It is related of some good man (I forget who), that upon his death-bed he recommended his son to employ himself in cultivating a garden, and in composing verses, thinking these to be at once the happiest and the most harmless of all pursuits.  Poetry may be, and too often has been, wickedly perverted to evil purposes; what indeed is there that may not, when religion itself is not safe from such abuses! but the good which it does inestimably exceeds the evil.  It is no trifling good to provide means of innocent and intellectual enjoyment for so many thousands in a state like ours; an enjoyment, heightened, as in every instance it is within some little circle, by personal considerations, raising it to a degree which may deserve to be called happiness.  It is no trifling good to win the ear of children with verses which foster in them the seeds of humanity and tenderness and piety, awaken their fancy, and exercise pleasurably and wholesomely their imaginative and meditative powers.  It is no trifling benefit to provide a ready mirror for the young, in which they may see their own best feelings reflected, and wherein “whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,” are presented to them in the most attractive form.  It is no trifling benefit to send abroad strains which may assist in preparing the heart for its trials, and in supporting it under them.  But there is a greater good than this, a farther benefit.  Although it is in verse that the most consummate skill in composition is to be looked for, and all the artifice of language displayed, yet it is in verse only that we throw off the yoke of the world, and are as it were privileged to utter our deepest and holiest feelings.  Poetry in this respect may be called the salt of the earth; we express in it, and receive in it, sentiments for which, were it not for this permitted medium, the usages of the world would neither allow utterance nor acceptance.  And who can tell in our heart-chilling and heart-hardening society, how much more selfish, how much more debased, how much worse we should have been, in all moral and intellectual respects, had it not been for the unnoticed and unsuspected influence of this preservative?  Even much of that poetry, which is in its composition worthless, or absolutely bad, contributes to this good.

Sir Thomas More.—­Such poetry, then, according to your view, is to be regarded with indulgence.

Montesinos.—­Thank Heaven, Sir Thomas, I am no farther critical than every author must necessarily be who makes a careful study of his own art.  To understand the principles of criticism is one thing; to be what is called critical, is another; the first is like being versed in jurisprudence, the other like being litigious.  Even those poets who contribute to the mere amusement of their readers, while that amusement is harmless, are to be regarded with complacency, if not respect.  They are the butterflies of literature, who during the short season of their summer, enliven the garden and the field.  It were pity to touch them even with a tender hand, lest we should brush the down from their wings.