ANDREW MOFFAT, SKINNER STREET, SNOW HILL, AND H. WASHBOURNE, SALISBURY SQUARE. AND A. & C. BLACK, EDINBURGH. 1841. Katalog PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. THE POEMS of CowPER are in themselves of such sterling excellence, and retain so important a place in public estimation, that it were superfluous to offer apology for any attempt to extend the usefulness of these accepted favourites. A few brief remarks only appear to be necessary, explanatory of the origin and objects of the present publication. In 1832, the Proprietor requested the Editor to prepare a Biography of the Poet, and a complete edition of his works. On farther consideration, it was deemed expedient not to include the translations of Homer. The manuscripts were sent to press in the winter of 1833, and early in the succeeding year the first volume appeared, followed at short intervals by two others, composing the first uniform edition published in Britain of "England's Domestic and Evangelical Classic." These facts will relieve the Editor from the charge of presumption, in attempting what others had accomplished, or were engaged in completing. In truth, his publisher had reason to complain both of Mr Grimshawe's and of Dr Southey's publishers, who, on his announcement, advertised their editions as ready for immediate publication, though the first volume of one of these did not make its appearance till two years afterwards. Dr Southey states, that he began his edition in 1833, and his preface bears date October, 1835; the original preface to the first edition of the present work is dated March, 1834. So far then from either having intruded on the field of another's labours, the Editor had begun to write, and the proprietor had matured his arrangements, long before any one seems to have thought of giving to the world the collected works of our greatest Christian poet since the days of Milton. Upon this task, the Editor entered with the most affectionate admiration of his subject; he prosecuted it with infinite pleasure, and he hopes with the requisite industry. But had he known sooner, that one so accomplished in all respects as Dr Southey was engaged in the same labour which his own veneration for Cowper had prompted him to commence, he would have relinquished the undertaking. From this feeling of sincere respect, he regrets the more, that, in some remarks on the Life of the Poet, (which accompanied the earlier editions of the present work in its original form,) the great Dr Southey should have indulged in asperities of expression which never add to the force of truth, and which none, whose approbation is worth having, will ever accept in the place of sound argument. Notwithstanding the untoward and unforeseen rivalship which the work, on its first appearance, had to sustain, two impressions have been called for. The present is therefore the third edition of the Poems. From its commencement the publication was SO arranged, that the Prose compositions could be separa |