Mrs. Unwin's son, in the prime of life, and in a of taking that degree of exercise in the open air, manner the most sudden and unexpected. Cowper which he always found so conducive to his health. had always loved him as a brother, and had most The following extracts from his first letter to Lady unreservedly communicated his mind to him, on all Hesketh, after entering on his new abode, describe occasions. Their attachment to each other was the state of his feelings, and prove how truly he mutually strong, cordial, and affectionate. The enjoyed the change. November 26, 1786. It is loss of such a friend could not fail to make a deep my birth-day, my beloved cousin, and I determine impression on the poet's mind, and the following to employ a part of it that is not destitute of festivi- extracts will show how much he felt on the occaty, in writing to you. The dark thick fog that has sion:-"I find myself here situated exactly to my obscured it, would have been a burthen to me at mind. Weston is one of the prettiest villages in Olney, but here I have hardly attended to it. The England; the walks about it are at all seasons of neatness and snugness of our abode, compensates the year delightful. We had just begun to enjoy for all the dreariness of the season, and whether the the pleasantness of our new situation, to find at least ways are wet or dry, our house, at least, is always as much comfort in it as the season of the year would warm and commodious. Oh! for you, my cousin, permit, when affliction found us out in our retreat, to partake of these comforts with us! I will not and the news reached us of the death of Mr. Unwin. begin already to tease you upon that subject, but He had taken a western tour with Mr. Henry Mrs. Unwin remembers to have heard from your Thornton, and on his return at Winchester, was own lips, that you hate London in the spring: per- seized with a putrid fever, which sent him to his haps, therefore, by that time, you may be glad to grave. He is gone to it, however, though young, escape from a scene which will be every day grow-as fit for it as age itself could have made him. Reing more disagreeable, that you may enjoy the com- gretted, indeed, and always to be regretted by those forts of the Lodge. You well know that the best who knew him; for he had every thing that makes house has a desolate appearance unfurnished. This a man valuable, both in his principles and in his house accordingly, since it has been occupied by us, manners, but leaving still this consolation to his surand our meubles, is as much superior to what it was viving friends; that he was desirable in this world when you saw it, as you can imagine; the parlor chiefly because he was so well prepared for a betis even elegant. When I say that the parlor is ele- ter. gant, I do not mean to insinuate that the study is It is neat, warm, and silent, and a much better study than I deserve, if I do not produce in it an incomparable translation of Homer. I think every day of those lines of Milton, and congratulate myself on having obtained, before I am quite superannuated, what he seems not to have hoped for

not so.

"The Throckmortons continue the most obliging neighbors in the world. One morning last week, they both went with me to the cliffs-a scene, my dear, in which you would delight beyond measure, but which you cannot visit except in the spring or autumn. The heat of summer, and clinging dirt of winter would destroy you. What is called the cliff, is no cliff, nor at all like one, but a beautiful terrace, sloping gently down to the base, and from the brow of which, though it is not lofty, you have a view of such a valley, as makes that which you saw from

"The death of one whom I valued as I did Mr. Unwin, is a subject on which I could say much, and with much feeling. But habituated as my mind has been these many years to melancholy themes, I am glad to excuse myself the contemplation of them as much as possible. I will only observe that the death of so young a man, whom I saw so lately in good health, and whose life was so desirable on every account, has something in it peculiarly distressing. I cannot think of the widow and the children he has left, without a heart-ache that I remember not to have felt before. We may well say that the ways of God are mysterious: in truth, they are so, and to a degree that only such events can give us any conception of. Mrs. Unwin's life has been so much a life of affliction, that whatever occurs to her in that shape, has not, at least, the terrors of novelty to embitter it. She is supported under this, as she has been under a thousand others, with a submission of which I never saw her deprived for a moment.

"Though my experience has long since taught me that this world is a world of shadows, and that it is the more prudent, as well as the more Christian course, to possess the comforts that we find in it, as if we possessed them not, it is no easy matter to reduce this doctrine to practice. We forget that that God who gave them, may, when he pleases, take them away; and that, perhaps, it may please him to take them away at a time when we least expect it, and are least disposed to part with them. Thus it

THE LIFE OF WILLIAM COWPER.

