The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-11-15 00:00:00

LITERARY NOTICES.

ANGLO-PQLISH HARP.

.V,titmey in his Belles Lettres says that poetry is the
language of passion, where I suppose we are to understand
by passion that emotion of the mind which Lord Kaimes
affirms is ever accompanied by some desire. We shall not
stop here to review either of these definitions, but certain
it is, that when the critic judges of the higher effusions of
the mind by the stern, unbending rules of art, he acts very
much like Roberval, the French mathematician, who,after
having for the first time seen a play, asked—What does
it prove ? If the critic ought to possess a portion of the
poet's fire, what should be the feeling of him who under-
takes to sit in judgment upon the Anglo-Polish Harp ?
None but a Pole should. review it. We, who are.sober
Englishmen, can only imagine the intensity of feeling.
which
.gave birth to some of the expressions in the vo-
lume before us. It would be easy to give our general
impression of the work; but whilst we fall short, by many
octaves, of the thrilling notes sounding throughout it,
we are not insensible of its appeal. As a specimen of
patriotic poetry it deserves to stand very high, but we
tear it will not long survive. the excitement which gave
it,birth. As Mr. Jones may visit the muses on other
occasions, we will take the liberty of acquainting him
with some little of the etiquette of those ladies. They
never listen to " harsh discord," and would therefore
turn away their ear from "civilization's headland bold !"
(vide " The Spartan's 'Pass may live in song.") The
composition of this piece is in almost pure iambics, and vet
we defy an Englishman, without the grossest cacophony
and violation of accent, to make the first foot of this line
an iambic. Addison is known to have been ridiculed for
the redundant burden of the beginning of Cato—

" The dawn is overcast—the morning lowers,
And heavily in clouds brings on the day."
So we should complain of the poem entitled " Poland,"
which opens thus

" I hung my harp awhile to rest,
And gave the strings to cease their trembling."

Why surely when he "hung his harp up to rest" he also
"gave the strings to cease their trembling." But we
are not inclined to be over fastidious, and would wish to
be underitood to have only been ticking out a few weeds
frOm a garden of flowers. The "Scenes from Longi-
nus" have pleased us less than the minor poem% Mr.
Jones does not appear to us to have been destined by
nature to tread on the Cothurnus. The language of
Aurelius is not the language of a dramatic king—it has
not the stately tone of royalty ; and Bonosius, though
not inaptly made " a chosen officer" in the court where
Aurelius wears the diadem, is a subject that might be
found in many other coarts known in the great metropo-
lis. We would advise Mr. Jones to cut acquaintance
with Melpomene—her sisters are more kind.

Burke's History of the Commoners. Part XIII. Henry

Colburn.

we hare received
. With the periodicals of this month,
the thirteenth part-of Mr. But ke's national work, " The
History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ire-
lmd"—national truly, if nationality ,mean peculiar to a
particular nation ; for there is no other land on earth
which could furnish materiel for a similar undertaking.
Other countries have their noble, their ecclesiastic, their
military orders, but where is the life's blond of all the
independent, influential, manly order of country gentle-
men to be found—where, save within the realm of his
Britannic Majesty ? Without entering into a critical
analysis of so extending a. work, which we consign to the
great quarterly tribunal, we may be allowed cursorily to
observe, that the execution appears fully equal to the
conception, and that the projector deserves well of his
country.
In the part before its—which comprises. nearly one-
hundred families—we find blended with houses of great
antiquity, many of modern date, which !tare risen to
affluence, station, and importance, through manufactu-
ring and commercial enterprise. Of the latter, are our
estimable townsmen—William Brown, Esq., of Rich-
mond Hill and Brandon ; Samuel Sandbach, Esq., of the
Woodlands; and James Pownall, Esq., of Pownall and
Mayfield ; and of the neighbouring commercial places—
James Brown, Esq., of Harehill Grove, near Leeds ; and
and John Greaves, Esq., of the ,Crescent, Salford, anti
Mani Hall, near Warriegton.., Mr. Greaves, who is a
munificent patron of arts and letters, is the only son and
heir of John Greaves, . who was in partnership with Sir
Robert. Peel, in the. banking:house of Peel, Greaves,
and Co. of Manchester. -Of old • proprietors, we have,
Kemys, Tynte of Halsewell, Barnabv of Rockhampton,
Entwistle or Foxholes, Fords! of Seaforde, Hullon of
Hutton, Fulford of Great Fulfurd, Tayieur of 13untings.
(late, (of which our townsman, Charles Tayleur,
Long of Rowde Ashston, Northey ; Hopkins of fling
House, Paploe of Garnston, &c. &c. &c.