The poetical works of Mrs. Felicia Hemans; : complete in one volume..

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Preface

putation of the larger portion of them, all her later productions included ; for it is true, as critics have remarked, that not only the debut which she made in a juvenile volume, at Liverpool, while yet in her childhood, (a collection of little effusions written between the ages of eight and thirteen, to which she, who had the right of decision, did not herself subsequently choose to give a place among her mature 'works',) but even the much more elaborate compositions of many succeeding years, including the Restoration of the Works of Art to Italy, (published in 1817,) and other poems studded as richly with brilliant passages, did not have the effect to establish her reputation. In fact, the Records of Woman, which appeared only some eight years since, may be considered as having fairly laid its foundations. From that time, however, as we have said, the favour her poems met with was unexampled. But who will pretend that it was no more than 'favour ;' that it was but a transient air of popular whim which sustained them, but gave no test nor pledge of an inherent and enduring buoyancy ? Who will deny that Mrs. Hemans has enjoyed — or, if we use the term which is applicable to the personal effort and effect, that she has suffered, — in her own life-time, a true fame, — even the truest, dearest, best, of all its species, — though only as the dim beginning of the brightness which awaits her name ? Even the extraordinary newspaper popularity (so to speak) of her later writings, is itself an indication, on the whole, of the fact.

It shows the feeling of the people, which dictates the fashion of the press ; and although there are many of the works of genius which may largely attract the attention and admiration of the world, for a time, and for various and obvious reasons, without leaving their mark on the minds or hearts of men, others there are, possessed of a vital spirit, that, once appreciated, they will not ' willingly let die.' The notoriety of such an author, as an author, is equivalent to his fame. It is as true of virtue, especially, as of vice, that it 'needs but to be seen;' and although that conventional corporation which has the name of ' the public,' merely, are not seldom deceived by false pretences, and dazzled by brilliant shows, the world at large is wiser than the public, (as much as it is wiser than any individual,) and will see. It will feel, too ; and acknowledge what it feels. It will acknowledge it, not in the columns of the newspapers, to be sure, alone — though these certainly have their part to play — but as Scott's was acknowledged, when a traveller states that he found, in the remotest regions of Hungary, a volume of one of his delightful romances in a peasant's cabin ; as Thomson's was, when a shabby, soiled copy of ' The Seasons' was noticed, by a man of genius, lying on the table of an obscure ale-house, in England. ' That,' said he, ' is true fame !' And it was, and is so. Such is the fame of the Vicar of Wakefield, and John Gilpin, and the Pilgrim, and poor Robinson Crusoe, and the Cotter's Saturday Night.

It is seen not in the diamond editions that glitter on the centre-tables of genteel society, or crowd, with everything else, the bibliopole's multifarious collections of rarities; but the ragged volumes of every circulating library, grown old and illegible before their time by dint of reading — and the thumbed copies that lie on the window-ledge of the poor man's cottage, with the leaves turned down by the good woman to ' keep the place' — and the song, or the ode, which the milk-maid trolls on the hill-side, or a band of freemen (like the descendants of the Plymouth Pilgrims) adopt for the festal commemoration of their fathers' glory, — these are the quick pulses that prove the existence of an author in his fame. Such has been already the success of Mrs. Hemans. She addressed herself not to passion, or fashion, or the public, or any class of the community or country she lived in, but to human beings, as such, — to their hearts, as well as their heads — with truth's transparent and glowing passport in her hand ; — and it was an introduction that never yet failed to be effectual, nor ever will. Fashion will pass away, and passion subside in satiety ; and the frivolous industry that ministered to the gratification of the one, and the false excitement that led the other to its own destruction, will be despised first, and then forgotten ; but man remains the same, from first to last ; and truth, which also remains, is mighty, and, worthily interpreted, must prevail. How long it may be in making its way, depends upon the circumstances of each particular case. It may address the head, or the heart, or both. It may be more or less a matter of necessity, or of luxury alone. It may be left to the recommendation only of its own modest merit, or be drawn into notice by fortunate

PREFACE.

crises, or casual accompaniments, well adapted to excite a seasonable sympathy as it were at the mere aighl of its features, or the sound of Hs name, while its absolute character is yet unknown. [Meanwhile

" The soul whence these high gil'ts are shed, Man faint in solitude," exhausted by these same efforts, or borne down by circumstances which have little or no connexion with them; or it may thrive as tlic young tree that leans over running waters, and grow stronger as it gives more fruit, till it lives to feel, in the airs that reach it from many a far-off shore, the joy of its own blossomy breath returned to it, and to hear the blessing of the poor pilgrim who has paused in the dust of the way-side of a weary life, and the school-girl's glee, and the child's murmur of sweet delight, as they turn down from the heat of the day, to he refreshed and rejoice together in the gloom of its green repose.