has happened in the present case. There never
was a moment in Unwin's life when there seemed
to be more urgent want of him than the moment in
which he died. He had attained to an age, when,
if they are at any time useful, men become more
useful to their families, their friends, and the world.
His parish began to feel, and to be sensible of the
value of his ministry; his children were thriving
under his own tuition and management. The re-
moval of a man in the prime of life, of such a cha-
racter, and with such connections, seems to make a
void in society that can never be filled. God seemed
to have made him just what he was, that he might
be a blessing to others, and when the influence of
his character and abilities began to be felt, removed
him. These are mysteries that we cannot contem-
plate without astonishment, but which will never-
theless be explained hereafter, and must, in the
mean time, be revered in silence. It is well for
Mrs. Unwin that she has spent her life in the prac-
tice of an habitual acquiescence in the dispensations
of Providence, else I know that this stroke, would
have been heavier, after all that she has suffered
upon another account, than she could have borne.
She derives, as she well may, great consolation from
the thought that he lived the life, and died the
death of a Christian. The consequence is, if pos-
sible, more certain than the most mathematical
conclusion, that therefore he is happy."

Cowper had scarcely given vent to his feelings
on the melancholy occurrence of Mr. Unwin's de-
cease, when he was himself again visited by severe
indisposition. His depressive malady retured, with
all its baleful consequences, and prevented him for
more than six months, either from doing any thing
with his translation of Homer, or carrying on his
correspondence with his friends, or even from en-
joying the conversation of those with whom he was
most intimately associated, and whom he loved
most affectionately. It is highly probable, that the
painful feelings, occasioned by a too frequent recur-
rence to the apparently disastrous consequences, that
must be the result of his friend's removal, occasion-
ed this attack. His mind bore up under the first
shock with comparative firmness, but his intense
feelings, perhaps, pictured its remote effects in
colors much more gloomy than were ever likely to
be realized. Such seems to have been the case
with him at the death of his brother. He attended
him in his dying hours, saw him gradually sink into
the arms of death, arranged all the affairs of his
funeral, and then, when other persons less susceptible
of feeling, would in all probability have forgot-
ten the event, his apprehensive mind invested it
with imaginary h. rrors that were to him insupporta-
ble.

This affliction of Cowper's commenced in the early part of January, 1787. In his letters to his cousin, he thus adverts to the first symptoms of it:"I have had a little nervous fever lately, that has somewhat abridged my sleep, and though I find myself better to-day than I have been since it seized me, yet I feel my head lightish, and not in the best order for writing." In the next letter to the same correspondent, written about a week afterwardsthe last he wrote to any of his correspondents until his recovery, he again adverts to the progress of his complaint. "I have been so much indisposed with the nervous fever, that I told you in my last had seized me, my nights, during the whole week, may be said to have been almost sleepless. The consequence has been, that, except the translation of about thirty lines at the conclusion of the thirteenth book, I have been forced to abandon Homer entirely. This was a sensible mortification to me, as you may suppose, and felt the more, because my spirits of

course failing with my strength, I seemed to have
peculiar need of my old amusement. It seemed
hard, therefore, to be forced to resign it, just when
I wanted it most. But Homer's battles cannot be
fought by a man who does not sleep well, and who
has not some little degree of animation in the day-
time. Last night, however, quite contrary to my
expectation, the fever left me entirely, and I slept
soundly, quietly and long. If it please God that it
return not, I shall soon find myself in a condition
to proceed. I walk constantly, that is to say, Mrs.
Unwin and I together; for at these times I keep
her constantly employed, and never suffer her to be
absent from me many minutes. She gives me all
her time, and all her attention, and forgets that
there is another object in the world besides my-
self."

About this time, that intimacy between Cowper
and Samuel Rose, Esq. which subsequently ripened
into a friendship that nothing but death could dis-
solve, commenced. At the close of the letter from
which we made our last extract, Cowper thus ad-
verts to the circumstance:-" A young gentleman
called here, yesterday, who came six miles out of
his way to see me. He was on a journey from Lon-
don to Glasgow, having just left the university there.
He came, I suppose, partly to satisfy his own curi-
osity, but chiefly, as it seemed, to bring me the thanks
of some of the Scotch professors for my two volumes.
His name is Rose, an Englishman. Your spirits being
good, you will derive more pleasure from this inci-
dent than I can at present, therefore I send it.".
Notwithstanding the depression of mind which Cow-
per was beginning again to experience, when this
unexpected interview between him and Mr. Rose
took place, and his consequent aversion to the visits
of any one, but especially strangers, yet he was so
highly pleased with his new friend, that he com-
menced a correspondence with him immediately on
recovering his health; and he ever regarded it as a
providential circumstance, and a token of the good-
ness of God towards him, in giving him a friend
and a correspondent, who, in some measure at least,
supplied the loss he had experienced by the death
of Mr. Unwin.

