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1817.] Review.—Lalla Rookh. 279

Mr Moore is beyond all comparison the most ingenious, brilliant, and fanciful Poet of the present age. His external senses seem more delicate and acute than those of other men; and thus perceptions and sensations crowd in upon him from every quarter, apparently independent of volition, and with all the vehemence and vivacity of instinct. He possesses the poetical temperament to excess, and his mind seems always in a state of pleasure, gladness, and delight, even without the aid of imagination, and by means merely of the constant succession and accumulation of feelings, sentiments, and images. The real objects of our every-day world to his eyes glow with all the splendour of a dream, and even during the noon of manhood, he beholds, in all the works of creation, that fresh and unimpaired novelty which forms the glory and so rarely survives the morning of life. Along with this extreme delicacy and fineness of organization, he possesses an ever-active and creative Fancy, which at all times commands the whole range of his previously-acquired images, and suddenly, as at the waving of a magic wand, calls them up into life and animation. Feeling and Fancy therefore are the distinguishing attributes of his poetical character; yet is he far from being unendowed with loftier qualities, and he occasionally exhibits a strength of Intellect, and a power of Imagination, which raise him above that class of writers to which he might otherwise seem to belong, and place him triumphantly by the side of our greatest Poets.

With this warmth of temperament, exceeding even the ordinary vivacity of the Irish national character, and with a fancy so lively and volatile, it behoved Mr Moore, when first starting as a poet in early life, to be cautious in the choice both of his models and his subjects. In both he was most unfortunate; and every lover of virtue must lament, that while his first productions sometimes breathe and glow with genuine feeling and passion, and often exhibit harmless and amusing flights of capricious fancy, they are so fatally infected with a spirit to which we can give no other name than licentiousness, and which is incompatible with that elevation and dignity of moral sentiment essential to the very existence of real poetry.

But though he was thus early led astray, he soon began to feel how mean and how unworthy were even the highest triumphs won in such a field, and to pant for nobler achievements. Even in his most unguarded and indefensible productions, his ideas were too bright, sparkling, fugitive, and aerial, to become the slavish ministers of sensuality. His mind was unduly inflamed, but it was not corrupted. The vital spirit of virtue yet burned strong in his soul,—its flame soon began to glow with less wavering lustre, and with manifest aspiration to its native heaven. The errors and aberrations of his youthful genius seemed forgotten by his soul, as it continued to advance through a nobler and purer region; and it is long since Mr Moore has redeemed himself—nobly redeemed himself, and become the eloquent and inspired champion of virtue, liberty, and truth.

There can indeed be no greater mistake, than to consider this Poet, since his genius has ripened and come to maturity, as a person merely full of conceits, ingenuity, and facetiousness. Many of his songs are glorious compositions, and will be immortal. Whatever is wild, impassioned, chivalrous, and romantic, in the history of his country, and the character of his countrymen, he has touched with a pencil of light,—nor is it too high praise to say to him that he is the Burns of Ireland. True, that lie rarely exhibits that intense strength and simplicity of emotion by which some of the best songs of our great national Poet carry themselves, like music from heaven, into the depths of our soul,—but whenever imagination requires and asks the aid of her sister fancy,—whenever generous and lofty sensibilities, to the