and hopefulness. Cowper, alas! had more than
his share of the tragedy of life, but let us not forget that he had some
of its joy, and that joy is reflected for us in a substantial literary
achievement, which has lived, and influenced the world, while his more
tragic experiences may well be buried in oblivion. This, you may have
noted, is not a criticism of Cowper, but an eulogy. I would wish to say,
however, that the criticism of Cowper by living writers has been of
surpassing excellence. For the first fifty or sixty years of the century
that we are recalling Cowper was the most popular poet of our country,
with Burns and Byron for rivals. He has been largely dethroned by
Wordsworth and Shelley, and Tennyson, not one of whom has been praised
too much. But if Cowper has sunk somewhat out of sight of late years,
owing to inevitable circumstances, it is during these late years that he
has secured the goodwill of the best living critics. Would that Mr.
Leslie Stephen {56}--who wrote his life in the _Dictionary of National
Biography_--would that Mr. Edmund Gosse--who has so recently published a
great biography of Cowper's memorable ancestor, Dr. Donne--were, one or
other of them, here to-day; or Mr. Austin Dobson, who has visited Olney,
and described his impressions; or Dr. Jessopp, who lives near Cowper's
tomb in East Dereham Church. These writers are, alas! not with us, and
some presentment of a poet they love has fallen to less capable hands.

But not the most brilliant of speeches, not all the enthusiasm of all the
critics, can ever restore Cowper to his former immense popularity. We do
well, however, to celebrate his centenary, because it is good at certain
periods to remember our indebtedness to the great men who have helped us
in literature or in life. But that is not to say that we work for the
dethronement of later favourites. "Each age must write its own books,"
says Emerson, and this is particularly the case with the great body of
poetry. Cowper, however, will live to all time among students of
literature by his longer poems; he will live to all time among the
multitude by his ballads and certain of his lyrics. He will, assuredly,
live by his letters, to study which will be a thousand times more helpful
to the young writer than many volumes of Addison, to whom we were once
advised to devote our days and our nights. Cowper will live, above all,
as a profoundly interesting and beautiful personality, as a