In February, 1787, Cowper's depressive malady had so greatly increased, that his mind became again enveloped in the deepest gloom. The following extracts from his letters, written after his recovery, which took place in the ensuing autumn, will best describe the painful and distressing state to which he was reduced:-"My indisposition could not be of a worse kind. Had I been afflicted with a fever, or confined by a broken bone, neither of these cases would have made it impossible that we should meet. I am truly sorry that the impediment was insurmountable while it lasted, for such, in fact, it was. The sight of any face, except Mrs. Unwin's was to me an insupportable grievance; and when it has happened, that by forcing himself into my hiding place, some friend has found me out, he has had no great cause to exult in his success, as Mr. Bull could tell you. From this dreadful condition of mind, I emerged suddenly; so suddenly, that Mrs. Unwin, having no notice of such a change herself, could give none to any body; and when it. obtained, how long it might last, and how far it might be depended upon, was a matter of the greatest uncertainty. It affects me on the recollection with the more concern, because it has deprived me of an interview with you, and has prevented you from visiting others who would have been very glad to see you."

In the midst of Cowper's severe attack, his friend, Mr. Rose paid him another visit, and was greatly distressed to find him reduced to such a degree of

days in which we do not meet, and I am now almost as much at home in their house as in my own. I have the free use of their library, an acquisition of great value to me, as I cannot live without books. By this means I have been so well supplied, that I have not yet even looked at the Lounger, which you were so kind as to send me. His turn comes next, and I shall probably begin him to-morrow."

Cowper's correspondence with Mr. Newton had now been suspended for some months. In the be ginning of the ensuing October he renewed it; and the following extracts will afford some interesting information respecting the peculiarity of his case:

wretchedness that he could not be prevailed upon | to converse with him on any subject. Cowper, as soon as he began to feel the slightest symptoms of recovery, recollected the great sympathy and disinterested kindness of his new friend, and he took care to present him with the first productions of his pen. In the last week of July, 1787, he thus addressed him:-"This is the first time I have written these six months; and nothing but the constraint of obligation could induce me to write now. I cannot be so wanting to myself as not to endeavor, at least, to thank you, both for the visits with which you have favored me, and the poem that you have sent me. In my present state of mind I taste nothing, nevertheless I read-partly from habit, and partly My Dear Friend-After a long but necessary inbecause it is the only thing I am capable of." A terruption of our correspondence, I return to it again month afterwards he again wrote to the same cor- in one respect, at least better qualified for it than respondent. "I have not yet taken up my pen, ex- before; I mean by a belief of your identity, which, cept to write to you. The little taste that I have for thirteen years, strange and unaccountable as it had of your company, and your kindness in finding may appear, I did not believe. The acquisition of me out, make me wish that we were nearer neigh- this light, if light it may be called, which leaves me bors, and that there were not so great a disparity in as much in the dark as ever, on the most interesting our years; that is to say, not that you were older, subjects, releases me, however, from the most disabut that I was younger. Could we have met early greeable suspicion that I am addressing myself to in life, I flatter myself that we might have been you as the friend whom I loved and valued so highmore intimate than we are now likely to be. But ly in my better days, while in fact you are not that you shall not find me slow to cultivate such a mea- friend, but a stranger. I can now write to you withsure of your regard as your friends of your own age out seeming to act a part, and without having any can spare me. I hope the same kindness which need to charge myself with dissimulation-a charge has prompted you twice to call on me, will prompt from which, in that state of mind, and under such an you again; and I shall be happy, if, on a future oc- uncomfortable persuasion, I know not how to exculcasion, I shall be able to give you a more cheerful pate myself, and which, as you will easily conceive, reception than can be expected from an invalid. not seldom made my correspondence with you a My health and spirits are considerably improved, burden. Still, indeed, it wants, and is likely to and I once more associate with my neighbors. My want, that best ingredient, which alone can make it head, however, has been the worst part of me, and truly pleasant, either to myself or you that spiritu still continues so; is subject to giddiness and pain, ality which once enlivened all our intercourse. You maladies very unfavorable to poetical employment: will tell me, no doubt, that the knowledge I have but I feel some encouragement to hope that I may gained is an earnest of more, and more valuable inpossibly, before long, find myself able to resume the formation too; and that the dispersion of the clouds translation of Homer. When I cannot walk, I read, in part, promises, in due time, their complete disand read perhaps more than is good for me. But I persion. I should be happy to believe it; but the cannot be idle. The only mercy that I show my-power to do so is at present far from me. Never self in this respect is, that I read nothing that requires much closeness of application."

