such a high degree in poems like the _Highland Lass_ and _Yarrow
Revisited_, there is a romantic charm and thrilling magic which Pope
never could produce. A line or two from one of the poems cited has a far
more potent effect over the affections of the heart than the gorgeous
declamatory rhetoric of _Eloisa and Abelard_. But it would be foolish
to suppose that because Pope has not the passion for nature nor the glow
of self-oblivious benevolence, he has not highly educative and estimable
features. He should not be censured for what he never meant to supply:
we should rather strive to cultivate catholicity of taste by extracting
from his poems the information and enjoyment they are so well able to
furnish.

The Prologue of Pope's _Satires_ is, of course, the best introduction to
a systematic study of the works of this writer. That poem is the
masterpiece of Pope's volume, and exemplifies better than any other
piece the striking and brilliant qualities for which he is so famous. In
perusing it, the reader soon discovers that he is in presence of a work
which is the result of incessant and prolonged labour, and which,
consequently, deserves patient study. The works of a great technical
artist require such elaborate treatment if the force of their genius is
to be adequately felt.

VICTORIAN WRITERS.

If any man proposes to stay a month among scenery of hill, mountain, and
lake, I should advise him to slip a copy of Wordsworth into his pocket,
and read therefrom an hour daily; not hurrying over the pages, but
turning aside, now and again, to take in the glory of pinewood, heather,
and linn. In no volume, ancient or modern, can a tired man find such
soft and genial balm for his weariness as in the calm pages of the Rydal
singer. The poet is at his best in the broad region of natural religion.
He looks round on the beauties of the world with that solemn awe a man
feels in the hallowed precincts of a mediaeval temple. The grandeur and
mystery of the world throw him into a kind of enchantment: his own soul
and that of the universe touch and commune with each other. In his rapt
verses we feel some of that mystic thrill felt by a devotee in the open
sanctuary of the Almighty. No man ever interpreted Nature in such
inspired strains as William Wordsworth. What supremely delights the
lover of scenery is that this poet's muse can overwrap the exact and
detailed knowledge of Nature with a superb mantle of idealistic glory.
He saw