So, we say, has it been already, and so, we venture to predict, it will be still, with much of the poetry of Mrs. Hemans. She strove to be the worthy interpreter of worthy truth, deeply concerning the happiness of her race ; and the vital spirit of virtue has inspired her to be equal to the task. This is her praise ; and it is praise enough ; not that she has spent her strength in the rearing of dazzling fabrics of fancy, as brilliant and as useless as the ice-palaces of the northern Queen ; not that she has chosen to indulge the impulse of a wayward temperament in the reckless expression of feeling without principle, and of sentiment without point ; not that she has dealt only in the cold oracles of a selfish philosophy, more thoughtful of truth, and of proof, than of the use of either m the wants of the world ; not that she has indulged unholy passion in her own breast, or the breast of any living creature ; not that she has dared to exaggerate, that at all events she might astonish, or deigned to be mean, in the miserable hope of amusing. No ! She has neither failed to feel the high dignity of her profession, nor forgotten to observe it. She has made no vain display of genius faithless to its trust. She has cultivated self as the means, not consulted it as the end. She has been ambitious less to gain honour, than to give pleasure, and do good. She has not assumed to assert what is doubtful, or to deny what is not. She has not dogmatized, criticized, or theorized.

She has not speculated. She has not trifled. She has not flattered, nor inflamed. But she did si rive to ennoble virtue ; to encourage exertion; to sustain hope; to increase the happiness of men, by increasing their capacity to be happy, and developing their taste for what is deserving of pmsuit. She strove, in a word, as we began with saying, to be the worthy interpreter of worthy truth. And she was so.

This, we say, is her praise ; and it is the greater for its rarity. There has been too much among us of extravagant excitement, — even from the master-minds of the times, — as if there were no way of avoiding the cold gorgeousness of the mere phantasmagoria of fancy, or the idle insipidity of a soulless scntimentalism, or any other of the deficient styles of the day, but by rushing headlong to the opposite extreme. Mrs. Hemans has taken the reasonable medium, which her native sense and sensibility alike approved. She has shown us that nature alone is strange enough, and strong enough, for all the purposes of interest and instruction which poetry demands : and that its true office is not to distort, but to describe ; not to magnify, but to simplify ; to do justice, strictly, to divinity, and to humanity, and to the universe around us, not by assuming to paint them as they should be, but by faithfully labouring to interpret them as they are.

No Delphic frenzy could aid in the discharge of such a service ; it would have made it, as in so many other cases, (not heathen,) it has done, a worse than worthless labour. She wanted the powers of perception, and reflection, to appreciate the world without, and the world within; and these she had, and did ; but not as if to know, and to think, only, were the life of the soul. She wanted sensibility, — the more exquisite the better, — and the more cultivated with all the faculties in due proportion, the better, — ' for what is it to live, if it be not to love ?' * She wanted to be ready to feel, as only the good can do, ' at the sight of whatever is excellent, an emotion like that which the sweet remembrance of infancy causes ;' — an instinct to recognize the face of the beautiful, wherever it may be, and to rush, as it were, into its arms, as the Syrian pilgrim, f from all his wanderings returned to his mother's home again, into hers. She wanted enthusiasm even, in the exercise of

* Degorando.

t The Crusader's Return

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PREFACE.

these capacities, — enthusiasm to make the exercise a delight, anil to inspire her to communicate to other bosoms the rejoicing of her own. But with all these, which she had, she needed no morbid disorder. She had none. She knew that " we preserve this precious faculty of the heart" — even this — ' only in proportion as we cultivate truth, and guard against the exaggerated, affected, or factitious.' She kept herself calm even for the purpose of feeling — of feeling rightly — as much as of seeing clearly, — knowing also it is a fruitless torture we choose to suffer, 'to force ourselves to be false to ourselves, and to everything, that we may learn how to be true ;' that the mind may faithfully mirror, only in a state of composure, the impressions which meet it ; that the knowledge, the knowledge of all nature, and especially of his own, which the poet pursues, flees from the rushing footstep of passion, even as the haste of the hunter startles his game. 'And why, after all,' — the philosopher Ave have cited so often, inquires, — ' why should we be disturbed ? What should we gain by so much toil ? Why do we not allow ourselves time to breathe ? The good we follow' — and this is as true in poetry, as in philosophy — ' is nearer to the soul than we think ; it would come to us, if we only consented to be calm.''

