Some of Our English Poets. By the Rev. Charles D.
Boll. (Elliot Stock.)—We do not see that Dr. Bell has anything quite new about the " English Poets "—there are six chosen for his themes, Gray, Goldsmith, Cowper, Scott, Coleridge, and Words. worth—but what he does say is judicious, shows a sound critical discretion in things literary, and a kindly human feeling in things personal. The essays have the look of having been de- livered as lectures ; a certain didactic tone may be observed, but it is not intrusive or too strongly pronounced. We may note a curious oversight, as it appears to be, in the concluding paragraph of the essay on Thomas Gray. Dr. Bell quotes from one of Gray's letters a passage ending, " Wished for the moon, but she was dark to me and silent, hid in her vacant interlunar cave ;" and re- marks, "Surely this is poetry, if poetry there be in the world, though the thought is expressed in prose." It looks as if the Canon had forgotten the lines in " Samson Agonistes " :— " The sun to me is dark And silent as the moon,
When she deserts the night, Hid in her vacant interlunar cave."
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