The Sun. — 1834-01-17 (London, England)

JOHN MACKAY WILSON. EDINBURGH, 1834. These poems have one great recommendation, they are written with considerable feeling and simplicity by one who understands what he is about. With less elaborate polish and harmony of rhythm than our poetical contributors to Annuals, as a matter of course, exhibit, Mr. Wilson is worth them all in the straight forward, unaffected character of his genius. A well written preface— to every word of which we cordially subscribe— furnishes us with his ideas of what poetry is, or should be ; and when we say that he puts forth Burns as one of his poetical idols, we have said, we conceive, quite enough to impress the reader with a favourable opinion of his judgment. None but puling sentimentalists and namby-pamby versifiers affect to underrate the works of Scotland's best poet. The " Enthusiast," which is the longest, is also the best poem in the present collection. We subjoin a specimen :  " Or, when brown Autumn touched the leaves with age, The heavens became the young Enthusiast's page Wherein his fancy read ; and they would then Hand locked in hand, forsake the haunts of men; Communing with the silver queen of night, Which, as a spirit shone upon their sight, Full orbed in maiden glory, and her beams Fell on their hearts, like distant shadowed gleams Of future joy and undefined bliss,— Half of another world and half of this. Then rapt in dreams, oft would he gazing stand, Grasping in his, her fair and trembling hand, And thus exclaim—" Helen, when I am gone,— When that bright moon shall shine on you alone,— And but one shadow on the river fall, Say, wilt thou then these heavenly hours recall, Or read upon the fair moon's smiling brow The words we've uttered—those we utter now ? Or, think, though seas divide us, I may be Gazing upon that glorious orb with thee At the same moment,—hearing in its rays The hallowed whisperings of early days ? For, 0, there is a language in its calm And holy light, that bath a power to balm The troubled spirit, and like memory's glass Make by-gone happiness before us pass."  Among the minor poems, that entitled " Tomorrow" is the best. There are many fine thoughts scattered through it ; as, for instance, where Mr. Wilson defines to-morrow as the " pillar where misfortune leans," and speaks of "the power Of Knowledge and of Science, walking forth In silence and in strength, and o'er the earth Flinging the glory of a sun snore bright Than that which heav'n can boast." In this poem our author has evidently had an eye to Young; not in the structure of his blank verse, or the ascetic, gloomy turn of his feelings, but in his frequent point, and epigram, and antithesis, and more especially in his luxuriance of imagery. But Young, sublime as he is on occasions, is not the best model for a poet. He is cold, stately, and at times stiff and pedantic. There is nothing plastic or yielding in his imagination. With much of the polish, it has still more of the hardness and rigidity of marble. Mr. Wilson, however, has wisely avoided these faults. We must give one more extract from his volume—a sonnet on " Midnight," which is finely felt. The cheerful, soothing ideas conveyed in the two last lines, contrast most artfully and felicitously with the images of awe and solemnity by which the rest of the sonnet is oppressed. The effect, on reading them, is as if a nightmare were suddenly removed from one's chest. The sea is silent, and the winds of God Stir not its waters; on its voiceless waves Thick darkness presses as a mighty load, Weighing their strength to slumber. O'er earth's graves One lonely star is watching ; and the wind, Benighted on the desert, howls to find Its trackless path as would a dying hound. The thick clouds wearied with their course all day, Repose like shrouded ghosts on the black air; Or in the darkness having lost their way, Await the dawn. 'Tis menight reigns around— Midnight, when crime and murder quit their lair, When maidens dream of music's sweetest sound, And mothers breathe the fond, the yearning prayer.