This calmness it is, which eminently characterizes the poetry of Mrs. Hemans, and which most distinguishes it from the revolutionary poetry of the revolutionary age we live in. It is a self-possession which never forsakes her in the heat of her highest enthusiasm of joy or sorrow. There is a divine dignhy, 4 *insMrpassed even by the grandeur of Milton, in the rapture of an admiration that seems almost to lift her in her song, as upon angels' pinions, —

" To the breath Of Dorian flute, or lyre note soft and slow."*

and again, in the darkest mood of the ' tender gloom' which beautifully tinges the whole surface of her works, (like the dim religious light of an ancient forest, or of one of her own lonely fanes —

"A mighty minster, dim, and proud, and vast,)"

there is yet a more than wakeful, — a cheerful, — an inextinguishably cheerful spirit, — an immortal hope, — 'a calmness of the just,' — as manifest and as majestic in herself as in

* League of the Alps.

her own " Alvar's glorious mien," t — and

making its voice heard in the midst of its

sorrow, like the martyr's

" Sweet and solemn-breathing strain, Piercing the flames, untremulous and clear."

We have called it the vital spirit of virtue

which sustains her. Let us s'ay, in her own

language, again, —

" It is a fearful, yet a glorious thing. To hear that hymn of martyrdom, and know That its glad stream of melody could spring Up from the unsounded gull's of human woe ! Alvar! Theresa !— What is deep? what strong'? God's breath within the soul! "

For such an exhaustless reservoir of resources, after all, is the secret of her inspiration. And this, too, is the inspiration of truth, deep-seated, but calm, as a lake of the hills, in the sun-bright silence of the breast.

This, then, we regard as the principle of the poetry of Mrs. Hemans, — its truth. It implies much, in detail. It implies perception, imagination, sensibility, self-control, and control over language ; and truth, and taste, in all ; for there is need to know, feel, reason, conceive, and describe, and all in their due proportion and season ; in other words, as truth requires, — since to feel too much (for example) is of course as false to Nature as to feel too little, or not at all ; and as regards the party to whom poetry is addressed, to be unable to command the means of conveying what is felt, by suitable language, is the same, so far as the deficiency exists, as if there were nothing to be conveyed, and no effort made to do it.

This characteristic implies, then, that what is attempted, is done. It does not imply, necessarily, the highest order of genius, in the popular sense of the term, or, — not to settle the precedence of the diversities of genius, — it does not imply every kind of it. In the Evening Prayer at a Girls' School, Mrs. Hemans may have exquisitely succeeded in doing justice to the truth of a beautiful subject (as we think she has) without evincing (as we think she has not) the universal power of Shakspeare to identify himself, intuitively, as it has been described, with every character which he wished to represent, " and to pass from one to another like the same soul successively animating different bodies." This may be necessary to a perfect dramatic talent, but not to every species of composition ; the writer himself, whose splendid sketch we refer to, admits

t Forest Sanctuary.

PREFACE.

VJ[ thai even the universality of bis

was ' perhaps a disadvantage to his single

works, 1 the variety of his resourci

times diverting him from applying them to

the mos< effectual purpose.

Mrs. Uonians did not attempt everything, though her range certainly was wide enough tocontenl flu- mere ambition of most authors. Nor did she equally succeed in everything she did undertake, especially in the earlier part of her career, while it remained yet to be dei ided by trial, to her own satisfaction-, what she was best qualified to do. It is one of the (raits she most deserves to be praised for, that she has not attempted some thing's, as much as that she succeeded so eminently in others. It were far better for the world, as well as for those who write for it, if they would exercise a good deal more of tiie mind they do possess, in the shape of a sound judgment and a nice tact, to determine what they cannot accomplish, and what they should not attempt. There would be far more work done, — and far worthier of being- done, — and better done ; — and far fewer of those abortive abuses which consist in the juggling torture, and end often in the sacrifice, of real poetical power, with only the reward of the open-mouthed gaze of the mob, — upturned for a moment, — who are silly enough to surround the stage which it plays its pranks on. There is no necessity of particularizing those portions of the works of our authoress, in which she has succeeded best, or least, upon this principle of following her bent. Suffice it to say that she made it a study — at the expense of experience, of course — a serious and conscientious study ; and that she finally devoted herself, for the most part, with a sagacity and a self-denial equally worthy of all admiration, to the department she found herself to be fitted for. Thus, too, did she follow out the principle of her genius, its truth. She was true to herself, as well as to nature ; true to her own nature, we should rather say ; and because she was so, in no small degree it is, that she achieved, in those departments, a success unrivalled in the history of the literature to which we allude.

