The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1852-03-31


The Late Thomas Meore.
We noticed very briefly, in our last weeks
paper. the death of Thomas Moore, who up to
the time Of his decease, was the greatest sur
vivor of that galaxy of illustrious names which
has given to our own time proud place in the
history of poetry. We have since been favored
by literary friend with the following cursory
but graphic sketch of the intellectual idosyn-
cracy of this popular poet, who more than any
other whom We remember, was the idol of his
day:
The ilustrious brotherhood Of poets which
forms such conspicuous glory of the past age
is now nearly all disbanded. Keate, the young.
est, was the first to die, and Rogers, the oldest,
who published ten years before Keats was born,
is still living, thirty years after the death Of his
youthful contemporary Keats, in the full flush
Of youth, with all his glorious faculties imma-
ture and nascent, was first cut off; then Shell
ley, just verging from the rocks and shoals of
youthful passion and experience into the calm,
sunny, fathomless expanse of intellectual man
hood, was suddenly drowned; then Byron, in
the pri,re of his manhood, "Nel mezzo del
cammin di nostra VITA" with the passions of his
youth rushing through his maturity like the
waters of the St Lawrence, far into the Atlant c
ocean, just as the current was abating in its
fury, and heaven and ocean seemed propitious,
suddenly vanished from the horizon.
A few years subsequent, Sir Walter Scott,
after making and losing princely fortune just
when the autumnal touches sho we'd the ripeness
of age, from prodgous overworking of pow
ers, died with his mind a melancholy blank
Shortly afterwards Coleridge, i" the rapt one
with the godlike forehead" with the intellect of
superior being and scarcely the moral purpose
of child, after years Of languishing produced
by the tyranny of opium, found rest Then
Southcy, with his powers exhausted like Sir
Walter SCOTS, died with his mind insane then
Campbell, scarcely past the time when man is
in the vigor of his faculties, became fatuous and
expired an imbecile; and now last week, Tom
Moore, the bard of his native Erin, the poet who
possessed and exercised a more active fancy than
any of his contemporaries, whose wit, raillery,
powers of imagery and musical expressions arc
unrivalled, although he had only just passed the
boundaries of the three score years and ten, de-
parted to the unknown world, with all his bril-
liant faculties dimmed bv premature decay, dy-
ing as it we're like an old man asleep, in the mis-
ty MEDICATION Of childish dream. Sad conclu-
sions. Keats dead before his manhood Shelly
on the threshold, Byron at its prime and Scott,
Southey, Campbell, and Moore, like tropical
afternoon during sudden storm passed as it
were, at one stride, from day to darkness-from
the pride of power to the humi ,tion of second
childhood. The great exception is Wadsworth !;
he died full of years, full of glory, and full of
intellect; he sank like the sun through cloud
less sky in the ocean, showing his subdued
splendors along the deep further and further till
he sets, and. all Is night The causes Of this
falling off"-of great men in their declining
years would be an interesting, though sad in.
quiry, but would occupy too much of our space,
and we now revert to the great poet who has
just departed, and now in the gorgeous cloud
land of poetry has left :" gap i'th' clouds"
Tom Moore, besides his great political genius,
possessed social talents which made him, as
Byron has described him in the dedication of the
Corsair, the idol of every circle in which he
moved It was never our happiness to meet
him, but we have heard highly. cultivated gen.
tleman, residing among us, give many graphic
accounts of evenings spent with him, when he
shone pre- eminent among circle Of wits, from
the readiness and perfect good humor of his
repnrtee, the shrewdness of his observation, the
JUNCTION of humor and the exquisite taste and
talent of his singing.
lie was pre-eminently a fascinating man, not
like Lord Byron, by theatrical righteousness
and empirical responsiveness, but from native
benevolence of MANNER and that plastic sym.
pathy which adapts itself to the peculiarites of
every listener.
Moore, more than any other poet of the age,
has left the impress of his social genalities upon
the memories Of his successors: as to his ge-
MUS it requires merely to be sketched. as it has
been delineated in such a mastery manner by
more than one of our metropolitan contempo-
rares
There never was poet who possessed such
facility of imagery, of such buoyancy of temper.
He is more genial than even his favorite Ana
creon; and if he have not the suavity, and
shrewd observation of Horace he has far more
playful and ebullient wit, and q fancy beyond
comparison more brilliant, copious, and rapid
His fancy was too active and projectile for
calm and deep emotion, hence, even in the
aLoves of the Angels" there is no intensity Of
passion, but in its place plenty of amatory SEN
timent Lalla Rookh is unique Its fidelity to
eastern manners and scenery is marvellous, but
still more marvellous is the rapid and untirng
succession of comparisons, flashing out one af-
ter another in glorious disorder, like fresh i'm.
ages of the sun on the ripples of river, from
every breath of wind.
AS song writer he is immortal, and Burns is
the only British lyrist to contest the palm with
him. He has II the passion, energy, and con-
centrated expression of the Scottish bard, but
his intellectual resources are more extended, his
subjects more diversified, his versifcation more
musical, and his embellishments more lavish
He is the poet of sentment-Burns of passion
He is never swept on by his theme the fercer
feelings are unknown to him, and his mind in
its intensest efforts, is never moved from its
place, but merely swayed to and fro like the
broad-leaved branches of sycamore in sum
mer tempest, while its roots are sleeping in the
SOIL
Meeting in Philadelphia against View York
Mint.