In poetry the heresies and escapades of Lord Byron are
too much for him, although as a Peer and a gentleman he always speaks well
and deferentially of him. Shelley he can make nothing of, and therefore
says, which is the strict truth in one sense at least, that he has never
read him. He praises Campbell, Crabbe, and Rogers, and shakes his head at
Tom Moore; but Pope is his especial favourite; and if anything in verse
has his heart, it is the "Rape of the Lock." Peter Pindar he partly
dislikes, but Anstey, the "Bath Guide," is high in his estimation; and
with him "Gray's Odes" stand far above those of Collins'. Of the "Elegy in
a Country Church" he thinks, as he says, "like the rest of the world."
"Shenstone's Pastorals" he has read. Burns he praises, but in his heart
thinks him a "wonderful clown," and shrugs his shoulders at his extreme
popularity. He says as little about Shakespeare as he can, and has by
heart some half dozen lines of Milton, which is all he really knows of him.
In the drama he inclines to the "unities;" and of the English Theatre
"Sheridan's School for Scandal," and Otway's "Venice Preserved," or Rowe's
"Fair Penitent," are what he best likes in his heart. John Kemble is his
favourite actor--Kean he thinks somewhat vulgar. In prose he thinks Dr.
Johnson the greatest man that ever existed, and next to him he places
Addison and Burke.
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