Of course, then, we do not mean to imply that a poet must necessarily display virtuous and religious feeling; we are not speaking of the actual material of poetry, but of its sources. A right moral state of heart is the formal and scientific 15 condition of a poetical mind. Nor does it follow from our position that every poet must in fact be a man of consistent and practical principle; except so far as good feeling commonly produces or results from good practice. Burns was a man of 20 inconsistent life; still, it is known, of much really sound principle at bottom. Thus his acknowledged poetical talent is in no wise inconsistent with the truth of our doctrine, which will refer the beauty which exists in his compositions to the 25 remains of a virtuous and diviner nature within him. Nay, further than this, our theory holds good, even though it be shown that a depraved man may write a poem. As motives short of the purest lead to actions intrinsically good, so frames 30 of mind short of virtuous will produce a partial and limited poetry. But even where this is instanced, the poetry of a vicious mind will be inconsistent and debased; that is, so far only poetry as the traces and shadows of holy truth still remain upon it. On the other hand, a right moral 5 feeling places the mind in the very center of that circle from which all the rays have their origin and range; whereas minds otherwise placed command but a portion of the whole circuit of poetry. Allowing for human infirmity and the varieties of 10 opinion, Milton, Spenser, Cowper, Wordsworth, and Southey may be considered, as far as their writings go, to approximate to this moral center. The following are added as further illustrations of our meaning. Walter Scott's center is chivalrous 15 honor; Shakspeare exhibits the characteristics of an unlearned and undisciplined piety; Homer the religion of nature and conscience, at times debased by polytheism. All these poets are religious. The occasional irreligion of Virgil's poetry is painful 20 to the admirers of his general taste and delicacy. Dryden's _Alexander's Feast_ is a magnificent composition, and has high poetical beauties; but to a refined judgment there is something intrinsically unpoetical in the end to which it is devoted, the 25 praises of revel and sensuality. It corresponds to a process of clever reasoning erected on an untrue foundation--the one is a fallacy, the other is out of taste. Lord Byron's _Manfred_ is in parts intensely poetical; yet the delicate mind naturally 30 shrinks from the spirit which here and there reveals itself, and the basis on which the drama is built. From a perusal of it we should infer,