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quarters in four hours, through the valley of Frutigen, which runs parallel with the Simmenthal, but which we all thought exceeded it in beauty. The day was brilliant, the road bordered with pines, and firs, and other Alpine trees, inclosed here and there with fences; which gave the road a very park-like appearance. The same trees, seen at a distance and en masse, have a sameness which I, at least, do not admire.

In my next, I shall commence our homeward route; and if you are not tired of mountains, we purpose to have another climb before we leave, and will tell you all about it.

MONTGOMERY'S POEMS.1

C. A. B.

THE extremes of blame and praise which are awarded to those who venture to indulge poetic flights, make one ask again and again, What is Poetry? We are all conscious that there is some mystic spell which for a while binds us; that our feelings are carried along we know not how; and words, chained to holy song, fix themselves in the mind, and oftentimes come up again in after years of pleasure or of pain. They live in the memory; we become attached to them as if living things; and they are familiar as "household words." And all at once we are told that we have made a sad mistake; that what charms us, is most offensive to our next-door neighbour (we mean "critic ;") and that after all it is not poetry at all. Nor is this all. At different periods of our lives, our own taste changes also, and we find ourselves admir. ing what erewhile we cast aside as worthless, or becom

1 The Poetical Works of R. Montgomery, M.A., revised by himself. Chapman and Hall.

ing dissatisfied with what erewhile formed the chief source of our pleasure and amusement. And so again we ask, What is Poetry? In the most charming of his many pleasant books, (Imagination and Fancy,) the veteran Leigh Hunt has given us an answer to the question. It is by far the best we ever met with; but, as it is too long to quote in extenso, we must be content with such extracts as will suffice for our present purpose:—

"Poetry, strictly and artistically so called,-that is to say, considered not merely as poetic feeling, which is more or less shared by all the world, but as the operation of that feeling, such as we see it in the poet's book,—is the utterance of a passion for truth, beauty, and power, embodying and illustrating its conceptions by imagination and fancy, and modulating its language on the principle of variety in uniformity..... Poetry is a passion, because it seeks the deepest impressions, and because it must undergo in order to convey them. It is a passion for truth, because without truth the impression would be false or defective. It is a passion for beauty, because its office is to exalt and refine by means of pleasure, and because beauty is nothing but the loveliest form of pleasure. It is a passion for power, because power is impression triumphant, whether over the poet, as desired by himself, or over the reader, as affected by the poet. It embodies and illustrates its impressions by imagination, or images of the objects of which it treats, and other images brought in to throw light on those objects, in order that it may enjoy and impart the feeling of their truth, in its utmost conviction and affluence. It illustrates them by fancy. . . . . It modulates what it utters, because in running the whole round of beauty, it must needs include beauty of sound."

These, then, are the tests by which any claimant to poetic fame must be judged: for all criticism founded upon mere prejudices, and partialities, and not governed by sound principles and strict integrity, is perfectly worthless. It is nothing but hasty decisions where, above all,

calm discrimination should hold sway, that has at any time caused the conductors of periodical literature to be assailed, and the integrity of critical notices to be questioned. There is a standard, in all cases. And in the particular question of poetry, we cannot but think that "he who has thought, feeling, expression, imagination, action, character, and continuity, all in the largest amount and highest degree, is the greatest poet."

Apposite as these remarks seem to us, when about to undertake the examination of any poetical work, they appear peculiarly so in the case of Mr. Montgomery, whose writings for more than twenty years are now revised by himself, and published in one large handsome volume, which, for the beauty of its getting up, may well claim a place in any library. We welcome heartily and cordially the works of such a mind. We are glad to find the labours of many years collected together, inasmuch as we are thus enabled to trace the gradual development of his mental powers, and the deeper hold which Catholic truth has won upon one whom we regard as among the greatest intellectual lights of this century. In this latter respect we have a striking and a glorious contrast. crude sentiments of youth, have been developed into the mature reflections of manhood; vague generalities have given way before positive statements; and undefined theories have settled down into the dogmatic forms of the Catholic faith. Nor should we be surprised at this. We should not judge his earlier writings by the same standard as we should now. He began to write at a time when the greatest laxity prevailed in the theological world, when men were content with mere cold, wretched negation; when orthodoxy itself was a mere orthodoxy of words, without the hidden meaning of those words being sought for and developed; when mere Establishmentarian

The

ism was looked upon as the "proper" thing,-very respectable, and not less fashionable; and when the aged representatives of the system would have as soon gone without their port wine, (an orthodox luxury,) as without the toast of “Church and State," at their festal gatherings. That great and mighty movement which has brought forth the true claims and character of CHRIST's Church; which has given a reality to the pregnant words of our Creeds, and definiteness to our theological terms; which, in a word, has infused life into the dry bones, had not then taken place. And it is plain to see that that movement has not been lost on Mr. Montgomery. His noble volume, entitled Christian Life, and, if we mistake not, a series of poems now appearing anonymously in a weekly contemporary, are the sources from whence we can draw a fair and correct opinion of the religious views of our author. Of this we are glad to see Mr. Montgomery himself is conscious. In his few words of preface, he nobly meets this point, and thus, we think, effectually silences the gainsayer:

"One point remains, unto which the author may now be permitted to refer. In a series of poems, extending from the verge of boyhood unto mature life, it must be expected, during so long a period, a writer's sentiments and opinions on themes of vital interest, will undergo various modifications, and exhibit corresponding developements. In the present instance, it would. be uncandid not to confess that the Catholic attributes of the Church, and the Sacramental connections with the One Almighty Head of His Mystical Body, when the author published his early poems, were almost doctrinally ignored, and practically forgotten. Hence, between his first and last production, a theological reader will detect expressions and thoughts which attest the power and presence of those spiritual influences awakened around him during the period referred to. But. surely it would be a harsh injustice to brand all modifications

of religious sentiments as apostasies! Supposing them to be a conscientious growth of our spiritual and intellectual being, and controlled by those supernatural aids offered to all who seek them in faith and prayer, no honourable mind will condemn them as mere inconsistencies. More or less, such variations in mental and moral life are inevitable. Again, no author who compares what he wrote at nineteen, with what he has published at forty, can realize the comparison without a feeling of selfcorrection. If he be a devout man, he will at once confess, that had some of those high and hallowed themes to which his youthful powers were consecrated been deferred to a later period of life, he would have discussed them with more reverence, fulness, and depth, than his earlier pages now exhibit."

We thank Mr. M. for this candid and manly avowal, which considerably facilitates our task in noticing his productions; as we must honestly confess that the absence of the qualities to which he alludes has always prevented his earlier works being such favourites with ourselves as they otherwise would have been. He need not fear, nor be very sensitive about any charges of apostasy or inconsistency, as these must be shared by many men of no less mental power than himself. In the present age there are few who have not been "progressionists;" and for ourselves we look upon it as the best possible sign that so many have been prepared to advance whither the truth led them. We only wish that, as his theological views have deepened, he had been led to apostatize a little further. We only wish that as he has sung of the bliss of that time,

"When first the wings of light unfurl'd

Their radiance o'er a new-born world,
And choral music, faint and far,
Awoke in each melodious star,"

he had lent the weight of his great influence to the restoration of "Choral music" in the Church on earth, and

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