The subject is the recovery of Jerusalem from infidels, by the united powers of Christendom. The enterprise was splendid, venerable, and heroic; and an interesting contrast is exhibited between the Christians and Saracens. Religion renders the subject august, and opens a natural field for machinery and sublime description. The action too, lies in a country, and In a period of time, sufficiently remote to admft an intermixture of fable with history.

Rich invention is a capital quality in Tasso. He is full of events, finely diversified. He never fatigues his reader by mere war and fighting. He frequently shifts the scene; and from camps and battles, transports us to more pleasing objects. Sometimes the solemnities of religion; sometimes the intrigues of love; at other times the adventures of a journey, or the incidents of pastoral life, relieve and entertain the reader. The work, at the same time, is artfully connected; and, in the midst of va riety, there is perfect unity of plan.

Many characters enliven the poem; and these distinctly marked and well supported. Godfrey, the leader of the enterprise, is prudent, moderate, and brave; Tancred, amorous, generous, and gallant. Rinaldo, who is properly the hero of the poem, is passionate and resentful, but full of zeal, honour, and heroism. Solyman is high minded; Erminia tender; Armida, artful and violent, and Clorinda, masculine, In drawing characters, Tasso is superior to Virgil, and yields to no poet but Homer.

He abounds in machinery. When celestial beings interpose, his machinery is noble. But

devils, enchanters, and conjurers, act too great a part throughout his poem. In general, the marvellous is carried to extravagance. The poet was too great an admirer of the romantic spirit of knight errantry.

In describing magnificent objects, his style is firm and majestic. In gay and pleasing description, it is soft and insinuating. Erminia's pastoral retreat in the seventh book, and the arts and beauty of Armida in the fourth book, are exquisitely beautiful. His battles are animated, and properly varied by incidents. It is rather by actions, characters, and descriptions, that he interests us, than by the sentimental part of his work. He is far inferior to Virgil in tenderness; and, when he aims at being sentimental and pathetic, he is apt to become artificial.

The

It has often been objected to Tasso, that he abounds in point and conceit; but this censure has been carried too far. For, in his general character, he is masculine and strong. humour of decrying him, passed from the French critics to those of England. But their strictures are founded either in ignorance or prejudice. For the Jerusalem is,in my opinion, the third regular epic poem in the world; and stands next to the Iliad and Eneid. In simplicity and fire, Tasso is inferior to Homer, in tenderness to Virgil; in sublimity to Milten; but for fertility of invention, variety of incidents, expression of characters, richness of description, and beauty of style, no poet, except the three just named, can be compared to him.

THE LUSIAD OF CAMOENS.

THE Portuguese boast of Camoens, as the Italians do of Tasso. The discovery of the East Indies by Vasco de Gama, an enterprise alike splendid and interesting, is the subject of the poem of Camoens. The adventures, distresses,and actions of Vasco and his countrymen, are well fancied and described; and the Lusiad is conducted on the epic plan. The incidents of the poem are magnificent; and, joined with some wildness and irregularity,there is displayed in it much poetic spirit, strong fancy, and bold description. In the poem, however,there is no attempt toward painting characters Vasco is the hero, and the only personage that makes any figure.

The machinery of the Lusiad is perfectly extravagant; being formed of an odd mixture of Christian ideas and Pagan mythology. Pagan divinities appear to be the deities; and Christ and the Holy Virgin to be inferior agents. One great object, however, of the Portuguese expedition is to extend the empire of Christianity, and to extirpate Mahometanism. In this religious undertaking the chief protector of the Portuguese is Venus, and their great adversary is Bacchus. Jupiter is introduced, as foretelling the downfal of Mahomet. Vasco during a storm implores the aid of Christ and the Virgin; and in return to this prayer Venus appears, and discovering the storm to be the work of Bacchus, complains to Jupiter, and procures the winds to be calmed. All this is most prepos

terous; but, toward the end of his work, the poet offers an awkward apology for his mytho logy; making the goddess Thetes inform Vasco, that she and the other heathen divinities are no more than names to describe the operations of Providence.

In the Lusiad, however, there is some fine machinery of a different kind. The appearance of the genius of the river Ganges, in a dream to Emanuel, king of Portugal, inviting him to discover his secret springs, and acquainting him that he was the monarch, destined to enjoy the treasures of the East is a happy idea. But in the fifth canto, the poet displays his noblest conception of this sort, where Vasco recounts to the king of Melinda, all the wonders of his voyage. He tells him, that when the fleet arrived at the Cape of Good Hope, which had never been doubled before, by any navigator, there appeared to them suddenly a huge phantom, rising out of the sea in the midst of tempest and thunder, with a head that reached the clouds, and a countenance that filled them with terror. This was the genius of that hitherto unknown ocean; and he menaced them in a voice of thunder for invading those unknown seas; foretelling the calamities that were to befal them, if they should proceed; and then with a mighty noise disappeared. This is a very solemn and striking piece of machinery; and shows that Camoens was a poet of a bold and lofty imagination.

THE TELEMACHUS OF FENELON.

IT would be unpardonable in a review of epic poets to forget the amiable Fenelon. His work, though in prose, is a poem; and the plan in general is well contrived, having epic grandeur and unity of action. He employs the ancient mythology; and excels in application of it. There is great richness as well as beauty in his descriptions. To soft and calm scenes, his genius is more peculiarly suited; such as the incidents of pastoral life, the pleasures of virtue, or a country flourishing in peace.

His first books are eminently excellent. The adventures of Calypso are the chief beauty of his work. Vivacity and interest join in the narration. In the books which follow, there is less happiness in the execution,and an apparent languor. The author, in warlike adventures, is most unfortunate.

'Some critics have refused to rank this work

among epic poems. Their objection arises from the minute details it exhibits of virtuous policy, and from the discourses of Mentor, which recur too frequently, and too much in the strain of commonplace morality. To these peculiarities,however,the author was led by the design with which he wrote, that of forming a young prince to the cares and duties of a virtuous monarch.

Several epic poets have described a descent into hell; and in the prospects they have given us of the invisible world, we may observe the