I fill'd this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon-
Her health! and would on earth there stood,
Some more of such a frame,
That life might be all poetry,
And weariness a name.
It was the misfortune of Mr. Pinckney to have been born too far
south. Had he been a New Englander, it is probable that he would
have been ranked as the first of American lyrists by that
magnanimous cabal which has so long controlled the destinies of
American Letters, in conducting the thing called "The North American
Review." The poem just cited is especially beautiful; but the poetic
elevation which it induces we must refer chiefly to our sympathy in
the poet's enthusiasm. We pardon his hyperboles for the evident
earnestness with which they are uttered.
It was by no means my design, however, to expatiate upon the
merits of what I should read you. These will necessarily speak for
themselves. Boccalini, in his "Advertisements from Parnassus," tells
us that Zoilus once presented Apollo a very caustic criticism upon a
very admirable book:- whereupon the god asked him for the beauties
of the work. He replied that he only busied himself about the
errors. On hearing this, Apollo, handing him a sack of unwinnowed
wheat, bade him pick out all the chaff for his reward.
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