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I am sorry to see in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, vol. ii, An Essay on the Character of Hamlet, written, I should suppose, by a very young man, though called 'Reverend; who speaks with presumptuous petulance of the first literary character of his age. Johnson has remarked, that "time toil'd after him in vain."
He had threatened and entreated, raged and cajoled. 'Twas all wasted. The mule was as deaf to prayer as to objurgation. It browsed contentedly along the even tenor of its way, so near and yet so far from the young man, who, like "panting time, toil'd after it in vain." And Larned much more than twenty miles away.
I say if the present theory of our army and navy is sensible and true, then the rest of America is an unmitigated fraud. A: After the rest is satiated, all interest culminates in the field of persons, and never flags there. Accordingly in this field have the great poets and literatuses signally toil'd.
They are the forcible verses of a man of a strong mind, but not accustomed to write verse ; for there is some uncouthness in the expression ." 'Drinking tea one day at Garrick's with Mr. Langton suggested, that in the line "And panting Time toil'd after him in vain," Johnson might have had in his eye the passage in The Tempest, where Prospero says of Miranda,
Soft came the breath of spring; smooth flow'd the tide; And blue the heaven in its mirror smil'd; The white sail trembled, swell'd, expanded wide, The busy sailors at the anchor toil'd. With anxious friends, that shed the parting tear, The deck was throng'd how swift the moments fly! The vessel heaves, the farewel signs appear; Mute is each tongue, and eloquent each eye!
Langton, he was questioned if he was not somewhat of a heretick as to Shakspeare; said Garrick, "I doubt he is a little of an infidel." Mr. Langton suggested, that in the line "And panting Time toil'd after him in vain," Johnson might have had in his eye the passage in The Tempest, where Prospero says of Miranda, " -She will outstrip all praise, And make it halt behind her." Johnson said nothing.
It is inserted in the Memoirs which Hayley wrote of his son. An active spirit in a little frame, This honest man the path of duty trod; Toil'd while he could, and, when death's darkness came, Sought in calm hope his recompense from God. His sons, who loved him, to his merit just, Raised this plain stone to guard their parent's dust. In a similar sketch from the pen of the Rev.
Shield, that would be foeman's terror, Still should gleam the morning's mirror. "Poor hire repays the rustic's pain; More paltry still the sportsman's gain; Vainest of all, the student's theme End in gome metaphysic dream. Yet each is up, and each has toil'd Since first the peep of dawn has smiled; And each is eagerer in his aim Than he who barters life for fame.
"My mariners, Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with gods!" TENNYSON'S Ulysses.
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