Page:Hero and Leander - Marlowe and Chapman (1821).pdf/71

Rh sophical or metaphysical oracle, an apopthegmatical couplet; and he takes leave of flesh and blood, to consort with shadowy personifications and embodied abstractions. Of a piece too with his phraseology, is his versification, which is now equable, sonorous, and full; now, harsh, angular, inappropriately jaw-breaking, quaintly twisted, strangely distorted. But with all this he is a noble spirit:—"passion, the all-in-all in poetry, (to repeat an admirable criticism) is everywhere present.—He makes his readers glow, weep, tremble, take any affection which he pleases, be moved by words, or in spite of them, be disgusted, and overcome their disgust." Take for example the last scene of this cutting tragedy, which is indeed struck out with a towering energy.—I do not envy the feelings of that critic who can go over it unmoved, nor of "the little judge" who stops to cavil at an odd word, or extraneous syllable.—Something healing is spread over the final paragraph, which reconciles and imperceptibly harmonizes the mind. It is truly stated by Mr. Lamb, that the genius of Chapman