“And dally with the innocence of thought,
  Like the old age”—­

his Lordship’s Muse spurns the olden time, and affects all the supercilious airs of a modern fine lady and an upstart.  The object of the one writer is to restore us to truth and nature:  the other chiefly thinks how he shall display his own power, or vent his spleen, or astonish the reader either by starting new subjects and trains of speculation, or by expressing old ones in a more striking and emphatic manner than they have been expressed before.  He cares little what it is he says, so that he can say it differently from others.  This may account for the charges of plagiarism which have been repeatedly brought against the Noble Poet—­if he can borrow an image or sentiment from another, and heighten it by an epithet or an allusion of greater force and beauty than is to be found in the original passage, he thinks he shews his superiority of execution in this in a more marked manner than if the first suggestion had been his own.  It is not the value of the observation itself he is solicitous about; but he wishes to shine by contrast—­even nature only serves as a foil to set off his style.  He therefore takes the thoughts of others (whether contemporaries or not) out of their mouths, and is content to make them his own, to set his stamp upon them, by imparting to them a more meretricious gloss, a higher relief, a greater loftiness of tone, and a characteristic inveteracy of purpose.  Even in those collateral ornaments of modern style, slovenliness, abruptness, and eccentricity (as well as in terseness and significance), Lord Byron, when he pleases, defies competition and surpasses all his contemporaries.  Whatever he does, he must do in a more decided and daring manner than any one else—­he lounges with extravagance, and yawns so as to alarm the reader!  Self-will, passion, the love of singularity, a disdain of himself and of others (with a conscious sense that this is among the ways and means of procuring admiration) are the proper categories of his mind:  he is a lordly writer, is above his own reputation, and condescends to the Muses with a scornful grace!

Lord Byron, who in his politics is a liberal, in his genius is haughty and aristocratic:  Walter Scott, who is an aristocrat in principle, is popular in his writings, and is (as it were) equally servile to nature and to opinion.  The genius of Sir Walter is essentially imitative, or “denotes a foregone conclusion:”  that of Lord Byron is self-dependent; or at least requires no aid, is governed by no law, but the impulses of its own will.  We confess, however much we may admire independence of feeling and erectness of spirit in general or practical questions, yet in works of genius we prefer him who bows to the authority of nature, who appeals to actual objects, to mouldering superstitions, to history, observation, and tradition, before him who only consults the pragmatical and restless workings of his own breast, and gives