He breaks forth into a lamentation, of which I can give only the concluding lines: "Had I the precepts of a father learn'd, But the finest thing of all, which rises, indeed, to a very great height of epic magnificence, is the appearance to him of the goddess, his mother: "While thus he fervent prays, the heaving tide, 6 Thy prayers are granted; weep no more, my son; And let the little tripod aid thy toil; On this methinks I see the walking crew At thy request support the miry shoe ; The foot grows black that was with dirt embrown'd, I have now said enough, or rather quoted enough, to show the excellence of this poem, in which common sense and shrewd observation are curiously mingled with satire and burlesque. 255 WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE. MR. POPE, with his usual felicity of expression, gives us in a single line the sum of human wisdom, in its most abstract form : ""Tis but to know how little can be known." There were few more knowing personages alive than he who said this; a man with many faults, however, (as who has not?) and vanities too, and some ill-humour, being apt to forget, as every philosopher occasionally does, the use upon his own behalf of that philosophy which he taught so admirably to others. But the judicious mind, and humble because judicious, cannot but recognise with sober satisfaction that the very superior and sharp-seeing intelligence of Pope came in its more serious moods to a Christian view of human infirmity-infirmity not merely of the flesh, but even of that which we are too apt to regard with a sort of idolatry, the mental powers of man. It is no inconsiderable thing, we must allow, even to know how little can be known in this mortal state; because, from the fact of our being allowed clearly to conceive how vast the realm of knowledge is beyond the reach of our present powers, we may reasonably infer that it is intended we should, under more favourable cir cumstances, have the means of penetrating into that realm. And doubtless the more religiously humble we are, in the estimation and in the use of such knowledge and wisdom as we have, the more fitted shall we be, as well as the more deserving, to make use of such measure of larger power as in a more exalted state of existence may be awarded us. Probably there never was a time when the pursuit of knowledge, or the appearance of that pursuit, was more the fashion than it now is. Have we any thing to regret in this? No; not in the thing itself, so far as it is sincere, and not affectation merely; but we have to regret that along with this pursuit of knowledge, there is not that pervading sense which Pope has so happily expressed-that honestly humble feeling that though very much may be learned, yet the sum of the whole will be but to know how little can be known, and how much will remain for a clearer and more extensive vision than that of the earth-bound mind to fathom. May it not be safely affirmed that, from a want of that abiding sense, the inquirers after knowledge greatly fail of obtaining their own happiness. They begin, as all begin, with expecting too much. They welcome to their hearts vain delusions respecting the wondrous things they shall achieve. All this is natural, but experience and reason ought ere long to teach them the truth, and a religious humility would make it palatable to them. They ought in reason to have "a proprietor's delight" in what they have acquired; but, so long as they look to human knowledge for giving more than it is in the nature of things that it can give, their fate will be disappointment, fretfulness, strife, envyings, and so on. Thus in effect we find it to be, and, to the disgrace of knowledge, it frequently turns out that they who have devoted themselves to it are very little wiser and not at all happier than they who have not done Could they be satisfied that the end of knowledge and wisdom is but to know how little can be known, the weariness of the spirit, which so often afflicts them, would not be felt. so. Cowper, in his delightfully easy, contemplative manner, discusses the sundry pursuits of the unphilosophical knowledge-fanciers, and describes them with admirable fidelity. But first he speaks of himself, and in a strain so simple and touching, that it cannot but be pleasing to all gentle hearts to listen to his pensive and yet no way dispiriting account of his position: "I was a stricken deer, that left the herd With gentle force soliciting the darts, He drew them forth, and heal'd, and bade me live. Since then, with few associates, in remote And silent woods I wander, far from those My former partners of the peopled scene; With few associates, and not wishing more. Here must I ruminate, as much may, With other views of men and manners now Than once; and others of a life to come." Such is the critic-an honest, serious, feeling, meditative man. Now behold his views, and consider his ruminations: "I see that all are wand'rers, gone astray With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind, Alas! for poor mankind, always expecting from As if created only like the fly, That spreads his motley wings in th' eye of noon, |