Then you are off. Oh! sir--why not for an hour imitate that Moon and those Stars? How silently they shine! But what care you for the heavenly luminaries? In the majestic beauty of the nocturnal heavens vain man will not hold his peace. SEWARD. Is that the murmur of the far-off sea? NORTH. It is--the tide, may be, is on its return--is at "Connal's raging Ferry"--from Loch Etive--yet this is not its hour--'tis but the mysterious voice of Night. BULLER. Hush! NORTH. By moonlight and starlight, and to the voice of Night, I read these words from Mr Alison--"In the speech of Agamemnon to Idomeneus, in the Fourth Book of the Iliad, a circumstance is introduced altogether inconsistent both with the _dignity of the speech, and the Majesty of Epic Poetry_:-- 'Divine Idomeneus! what thanks we owe To worth like thine, what praise shall we bestow! To Thee the foremost honours are decreed, First in the fight, and every graceful deed. For this, in banquets, when the generous bowls Restore our blood, and raise the warriors' souls, Though all the rest with stated rules be bound, Unmixed, unmeasured, are thy goblets crowned.'" SEWARD. That is Pope. Do you remember Homer himself, sir? NORTH. I do. @Idomenehy, pheri mhen se thiô Danahôn tachyphôlôn, hêmhen henhi ptolhemô hêd' hallohiô hephi hergô, êd' hen dahith', hote pher te gerohysion ahithopa ohinon 'Argehiôn ohi haristoi henhi krêthêrsi kherôntai. ehiper ghar t' halloi ge karêkomhoôntes 'Achaiohi daitrhon phinôsin, shon dhe plehion dhepas ahiehi hestêch', hôsper hemohi, piheein, hote thymhos hanhôgoi. hall' horseu pholemhond', ohios pharos ehycheo ehinai.@ I believe you will find that in general men praise more truly, that is justly, deservedly, than they condemn. They praise from an impulse of love--that is, from a capacity. Nature protects love more than hate. Their condemnation is often mere incapacity--want of insight. Mr Alison had elegance of apprehension--truth of taste--a fine sense of the beautiful--a sense of the sublime. His instances for praise are always well--often newly chosen, from an attraction felt in his own genial and noble breast. The true chord struck then. But he was somewhat too dainty-schooled--school-nursed, and school-born. A judge and critic of Poetry should have been caught wild, and tamed; he should carry about him to the last some relish of the wood and the wilderness, as if he were ever in some danger of breaking away, and relapsing to them. He should know Poetry as a great power of the Universe--a sun--of which the Song--whosesoever--only catches and fixes a few rays. How different in thought was Epos to him and to Homer! Homer paints Manners--archaic, simple manners. Everybody feels--everybody says this--Mr Alison must have known it--and could have said it as well as the best-- SEWARD.