was the mind of man benighted to the degree that mine has been. The storms that have assailed me Cowper was now recovered sufficiently to resume would have overset the faith of every man that ever his correspondence with Lady Hesketh, and the had any; and the very remembrance of them, even following extracts will throw some additional light after they have been long passed by, makes hope on the gradually improving state of his health, and impossible. Mrs. Unwin, whose poor bark is still on the manner in which he then spent his time:- held together, though much shattered by being tossed My dear cousin, though it costs me something to and agitated so long at the side of mine, does not write, it would cost me more to be silent. My inter- forget yours and Mrs. Newton's kindness on this last course with my neighbors being renewed, I can no occasion. Mrs. Newton's offer to come to her aslonger forget how many reasons there are why you sistance, and your readiness to have rendered us the especially should not be neglected: no neighbor, in- same service, could you have hoped for any salutary deed, but the kindest of my friends, and ere long, I effect of your presence, neither Mrs. Unwin nor myhope an inmate. My health and spirits seem to be self undervalue, nor shall presently forget. But mending daily. To what end I know not, neither you judged right when you supposed that even your will conjecture, but endeavor, as far as I can, to be company would have been no relief to me; the comcontent that they do so. I use exercise, and take pany of my father or my brother, could they have the air in the park; I read much; have lately read been returned from the dead to visit me, would have Savary's Travels in Egypt, Memoirs of Baron du been none. We are now busy in preparing for the Tott, Fenn's Original Letters, the Letters of Frede- reception of Lady Hesketh, whom we expect here rick of Bohemia, and am now reading Memoirs shortly. Mrs. Unwin's time has, of course, been d'Henri de Lorraine, Duc de Guise. I have also lately occupied to a degree that made writing, to her read Barclay's Argenis, a Latin romance, and the impracticable; and she excused herself the rather, best romance that was ever written. All these, to- knowing my intentions to take her oflice. It does gether with Madan's Letters to Priestley, and seve- not, however, suit me to write much at a time. This ral pamphlets, I have read within these two months. last tempest has left my nerves in a worse condition So that you will say I am a great reader. I, how-than it found them; my head especially, though ever, write but little, because writing is become new to me; but I shall come on by degrees, and hope to regain the use of my pen before long. Our friends at the Hall make themselves more and more amiable in our account, by treating us rather as old friends, than as friends newly acquired. There are few

better informed, is more infirm than ever; I will therefore only add, that I rejoice to hear Mrs. Cowper has been so comfortably supported under her heavy trial. She must have severely felt the loss of her son. She has an affectionate heart towards her children, and could not but be sensible of the bitter

ness of such a cup. But God's presence sweetens | commenced the undertaking, and again entered up. every bitter. Desertion is the only evil that a Chris-on it with all his former spirit and activity. The tian cannot bear."

