"Manso afterwards tells us that Tasso would frequently in company be quite abstracted in his frenzy; would talk to himself, and laugh profusely; and would fix his eyes keenly upon vacancy for a long time, and then say that he saw his familiar spirit; and describe him as under the semblance of an angelic youth, such as he paints him in his dialogue of Le Messagiero. Manso particularly mentions that once Tasso, angry at his incredulity, told him that he should see the spirit with his own eyes. Accordingly next day, when they were talking together and sitting by the fire, Tasso suddenly darted his eyes to a window in the room, and sat so intent, that, when Manso spoke to him, he returned no sort of answer. At last he turned to him and said. 'Behold the friendly spirit, who is courteously come to converse with me; look at him, and perceive the truth of my words.' Manso immediately threw his eyes toward the spot; but with his keenest vision could see nothing, but the rays of the sun shining through the window into the chamber. While he was thus staring, Tasso had entered into lofty discourse with the spirit, as he perceived from his share of the dialogue: that of the spirit was not audible to him; but

he solemnly declares that the discourse was so grand and marvellous, and contained such lofty things, expressed in a most unusual mode, that he remained in extacy, and did not dare to open his mouth so much as to tell Tasso that the spirit was not visible to him. In some time, the spirit being gone, as Manso could judge, Tasso turned to him with a smile, and said, he hoped he was now convinced. To which Manso replied, that he had, indeed, heard wonderful things; but had seen nothing. Tasso said, 'Perhaps you have heard and seen more than ,' he then paused; and

Manso, seeing him in silent meditation, did not care to perplex him with further questions."*

Had Tasso not formed extravagant schemes of happiness and fame which are seldom, if ever, realized, and had corrected the fervor of an imagination too prone to admit the præternatural and strange, by cultivating those sciences which depend upon demonstrative evidence, or by mingling more with the world, and discriminating its various characters and foibles, the integrity of his mind had, most pro

Vide Letters of Literature p. 379.

bably, been preserved. Shakspeare possessed in a far superior degree, if I may be allowed the term, the powers of superhuman creation, and no poet ever enjoyed such an unlimited dominion over the fears and superstitions of mankind. Yet the acuteness, the inexhaustible variety of his genius, his talents for humour, and his almost intuitive penetration into the follies and vices of his species, enabled him to avoid, in a great measure, that credulity which his wild, terrific, yet delightful and consistent fictions, almost rivetted upon others. Milton, too, had a peculiar predilection for traditionary tales, and legendary lore, and, in his early youth, spent much time in reading romantic narratives; but the deep and varied erudition which distinguished his career, for no man in Europe, at that time, possessed a wider field of intellect, sufficiently protected him from their delusive influence, though, to the latest period of life, he still retained much of his original partiality. Ossian, however, that melancholy but sublime Bard of other times, seems to have given implicit credit to the superstitions of his country, and his poems are, therefore, replete with a variety of immaterial agents; but these are of a kind rather calculated to soothe and

support the mind, than to shake and harrow it, as the gothic, with malignant and mysterious potency.

In the present century when science and literature have spread so extensively, the heavy clouds of superstition have been dispersed, and have assumed a lighter and less formidable hue; for though the tales of Walpole, Reeve and Radcliffe, or the poetry of Wieland,* Burger and Lewis, still powerfully arrest attention, and keep an ardent curiosity alive, yet is their machinery, by no means, an object of popular belief, nor can it, I should hope, now lead to dangerous credulity, as when in the times of Tasso, Shakspeare and even Milton, witches and wizards, spectres and fairies, were nearly as important subjects of faith as the most serious doctrines of religion.

Yet have we had one melancholy instance, and toward the middle of the eighteenth cen

*The Oberon of this exquisite poet which, in sportive play of fancy, may vie with the Muse of Shakspeare, and which, in the conduct of its fable, is superior to any work extant, richly merits an english dress. It is said that the late Mr. Sixt of Canterbury left a translation of this Epic. If it be well executed it would be a highly valuable present to the public.

tury, where disappointment, operating upon enthusiasm, has induced effects somewhat similar to those recorded of the celebrated Italian. In the year 1756 died our lamented COLLINS, one of our most exquisite poets, and of whom, perhaps, without exaggeration it may be asserted, that he partook of the credulity and enthusiasm of Tasso, the magic wildness of Shakspeare, the sublimity of Milton, and the pathos of Ossian. He had early formed sanguine expectations of fame and applause, but reaped nothing but penury and neglect, and stung with indignation at the unmerited treatment his productions had met with, he burnt the remaining copies with his own hands. His Cdes to Fear, on the Poetical Character, to Evening, the Passions, and on the Superstitions of the Highlands of Scotland, strongly mark the bias of his mind to all that is awefully wild and terrible. His address to Fear,

Dark Power! with shudd'ring meek submitted thought

Be mine to read the visions old

Which thy awakening bards have told :
And, lest thou meet my blasted view,

Hold each strange tale devoutly true.