It might be expected that poetry to which these remarks were applicable, should be strongly distinguished by its simplicity ; and it is so. Truth is always simple, as every species of affectation necessarily is otherwise, and stands directly in its li ht These compositions are as simple as they are calm and serene. They will please therefore, at least, when they do not surprise ; nay, in the midst of all the whirl and turmoil of the machinery of the poetry-factory of these, days, they will surpj Lse, even, by their serene simplicity. They did so, especially at their first appearance ; and it is only because Mrs. Hemans herself lias accustomed the public to this rarest of the novelties, that the impression of its charm may have been in any degree even transiently disparaged, as by the charge, for example, of monotony. An accomplished writer, to whom we are probably more indebted in this country, than to any other individual, next to the authoress herself, for the early acquaintance we have made with her poems, has well illustrated her merit in this respect, as compared with the noisy and difficult jargon of many who have gone before her, by r reference to the anecdote of Napoleon's coronation, as emperor, in the cathedral of Notre Dame. The fondness of the French for parade and effect, is well known, and this was the most brilliant era of the great man's career. The Parisians, to astonish everybody, filled the orchestra with eighty harps, which were struck together with unequalled skill. 'The whole world' was delighted. But presently entered the Pope. A few of his singers, who came with him from Rome, received him with the Tu es Petrus of Scarlatti. Not an instrument was heard ; there were no fashionable flourishes ; but the simple majesty of the old-fashioned air, 'annihilated at once the whole effect of the preceding fanfaronade.'* We have had a liberal allowance of instrumental in the poetry of our times ; and the Voice of Spring is worth the whole of it. What a strength is in its simplicity ! What power from lips that seem to tremble, as

" They strive to speak.

Like a frail harp-string, shaken by the storm !"

So spake the Sw T itzer's Wife, when the Spells of Home inspired her : —

"Ay, pale she stood, but with an eye of light, And took her fair child to her holy breast.

And lifted her soft voice, that gather'd might As it found language :— " Are we thus oppress'd 1

Then must we rise upon our mountain sod,

And .man must arm, and woman call on God !"

* North American Review, for April, 1827. We need scarcely say, that allusion is made above to the editor of the Boston edition of the Earlier Poems of Mrs. Hemans.

Vlll

PREFACE.

- " I know what thou wouldst do,— and be it done !

Thy soul is darken'd with its feaT? for me. Trust me to Heaven, my husband ! This, thy son.

The babe whom I have borne thee, must be free! And the sweet memory of our pleasant hearth May well give strength— if aught be strong on earth.

"Thou hast been brooding o'er the silent dread Of my desponding tears; now lift once more,

My hunter of the hills, thy stately head, And let thine eagle glance my jojj restore !

I can bear all, but seeing thee subdued,—

Take to thee back thine own undaunted mood.

" Go forth beside the waters, and along The chamois-paths, and through the forests go;

And tell, in burning words, thy tale of wrong To the brave hearis that 'midst the hamlets glow.

God shall be with thee, my beloved !— Away !

Bless but thy child, and leave me,— I can pray !"

He sprang up like a warrior-youth awaking

To clarion-sounds upon the ringing air: He caught her to his breast, while proud tears, breaking

From his dark eyes, fell o'er her braided hair,— And " Worthy art thou," was his joyous cry, "That man for thee should gild himself to die."

Here, it must be confessed, after all, is the forte of Mrs. Hemans, — the fireside; and we come now to say, in a word, that we consider her not only, as the Edinburgh Review pronounced her some six years since, ' The most touching and accomplished ivriter of occasional verses that our literature has yet to boast of — splendid as that compliment is, — but as the model, in every respect, of what a female writer of poetry should be. Her poetry, itself; is the model of female poetry, so to speak. It has not simply a negative merit, of course, though that in our times is something to be distinguished by, if not to boast of; the merit of being free from the characteristic faults or foibles of men or women ; of being perfectly amiable as well as decorous, and meek and modest in all the fervour of its earnestness. This fervour itself, pure as it is, is an exquisite quality which belongs, in its true fineness, only to a woman's heart. Mrs. Hemans had a generous share of it in her temperament ; and she has poured and poured it out, strong and fresh as the rushing waters of her own 'streams and founts' of the Spring, when they burst

" From their sparry caves, And the earth resounds with the joy of waves."

