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parate images, and gets entangled in a throng of thoughts, until, at the end, we have a sense of a beautiful confusion of "flowers of all hues, and weeds of glorious feature," and applaud the fertility at the expense of the force of his mind. The truth is that will is an important element of genius, and without it the spontaneous productions of the mind must lack the highest quality of poetic art. True intellectual creation is an _effort_ of the imagination, not its result, and without force of will to guide it, it does not obey its own laws, and gives little impression of real power. Art is not the prize of luck or the effect of chance, but of conscious combination of vital elements. Mr. Hirst, though he does give evidence of Keats' fluency of fancy and expression, has really produced a finer work of art. We think it is so important that a poem, to be altogether worthy of the name, should be deeply meditated and carefully finished, that we hazard this last opinion at the expense of being berated by all the undeveloped geniuses of the land, as having no true sense of the richness of Keats' mind, or the great capacity implied, rather than fully expressed, in his Endymion. Mere extracts alone can give no fair impression of the beauty of Mr. Hirst's poem as a whole, but we cannot leave it without quoting a few passages illustrative of the author's power of spiritualizing the voluptuous, and the grace, harmony and expressiveness of his verse: And still the moon arose, serenely hovering, Dove-like, above the horizon. Like a queen She walked in light between The stars--her lovely handmaids--softly covering Valley and wold, and mountain-side and plain With streams of lucid rain. She saw not Eros, who on rosy pinion Hung in the willow's shadow--did not feel His subtle searching steel Piercing her very soul, though his dominion Her breast had grown: and what to her was heaven If from Endymion riven? Nothing; for love flowed in her, like a river, Flooding the banks of wisdom; and her soul, Losing its self-control, Waved with a vague, uncertain, tremulous quiver, And like a lily in the storm, at last She sunk 'neath passion's blast. Flowing the fragrance rose--as though each blossom Breathed out its very life--swell over swell, Like mist along the dell, Wooing his wondering heart from ou
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