His chief influence was through his “Observations on the Faerie Queen” and in his “History of Poetry,” but except as attention was thus directed to older writers, these works had no effect on the poetry of Nature. In Joseph Warton’s “Enthusiast” (1740) the love of solitary communion with Nature was supreme. About fourteen years later appeared William Whitehead’s “Enthusiast,” which is of interest here because it shows so well the typical eighteenth-century view in contrast to the pure romanticism of Warton. In Whitehead’s “Enthusiast” the poet yields instinctively to the new spirit, but is suddenly recalled to himself, is rendered sane by the wise admonitions of Reason. It is a bright day in May. The poet, entranced by the beauty about him, walks forth, With loit’ring steps regardless where, So soft, so genial was the air, So wond’rous bright the day. And now my eyes with transport rove O’er all the blue expanse above, Unbroken by a cloud! And now beneath delighted pass, Where, winding through the deep-green grass, A full-brim’d river flow’d. These, these are joys alone, I cry; ’Tis here, divine Philosophy, Thou deign’st to fix thy throne! Here Contemplation points the road Through Nature’s charms to Nature’s God! These, these are joys alone! Then Reason whispers “monitory strains,” and teaches the Enthusiast that “light, and shade, and warmth, and air,” that the “philosophic calmness,” the visionary sense of “universal love,” which come to man from Nature, must sink into insignificance before the exalted joys of Virtue, and reminds the poet that “man was made for man.” The intrinsic value of this poem is slight, but it is noteworthy because we see the two tendencies contending for mastery. Whitehead was no poet. He simply reflected in a turbid fashion what more original men were saying. His tolerably full statement of the romantic attitude toward Nature, with his subsequent assertion of the triumphant good sense of classicism is, therefore, valuable testimony to the twofold spirit of the age.