to doubt it, but reflection has taught me better. It acts also so very independent of the body—in dreams, for instance. . . I have often been inclined to materialism in philosophy, but could never bear its introduction into Christianity, which appears to me essentially founded on the soul. For this reason Priestly’s materialism always struck me as deadly. Believe the resurrection of the _body_, if you will, but not without the _soul_.” Thus there were times when the “divinity stirred within him,” and the soul asserted its regal prerogatives, and vindicated its own expectations of the future. Nay, the sentiment must have been habitual, for how often is it naturally implied in the ardor of composition, as in those beautiful lines: “Remember me! Oh, pass not thou my grave, Without one thought whose relics there recline. The only pang my bosom dare not brave, Would be to find forgetfulness in thine.” But our chief concern is with the _Poet_ Byron, not with the Philosopher or the Peer. It has been said that in reviewing the lives of the most illustrious poets—the class of intellect in which the characteristic features of genius are most strongly marked—we shall find that, from Homer to Byron, they have been restless and solitary spirits, with minds wrapped up, like silk-worms, in their own tasks, either strangers or rebels to domestic ties, and bearing about with them a deposit for posterity in their souls, to the jealous watching and enriching of which most all other thoughts and considerations have been sacrificed. In accordance with this theory, Pope said: “One misfortune of extraordinary geniuses is, that their very friends are more apt to admire than to love them.” True, they have often “dwelt apart,” have been so engaged in cultivating the imaginative faculty, as to become less sensible to the objects of real life, and have substituted the sensibilities of the imagination for those of the heart. Thus Dante is accused of wandering away from his wife and children to nurse his dream of Beatrice, Petrarch to have banished his daughter from his roof, while he luxuriated in poetic and impassioned ideals, Alfieri always kept away from his mother, and Sterne preferred, in the somewhat uncouth language of Byron, “whining over a dead ass to relieving a living mother.” But did not Milton love his daughter with an intense tenderness? Than Cowper who a more filial and devoted son to the memory of his mother? A fond father as well as faithful son was Campbell. Burns, too, delighted in his “fruitful vine,” and “tender olive plants.” In Wordsworth the beauty and purity of domestic life shone forth to the end. Southey had a home of love and peace. Scott was a model of a husband and father. Nothing can exceed the exquisite tenderness of some passages in his diary at the death of his wife. Goldsmith was neither husband nor father, yet his fine poetry never alienated his heart from the softer scenes and sympathies of life.