He might have excelled, that is, if like Horace
he had known the world. But he did not know the world. He saw the
"great Babel" only "through the loopholes of retreat," and in the
columns of his weekly newspaper. Even during the years, long past,
which he spent in the world, his experience had been confined to a
small literary circle. Society was to him an abstraction on which he
discoursed like a pulpiteer. His satiric whip not only has no lash, it
is brandished in the air.
No man was ever less qualified for the office of a censor; his judgment
is at once disarmed, and a breach in his principles is at once made by
the slightest personal influence. Bishops are bad, they are like the
Cretans, evil beasts and slow bellies; but the bishop whose brother
Cowper knows is a blessing to the Church. Deans and Canons are lazy
sinecurists, but there is a bright exception in the case of the Cowper
who held a golden stall at Durham. Grinding India is criminal, but
Warren Hastings is acquitted, because he was with Cowper at
Westminster.
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