Now this fable answers very well as a hit at the critics- but I am
by no means sure that the god was in the right. I am by no means
certain that the true limits of the critical duty are not grossly
misunderstood. Excellence, in a poem especially, may be considered
in the light of an axiom, which need only be properly put, to become
self-evident. It is not excellence if it require to be demonstrated as
such:- and thus to point out too particularly the merits of a work
of Art, is to admit that they are not merits altogether.
Among the "Melodies" of Thomas Moore is one whose distinguished
character as a poem proper seems to have been singularly left out of
view. I allude to his lines beginning- "Come, rest in this bosom." The
intense energy of their expression is not surpassed by anything in
Byron. There are two of the lines in which a sentiment is conveyed
that embodies the all in all of the divine passion of Love- a
sentiment which, perhaps, has found its echo in more, and in more
passionate, human hearts than any other single sentiment ever embodied
in words:-
Come, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home is still here;
Here still is the smile, that no cloud can o'ercast,
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last.
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