The reader feels as this fine sonnet is wound up with the sublime concluding image, that there is no want of an additional line or an additional illustration. Both the ear and mind are satisfied. The music of thought and the music of verse are exquisitely blended, and seem to arrive together at a natural termination. It reminds me of the Portuguese aphorism, that the sonnet ought to be shut with a golden key. The Italians say that it should be a body of sweetness with a sting, by which they do not mean that its tenderness or beauty should merge into an actual epigram, but that it should end with point and spirit. When a sonnet fails to exhibit a unity and finish, it is the fault of the artist. The question put by George Steevens, in allusion to Shakespeare's sonnets of " what have truth and nature to do with sonnets ?" is scarcely worthy of an answer. Truth and nature are not confined to any particular form of verse, and may be as well embodied in the 14-line stanza as in any other; they depend on the poet's genius, and not on his choice of metre. It is true that the sonnet imposes many peculiar difficulties on the poet, but it is his glory to overcome them; and we do not find that bad sonnets necessarily contain more nonsense than 14 lines of bad blank verse*. * In the notice of Robert Walpole's poetical translations from the Greek, Spanish, and Italian, in the Edinburgh Review, (1805) it is observed that " This species of composition has been called by an excellent writer, the most exquisite jewel of the Muses. With us it has never been completely naturalized. Milton and Gray, who have cultivated it with most success, both drank from the sweet streams of Italy, where a single sonnet can give immortality to its author, while the longer poems of his contemporaries are buried in oblivion." In adding that the strict laws of the sonnet ought not to be departed from, the reviewer remarks, Gray has observed them scrupulously." I cannot understand this prominent notice of Gray as a sonnet-writer. He wrote only one, and even that is omitted in Chalmer's collection! Though a very good sonnet, its excellence is by no means extraordinary. Milton's sonnets are unquestionably the best in our language, and possess a severe dignity that may be referred to as a triumphant disproof of the vulgar notion, that this form of verse is necessarily confined to ingenious conceits or maudlin sentiment. But it is time to draw the reader's especial attention to the sonnets (for such I must call them) of Shakespeare. If I regret their defects as sonnets, the truly Shakesperian beauties, with which they are so profusely sprinkled, make me delight in them as poems, without any reference to their peculiar class or construction. I shall commence with pointing out what I conceive to be specimens of their poetical merit, and shall afterwards proceed to offer some observations upon the difficult question of to whom are they addressed, which seems to have turned the heads of some of the poet's commentators. Mr. Steevens has asserted, that the sonnets are composed in the highest strain of affectation, pedantry, circumlocution and nonsense.” Now I shall endeavour to make the reader acquainted with the real nature of the poetry thus spoken of, and then leave him to his indignation and astonishment at such critical blasphemy in one who set himself up as a commentator on Shakespeare and a pretender to taste. Leigh Hunt has well described Steevens as an acute observer up to a certain point, but who could write like an idiot when he got beyond it." As the chief merit of Shakespeare's fourteen-line stanzas does not consist in their continuity or completeness, but in the freshness, force, beauty and abundance of the thoughts and images, I shall not confine my extracts to entire sonnets, but give occasionally such detached lines and short passages as seem most remarkable, and may be most easily separated from the context. I commence, however, with a complete poem, in which the writer persuades his friend to marry. "When forty winters shall besiege thy brow, And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field, Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now, C UNIV. OF CALL SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS. [ON THEIR POETICAL MERITS, AND ON THE QUESTION OF TO WHOM ARE THEY ADDRESSED* ?] Ar a time when our elder poets are so much studied, and so justly admired, it seems not a little extraordinary that the Sonnets of the immortal Shakespeare should be almost utterly neglected. When alluded to, as they rarely are, by modern critics, it is generally to echo the flippant insolence of Steevens, who asserted that nothing short of the strongest act of parliament could enlist readers into their service. We know, however, that in Shakespeare's life-time, these "sugred sonnets," as Meres quaintly calls them, were in great esteem, and were for a long while far better known than many of the Plays, which fell into comparative disrepute for some time before the author's death, and were not published in a collected form until several years after. Only eleven of the Dramas were printed during the Poet's life. Shakespeare died (on his birth-day, April 23,) in 1616. The first complete edition was printed in 1623, and was the joint speculation of four booksellers; a circumstance from which Malone infers, that no single publisher was at the time willing to risk his money on an entire collection of the plays. * "An almost impenetrable darkness rests on the question, and no effort has hitherto, in the smallest degree, tended to disperse the gloom.”—Drake. B How much more praise deserved thy beauty's use, Shall sum my count, and make my old excuse- This were to be new-made when thou art old, And see thy blood warm when thou feel'st it cold." The following lines, in which the same subject is continued, contain one of those vivid images that are flashed from the fancy of the genuine poet only. "Thou art thy mother's glass, and she in thee The ensuing extract has also much beauty : "Those hours, that with gentle work did frame For never-resting Time leads summer on Where in any modern poem may we look for such a description of sun-rise as the following? There is a freshness of imagery, a masculine simplicity and strength of diction, and a noble freedom of versification, in this passage, that could hardly be over-praised. "Lo, in the orient when the gracious light Scarcely less beautiful are the following lines: |