Let us now pass to the subject of literature, where we shall see the same evidences of the growing influence of philosophy and reason over the minds of men. Thus poetry, in its efforts to please and elevate the mind, by exciting the imagination and feelings, now never addresses us unattended by philosophy. Her favorite occupation of late has been to delineate the dispositions and characters of men; to reveal the secret workings of the passions and the sources of human sympathy; to exhibit the human mind, in short, under its most impressive phases. The prevalent taste of the age is for metaphysical poetry; by which I mean, poetry imbued with philosophy,--poetry which lays bare the anatomy of the human heart, and discloses all the springs and machinery by which it is put in play. Those who are gifted with this beautiful talent, have conformed to the ruling taste, and their success has been proportionate. It is to this circumstance that Byron owes part of his popularity; for in exhibiting the most subtle processes of human passion, its energies and its susceptibilities, he is superior to any of his predecessors; though in the mere embellishment of smooth and felicitous diction, and of agreeable and varied rhythm, or even in the higher attributes of lively imagery and lofty conception, he can boast of no superiority. Perhaps it would be more correct to say, that the metaphysical character of his poetry proceeded not so much from his wish to adapt it to the public taste, as because he himself partook of the character of his age; that he wrote metaphysically and philosophically because he spoke and thought in this way, and he so spoke and thought from the very same causes as his contemporaries. This inference is the more warranted, when we find the same tincture of philosophy in the poetry of his contemporaries,--Southey, Wordsworth, Campbell and Coleridge.[2] Even Moore infuses into his amatory poems as much philosophy as the subject will admit, though it is of the sensual school of Epicurus. Sometimes we see the spirit of philosophy controlling the poetic spirit, as was the case with Shelley, Coleridge and some others, in whose poetry the precepts of philosophy were more obscured by the restraints of verse than aided by its ornaments. It is an unnatural alliance, and both the poetry and the philosophy are the worse for the union. [Footnote 2: The recent poetry of continental Europe exhibits the same psychological character; as for instance, that of Alfieri and Monte in Italy, of Goethe and Tieck in Germany, and of Beranger in France.]