The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-08-21 00:00:00

Uct•aturr.

NOTICES.

The Epochs. A Poem. By Robert W. Thom.
(Second Notice.)
A poet, in these days of degenerate literature, who is
too high-souled to resort to puffery, has a small chance of
being recognised amidst the swarm of ephemerals—the
Albert Smiths, and others of the same calibre•—who '
flutter on the stream of popularity. Smartness, flippant
wit, and namby-pamby versification, command their full
ready reward in the literary market, whilst the deep-
toned voice of genius appeals to uniistening ears. True
poetry is voted " slow ;" too mystic for fast young men
and languid ladies, too frivolous (!) for utilitarian philo-
sophers and money-seeking men of the world. " L'Alle-
gro" and " Il Penseroso" of another Milton, if another
can be found capable of anything to approach these ex-
quisite compositions, would only furnish food for a squib
in Punch; and another " Hamlet," or " Midsummer
Night's Dream," would fail to draw an audience, and
certainly a publisher. Second-rate novelists and facetious
writers alone engross the gay portion of mankind ; and
staticians, the grave.
We know not whether the author before us, to whose
beautiful poem we are about to draw attention in a se-
cond notice, is destined at an early period to make his
light shine through the haze of dulness andotlippancy min-
gled, which has fallen upon the national mind. But of this
we are certain, that it will not be his want of " the faculty
divine" which will prevent him. He may not attain fame
per Ba/turn; but the mingled sublimity and beauty of
conception, the pure thoughts and deeply poetic feeling,
scattered through this work, will be appreciated by those
whose good opinion is worth Navin". We do not at all
wish Mr. Thom to believe that he is without faults. The
poem before us has many and grave ones. We could
point out instances of unmusical and faulty versification ;
lines too short, and rhymes which are not allowable. As
a whole the poem is faulty in construction. It has no
plot like " the tale of Troy divine," or the history " of
man's first disobedience and the fruits of that forgiven
sin;" and critics may carp at something in every other
page. But these are only like spots upon the sun's face ;
and may mar, but cannot obscure, the many beauties of
the poem.

We gave last week, as a specimen, one of Mr. Thom's
exquisite delineations of nature in her chastened domes-
tic attire. We shall close this notice with an extract of a
different description, which we find in Book VI.

THE CITY OF THE DESERT.

" A city of the desert I Lo! the moon,
Forth from a multitude of nights, had seen
Its chambers desolate ! The sun at noon
Beheld its halls unpeopled ; and the sheen
Of all the stars through flowing years had been
Unmarred amid its marts! Night into day,
Day into night had melted on the scene
Of solemn desolation, whereon lay
Oblivion waxed old, and slumbering 'mid his sway !

" There was no voice of being in the air;
There was no motion on the hollow lake ;
There was no tree uprising any where,
The idle compass of the view to break.
The very light was idle, nor did shake
With motion of a bird. All hush ! I could
Hear mine own heart the desert stillness wake!
The sun, that late amid the heavens stood,
Was not the dweller of a deeper solitude !
" Once Life stormed in these streets, as the old sea •
Chafed in its channels when the angry wind
Blew hostile to its current. Can it be,'
I cried aloud, that storm of humankind
Has sunk to this dread calm ! What heart divined
That on that strife of souls would rest so well
Silence profound? Thou city! thou didst bind
Thy hopes to the fleet hours, though these did tell
That nought of earthly kind might in their bosoms dwell !

" Thy mighty I where nre they ?—kinc.,,, senator,
Warrior, and poet, priest, philosopher?
Sceptre, and sword, and statute, are no more I
The lyre bath waxed mute within the shore
Of this broad sea, where solitude cloth pour
Its white unbroken waves from age to age I
Ay, it has grown as mute as where the roar
Of nations mock the heavens ! The lofty sage
Has perished withthe wars 'twas his in thee to wage!

00 The children of the stranger have for toys
The gods thou worshipped, and in mockery spit
Upon their solemn faces! There was noise
And tumult in the day when thou didst sit
Amid thy vanities, and badst uplit
Altars to their vain worship in the tone •
Of One eternal! So 'twas done; and yet
Time the Almighty's breath on thee has blown :
And where art thou and they? Ask of the desert lone !

" Where are the glories of thy battles gone?
Where is that power thy subtle councils won?
Where are those songs thy minstrels poured upon
The ravished car of Life? Thy creeds begun
In truth or falsehood—where? The solemn Sun
Asks for them in its course, and groweth old
Asking in vain ! As Winters that have done
Their work upon the earth, they are uprelled
And garnered. Where ? No mortal tongue bath told !
VII.
"'Thou bast no dwellers in the solitude
Of old eternities, whose fame recall
Thy name or history—none! The darkening flood
Of the descending years has swept o'er all !
Some cities sow their seed ; and when they fall,
Have their successors, who adopt their name:
But thou hast vanished wholly ; none recall
Thy name, thy date, thy glory, or thy fame,
Who were thy dwellers first, or from what source they came.'
There is another beautiful picture in the same book—the
death of a denyer of God—which we may quote hereafter.
We understand that Mr. Thom is preparing for publi-
cation another revision of the epochs; and would recom-
mend to him a thorough edition, and the removal of the
faulty lines, some of them probably' the work of the
printer, which occur in the present edition.

THE MANSELS : A TALE OF THE LATE
MONETARY CRISIS.