unread in my study window this twelvemonth, and would have been returned unread to its owner, had not my Cousin come in good time to save it from that disgrace. We are now reading it, and find it excellent; abounding with wit and just sentiment, and knowledge both of books and men.

impatiently, for a line from you, and am at last determined to send you one, to enquire what is become of you, and why you are silent so much longer than usual.

I want to know many things, which only you can tell me, but especially I want to know what has been the issue of your conference with Nichol: Has he seen your work? I am impatient for the appea

rance of it, because impatient to have the spotless credit of the great poet's character, as a man and a citizen, vindicated, as it ought to be, and as it never will be again.

It is a great relief to me, that my Miltonic labours are suspended. I am now busy in transcrib ing the alterations of Homer, having finished the whole revisal. I must then write a new Preface, which done I shall endeavour immediately to descant on The four Ages.

Adieu! my dear Brother.

W. C.

The reader may now be anxious to learn some

particulars of the projected poem, which has been repeatedly mentioned under the title of The four Ages; a poem to which the mind of Cowper looked eagerly

forward, as to a new and highly promising field for his excursive and benevolent fancy. The idea had been suggested to him in the year 1791, by a very amiable clerical neighbour, Mr. Buchanan, who in the humble curacy of Ravenstone (a little sequestered village within the distance of an easy walk from Weston) possesses, in a scene of rustic privacy, such extensive scholarship, such gentlenesss of manners, and such a contemplative dignity of mind, as would certainly raise him to a more suitable, and indeed to a conspicuous situation, if the professional success of a divine were the immediate consequence of exemplary merit. This gentleman who had occasionally enjoyed the gratification of visiting Cowper, suggested to him, with a becoming diffidence, the project of a new poem on the four distinct periods of life, infancy, youth, manhood, and old age. He imparted his ideas to the poet by a letter, in which he observed, with equal modesty and truth, that Cowper was particularly qualified to relish, and to do justice to the subject; a subject which he supposed not hitherto treated expressly, as its importance deserves, by any poet ancient or modern.

Mr. Buchanan added to this letter a brief sketch of contents for the projected composition. This

hasty sketch he enlarged by the kind encouragement of Cowper. How cheerfully the poet received the idea, and how liberally he applauded the worthy divine who suggested it, will appear from the following billet, written immediately on the receipt of the more ample sketch.

To the Revd. Mr. BUCHANAN.

MY DEAR SIR,

Weston, May 11, 1793.

You have sent me a beautiful

poem, wanting nothing but metre. I would to heaven that you would give it that requisite yourself;

for he who could make the sketch, cannot but be well qualified to finish. But if you will not, I will; provided always nevertheless, that God gives me ability, for it will require no common share to do justice to your conceptions.

I am much yours,

W. C.

Your little messenger vanished before I could

catch him.

VOL. 4.

I

Various impediments rendered it hardly possible for Cowper to devote himself, as he wished to do, to the immediate prosecution of a plan so promising; yet he cherished the idea for some years in his mind, and was particularly pleased (as the reader may recollect from a passage in one of his Letters to me) with a prospect that this intended poem might form a portion of a very ample original confederate work, which we hoped to produce in concert with the united powers of some admirable artists, who were justly dear to us both.

All who delight to accompany the genius of Cowper in animated flights of moral contemplation, will deeply regret that he was precluded by a variety of trouble from indulging his ardent imagination in a work, that would have afforded him such ample scope for all the sweetness and all the sublimity of his spirit. His felicity of description, and exqusite sensibility; his experience of life, and his sanctity of character, rendered him singularly fit and worthy to delineate the progress of nature in all the different stages of

human existence.

A poem of such extent and diversity, happily completed by such a poet, would be a national treasure, of infinite value to the country that gave it