following extracts will show that his affliction had Cowper's friends were all delighted to see him not deprived him of the vigor of his mind, or proagain in full possession of his mental powers; and, duced in him the slightest disinclination to engage as many of them attributed his last attack to the irri- in this laborious work. "I am as heretofore occutation and fatigue occasioned by his translation of pied with Homer; my present occupation is the reHomer, they endeavored to dissuade him from pur- visal of all I have done, which is the first fifteen suing it, and recommended him to confine his atten- books. I stand amazed at my own increasing dextion to original poetry. Cowper was not, however, terity in the business, being verily persuaded that to be diverted from his purpose without an irrefra- as far as I have gone, I have improved the work to gable proof of its injurious tendency, and he had double its value. I will assure you, that it engages, formed a very different opinion on the subject to unavoidably, my whole attention. The length of that of his friends. In a letter to Mr. Newton, he it, the spirit of it, and the exactness requisite to its particularly adverts to it."I have many kind due performance, are so many most interesting Bubfriends, who, like yourself, wish that, instead of jects of consideration to me, who find that my best turning my endeavors to a translation of Homer, I attempts are only introductory to others, and, that had proceeded in the way of original poetry. But what to-day I supposed finished, to-morrow I must I can truly say, that it was ordered otherwise, not begin again. Thus it fares with a translator of by me, but by that God who governs all my thoughts, Homer.-To exhibit the majesty of such a poet in and directs all their intentions as he pleases. It a modern language, is a task that no man can estimay seem strange, but it is true, that after having mate the difficulty of till he attempts it. To parawritten a volume, in general, with great ease to my-phrase him loosely, to hang him with trappings that self, I found it impossible to write another page. do not belong to him, all this is comparatively easy. The mind of man is not a fountain, but a cistern; But to represent him with only his own ornaments, and mine, God knows, a broken one. It is my creed, and still to preserve his dignity, is a labor that if İ that the intellect depends as much, both for the ener- hope in any measure to achieve it, I am sensible can gy and the multitude of its exertions, upon the ope- only be achieved by the most assiduous and most rations of God's agency upon it, as the heart, for the unremitting attention; a perseverance that nothing exercise of its graces, upon the influence of the Holy can discourage, a minuteness of observation that Spirit. According to this persuasion, I may very suffers nothing to escape, and a determination not reasonably affirm, that it was not God's good plea- to be seduced from the staight line that lies before sure that I should proceed in the same track, be- us, by any images which fancy may present. There cause he did not enable me to do it. A whole year are perhaps, few arduous undertakings that are not, I waited, and waited in circumstances of mind that in fact, more arduous than we at first supposed made a state of mere employment peculiarly irk- them. As we proceed, difficulties increase upon us, some to me. I longed for the pen as the only reme- but our hopes gather strength also, and we conquer dy, but I could find no subject: extreme distress, at difficulties, which, could we have foreseen them, last, drove me, as, if I mistake not, I told you some we should never have had the boldness to encountime since, to lay Homer before me, and translate ter. You possess by nature all that is necessary to for amusement. Why it pleased God that I should success in the profession you have chosen. What be hunted into such a business, of such enormous remains is in your own power. They say of poets, that length and labor, by miseries for which he did not they must be born such; so must mathematicians, see good to afford me any other remedy, I know so must great generals, so must lawyers, and so innot. But so it was; and jejune as the consolation deed must men of all denominations, or it is not may be, and unsuited to the exigencies of a mind possible that they should excel. But with whatever that once was spiritual, yet a thousand times have faculties we are born, and to whatever studies our I been glad of it, for a thousand times it has served, genius may direct us, studies they must still be. I at least, to divert my attention, in some degree, from am persuaded that Milton did not write his Parasuch terrible tempests as I believe have seldom been dise Lost, nor Homer his Iliad, nor Newton his permitted to beat upon a human mind. Let my Principia, without immense labor. Nature gave friends, therefore, who wish me some little measure them a bent to their respective pursuits, and that of tranquillity in the performance of the most turbu- strong propensity, I suppose, is what we mean by lent voyage that ever Christian mariner made, be genius. The rest they gave themselves. contented, that having Homer's mountains and forests to windward, I escape, under their shelter, from many a gust of melancholy depression that would almost overset me, especially when they consider that, not by choice, but by necessity, I make them my refuge. As to the fame, and honor, and glory, that may be acquired by poetical feats of any sort, God knows, that if I could lay me down in my grave with hope at my side, or sit with this companion in a dungeon all the residue of my days, I would cheerfully waive them all. For, the little fame that I have already earned, has never saved me from one distressing night, or from one despairing day, since I first acquired it. For what I am reserved, or to what, is a mystery; I would fain hope, not merely that I may amuse others, or only to be a translator of Homer."

"My first thirteen books of Homer have been criticised in London; have been by me accommodated to those criticisms, returned to London in their improved state, and sent back to Weston with an imprimatur. This would satisfy some poets less anxious than myself about what they expose in public, but it has not satisfied me. I am now revising them again, by the light of my own critical taper, and make more alterations than at the first. But are they improvements? you will ask. Is not the spirit of the work endangered by all this correctness? I think and hope that it is not. Being well aware of the possibility of such a catastrophe, I guard particularly against it. Where I find a servile adhe rence to the original would render the passage less animated than it should be, I still, as at the first, allow myself a liberty. On all other occasions, I Ten months had now elapsed since Cowper had prune with an unsparing hand, determined that laid aside his translation, and as Johnston, the pub- there shall not be found in the whole translation an lisher, had been informed of his recovery, he wrote idea that is not Homer's. My ambition is, to proto require him to persevere in the work with as lit-duce the closest copy possible, and at the same time the delay as possible.-Cowper immediately re-l as harmonious as I can possibly make it.-This