“I have tried to read Goethe. I never could succeed. Mr.---- refers me to his ‘Iphigenia,’ but I there recognise none of the dignified simplicity, none of the health and vigour which the heroes and heroines of antiquity possess in the writings of Homer. The lines of Lucretius describing the immolation of Iphigenia are worth the whole of Goethe’s long poem. Again there is a profligacy, an inhuman sensuality, in his works, which is utterly revolting. I am not intimately acquainted with them generally. But I take up my ground on the first canto of ‘Wilhelm Meister;’ and as the attorney-general of human nature, I there indict him for wantonly outraging the sympathies of humanity. Theologians tell us of the degraded nature of man; and they tell us what is true. Yet man is essentially a moral agent, and there is that immortal and unextinguishable yearning for something pure and spiritual which will plead against these poetical sensualists as long as man remains what he is.” Of Scott he says:-- “As a poet, Scott cannot live, for he has never in verse written anything addressed to the immortal part of man. In making amusing stories in verse, he will be superseded by some newer versifier; what he writes in the way of natural description is merely rhyming nonsense. As a prose writer, Mr. Wordsworth admitted that Scott had touched a higher vein, because there he had really dealt with feeling and passion. As historical novels, professing to give the manners of a past time, he did not attach much value to those works of Scott’s, so called, because that he held to be an attempt in which success was impossibility. This led to some remarks on historical writing, from which it appeared that Mr. Wordsworth has small value for anything but contemporary history. He laments that Dr. Arnold should have spent so much of his time and powers in gathering up, and putting into imaginary shape, the scattered fragments of the history of Rome.” And again:-- “He discoursed at great length on Scott’s works. His poetry he considered of that kind which will always be in demand, and that the supply will always meet it, suited to the age. He does not consider that it in any way goes below the surface of things; it does not reach to any intellectual or spiritual emotion; it is altogether superficial, and he felt it himself to be so. His descriptions are not true to nature; they are addressed to the ear, not to the mind. He was a master of bodily movements in his battle-scenes; but very little productive power was exerted in popular creations.” Moore:-- “T. Moore has great natural genius; but he is too lavish of brilliant ornament. His poems smell of the perfumer’s and milliner’s shops. He is not content with a ring and a bracelet, but he must have rings in the ear, rings on the nose--rings everywhere.” Shelley:-- “Shelley is one of the best _artists_ of us all: I mean in workmanship of style.” Tennyson:--