The Age Reviewed A Satire: In two parts: Second edition, revised and corrected [by Robert Montgomery] |
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 | The Age Reviewed |  |
Let Hunt alone stand forth, with lordly back,—
The pillow-nestling cheek, and trembling trees,
And now and then his breath-increasing breeze,
His notions stout upon the marring score,—
Degrade the heathen where the Lakist's poor.
How Ollier failed thy leaden tome to sell?—
Such putrid envy, mix'd with hate malign,
Such bestial doctrines blight that heart of thine;
Politic, not poetic flames burn there,—
Go—see the glass thy shedding hours declare!
The words printed in italic are transplanted here from Mr. Hunt's Rimini, &c.: Mr. Hunt joins to the greatest conceit a meanness of mind alike discoverable in prose and verse: his heart and feelings betray a sourness, even when his phraseology is attempting to be tender. Some have said, that in private life Mr. Hunt is really amiable; but we can hardly conceive this true, when rancour is the natural effusion of his soul.
Hunt evinced a great deal of alacrity in discovering the vulgarisms of Wordsworth; but has exceeded him in these very faults. His doctrine informs us, that “the proper language of poetry, is in fact, nothing different from that of real life.” How admirably he illustrates it with regard to his own life! Poor Scot, (late editor of the London Magazine,) sweated hard to give him a month's renown,—but
| The Age Reviewed | |