of poetry to need that we should enter into any analysis of them. We will venture on one solitary quotation, to remind such readers of the highly-finished melodious verse with which they abound. It shall be the first strophe of a hymn to Christ: it will suggest to them the remainder: "For Thou wast born of woman! Thou didst come, O Holiest to this world of sin and gloom, Not in Thy dread omnipotent array; And not by thunders strew'd Was Thy tempestuous road; save the life of the Queen. He represents to him, that if the King can certainly obtain a divorce, which he would on clear evidence of the guilt of Anne Boleyn, he will be contented with this means of getting her out of his way; otherwise he will destroy her in order to marry Jane Seymour. The enthusiastic youth sacrifices himself to save the Queen, and is, of course, the instrument of her destruction. Let us hope that such a moral monster as the ideal Jesuit here drawn never existed; and that some Nor indignation burnt before Thee on Thy approximation to such an ideal is way. But Thee, a soft and naked child Thy mother undefiled, In the rude manger, laid to rest The fourth on the list, "Anne Boleyn," is, in part, a reversion to the form of the English tragedy. It is not, however, written for representation. It holds a station midway between the dramatic poem and the acting play. With a few omissions, we imagine, it might be made as suitable to the stage as many other historical plays. Whether it would succeed or not is another question, and we certainly would not take upon ourselves to advise the experiment. There are eloquent passages in it, much powerful writing, but there is very little of that dialogue where mind really conflicts with mind-where man is felt to be acting upon man. The admirable passages are in the nature of soliloquies: they might have served for such, though they do not take that form. The prominent character in the piece is the Jesuit Angelo Caraffa, and nowhere could be found a more terrific description of the Jesuit than is put in the mouth of Angelo himself. It is through his intrigues, through his most cruel and perfidious inventions, that the tragic fate of Anne Boleyn is here brought about. He persuades Smeaton to give false evidence against the Queen, to proclaim himself a criminal, under the delusion that by so doing he will the utmost that humanity can be charged with. The supposition is, that because the Jesuit has a great end in view, means the most vile and detestable are sanctified to him. Because the Jesuit has no personal interest in his crimes-because he is as ready to go to the stake as to destroy others, he believes himself to have an immunity from all guilt. By yielding implicit obedience to his order, he releases himself from all personal responsibility. It is thus that Angelo Caraffa expounds to the proud churchman Gardiner, the principles of the new order, of which he is a distinguished member: For ever, title, rank, wealth - even being; And, self-annihilated, deem myself A limb, a nameless limb, of that vast body That shall bespread the world, unchecked, untraced nowhere Like God's own presence, everywhere, yet Nor passion, nor affection, nor the love kindred touch the earth estranged heart; My personal being is absorbed and dead. . versed Of Rome's patrician blood, rich, lettered, In the affairs of men-no monkish dreamer Hearing Heaven's vision God spoke within this heart, but with the voice Of stern, deliberate duty, and I rose Resolved to sail the flood, to tread the fire That's naught-to quench all natural compunction, To know nor right, nor nor virtue, But as subservient to Rome's cause and I've schooled my haughty soul to subtlest I've strung my tender heart to bloodiest havoc, And stand prepared to wear the martyr's flames Like nuptial robes,-far worse, to drag to the stake My friend, the brother of my soul,-if thus was understood some quarter of a century ago, when it was possible to have an affectionate respect for the Chuch as a whole, and it was not thought necessary to enrol one's self as a declared partisan of some wrong, nor crime, section of it. There was then a type of Churchman (and indeed there still is, and we trust that it is a type which will never become extinct), not clamorous, yet very sincere in their faith, and, above all things, solicitous to extend those sentiments of love and piety which constitute the essence of Christianity. They regarded the Church as а truly sacred institution, because it had this sacred object, this exalted purpose, to inculcate and sustain the love of God and the love of man. They knew that these great sentiments might be-and, as things are, could not help being-united with very different schemes of Christian doctrine. But these differences were subordinate in their minds to those great sentiments recognised by all intelligent Christians as the very fruit for which any tree of doctrine had to be planted. They had no vain hope of subduing all such differences of scheme or system, but they trusted (perhaps in too sanguine a temper) that, in a cultivated clergy, what all acknowledged to be the essence of Christianity would constitute a bond of union strong enough to counteract the tendency to division which dogmatic differences must create. To this type of Churchmen, we apprehend, Dean Milman belonged. It was as the result merely of his historical works that his name became conspicuous for a time in the theological controversies of the day. The history first of the Jews and afterwards of the Christian Church became the favourite subject of his study; it was a subject in perfect harmony with the sacred profession he had adopted; and as a member of that profession he had gravely to decide how, and according to what principles, a history of the Hebrews should be written, the documents for whose With this quotation we will terminate our brief record of the poetry of Mr. Milman; we will turn to the other phase of his literary character and say a few words of him as a historian. We must leave to others who had the happiness of knowing him personally to treat of the man himself, and of those social and moral qualities in which we understand him to have been eminent. It is of the author only we can speak, and as an author he came before the world first as poet and afterwards as historian. Perhaps we shall be told that we omit the theologian, the Churchman. Now we have not the least doubt that Dean Milman had formed his own mature conclusions on all the various controversies that disturb the quiet of the Church, but he never wrote specifically as a theologian. So far as we are aware, it is only as a historian of the Jews, or of the Christian Church, that his theology is brought forward; and even then not a word more is said of his own personal convictions than is absolutely necessary. Theological controversy appears never to have been attractive to him. He was prepared to write the history of such controversies; he had no disposition to descend into the arena and become a controversialist himself. He. was a good Churchman, as that phrase |