The learned and fastidious don shows through the inspired 'bard' by many equally unmistakable indications. His editor, Mitford, collected a number of parallel passages which curiously indicate the degree in which his mind was saturated with recollections of poetical literature. It seems to be now considered as unjustifiable plagiarism for a poet to assimilate the phrases of his predecessors. We may, indeed, find abundant proofs of familiarity with Shakespeare in Shelley, and in more recent writers; but they are generally of the unconscious kind, and would otherwise be avoided as sins against originality. The poets of the last century, such as Goldsmith, and especially Pope, had no scruples in the matter. Their work did not profess to be a sudden and spontaneous inspiration. It was a slow elaboration, with which it was perfectly allowable to interweave any quantity of previously manufactured material so long as the juncture was not palpable. Gray's adaptations seem sometimes to make the whole tissue of his poetry. He owns to an unconscious appropriation from Green (author of the 'Spleen') of the main thought of his 'Ode to the Spring,' the comparison of men to ephemeral insects. But everywhere he is giving out phrases which he has previously assimilated. So in the very spirited translation from the Norse, 'Uprose the king of men with speed,' we have a verse from the 'Allegro'—'Right against the Eastern Gate'—cropping up naturally in quite a fresh connection. A single phrase seems to combine several semi-conscious recollections. The words in the 'Bard' 'dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart' come from Shakespeare, and the preceding 'dear as the light that visits those sad eyes' are perhaps from Otway. But it is useless to accumulate instances of so palpable a process.