We cannot deny, it is true, that the satiric model of the
days in question is insusceptible of improvement, and that the
modern author who deviates therefrom must necessarily sacrifice
something of merit at the shrine of originality. Neither can we shut
our eyes to the fact that the imitation in the present case has
conveyed, in full spirit, the high qualities, as well as in rigid
letter, the minor elegancies and general peculiarities of the author
of "Absalom and Achitophel." We have here the bold, vigorous, and
sonorous verse, the biting sarcasm, the pungent epigrammatism, the
unscrupulous directness, as of old. Yet it will not do to forget
that Mr. Wilmer has been shown how to accomplish these things. He is
thus only entitled to the praise of a close observer, and of a
thoughtful and skilful copyist. The images are, to be sure, his own.
They are neither Popes, nor Dryden's, nor Rochester's, nor
Churchill's- but they are moulded in the identical mould used by these
satirists.
This servility of imitation has seduced our author into errors,
which his better sense should have avoided. He sometimes mistakes
intentions; at other times, he copies faults, confounding them with
beauties. In the opening of the poem, for example, we find the lines-
Against usurpers, Olney, I declare
A righteous, just and patriotic war.
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