What devotedness, — what fearless, uncalculating, uncompromising confidence, — the confidence of the heart, — of a woman's heart — breathe, as with a living ardour of the warm lips themselves, in the agony of Inez at the Auto da Fe, when the ' breathless rider' found her by the gleam of the midnight fire,

"And dash'd off fiercely those who came to part, And rush'd to that pale girl, andclasp'd her to his heart'

And for a moment all around gave way To that full burst of passion '.—on his breast, Like a bird panting yet from fear, she lay, But blest— in misery's very lap— yet blest!— Oh love, love, strong as death !— from such an hour Pressing out joy by thine immortal power, Holy and fervent love ! had earth but rest For thee and thine, this world were all too fair ! How could we thence be wean'd to die without despair 1

But she— as falls a willow from the storm, O'er its own river streaming— thus reclined On the youth's bosom hung her fragile form And clasping arms, so passionately twined Around his neck— with such a trusting fold, A full deep sense of safety in their hold, As if naught earthly might th' embrace unbind ! Alas! a child's fond faith, believing still Its mother's breast beyond the lightning's reach to kill !"

What a picture is this ! How do we feel that only one who has herself a heart, and such a heart, can render such justice to

"The strife Of love, faith, fear, and that, vain dream of life, Within her woman's breast!"

How do we seem to hear, as her hero ' woos her back to life,' in his frenzy, her ' soft voice in his soul /' How do we see, again,

"Her large tears gush Like blood-drops from a victim ; with swift rain Bathing the bosom where she lean'd that hour, As if her life wouidmelt in that o' ' ersweUing shower."

Not an ' inalienable trust' is this, alone ;

but what an exquisite tenderness is mingled

with it ; and how does that trait pervade

this poetry everywhere, till it must melt the

manhood even of the ' stoics of the wood,'

the savages in sentiment, who would have

been themselves ashamed — forsooth ! — to

' stain' their Indian page ' with grief.' Yet

have they wept with the Bride of the Greek

Isle, when leaving the vine at her father's

door, and the myrtle once called her own,

"She turn'd— and her mother's gaze brought back Each hue of her childhood's faded track. Oh ! hush the song, and let her tears Flow to the dream of her early years ! Holy and pure are the drops that fall When the young bride goes from her fathers' hall; She goes unto love yet. untried and new, She parts from love which hath still been true ; Mute be the song and the choral strain, Till her heart's deep well-spring is clear again! She wept on her mother's faithful breast, Like a babe that sobs itself to rest; She wept— yet laid her hand the while In his that waited her dawning smile. Her soul's affianced, nor cherish'd less For the gush of nature's tenderness !"

These, we say, are the fervour, and the trust, and the tenderness, of a woman's poetry. Shakspeare himself, perfect as even his female characters are, — as far as they are not female, but only human, — did not write

PREFACE.

ix

(lius, and could not, for though he was like all other men, excepting that he resembled nobody, as Hazlitt describes him, he was not like woman, and he could enter into the feeling of her character, — the female feeling, — in some respects perhaps but little better than Milton himself. It is no reproach to him that he could not, any more than it is to Mrs. Hemans that she could not write like him. It may, however, occasion a dramatic deficiency, — more or less perceptible to the reader, as he or she is possessed more or less of the quality itself in question, — wherever the play moves over ground which does not belong to this genius of man: and hence Shakspcare appears best upon his own ground, and so far forth as he represents the influence, rather than the absolute existence, of the other sex. And the same is true of her, and of her heroes. If it be true to a greater extent, on one hand, she has gained and saved something, on the other, by the exercise, in this instance, again, of that excellent tact — itself almost a characteristic of the sex, — which she has generally employed to so good purpose in the choice of subjects as well as of style, and not less in forbearance than in effort. She has avoided, almost entirely, mere masculine materiel, and has gradually abandoned even those topics of general interest, winch do not actually require the exertion of her more peculiar power. If she leaves the fireside occasionally, she does not travel in male disguise, — still less does she cease to be what she is. Her household gods go with her wherever she goes, — and the sound of their parting footsteps is audible with her own. With the wreck and the treasures of the deep, 'mid gold and gems, and buried isles, and towers o'erthrown, we find

" The lost and lovely ! — those for whom The place was kept at board and hearth so long !"

She brings her 'flowers' for crowns to the early dead, and for

"Brides to wear,— They were born to blush in their shining hair !"

She sends the Crusader to Syrian deserts, that he may find his way back again to ' some fond mother's glance,' that '■ o'er him, too, brooded in his early years.' She makes the conqueror in Ms sleep, ' a child again.' The Traveller, at the source of the Nile, thinks of the wild sweet voices of the streams, in