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INTBODUCTOKY ESSAY. 3g

And though Gray lived so much in the past, he is
receptive in the present, cognizant of new tendencies
and apt to resign himself to them, and to forego his
penetration when these are concerned; he would
willingly helieve in Macpherson's Ossian; he is
perhaps the only Englishman of note whom it affects,
as it affected the Continentals; this is because his
sensitive genius has a little shudder of presentiment,
at this first breath of the reviving spirit of Eomance.
It is these characteristics which make him, as I have
said, still modern for us in the best sense and justify
the curious and minute interest which some feel in
him now; it is at any rate the best account I am
able to give of a sort of homage which seems to
belong to much greater names, and yet which inclines
one who has given much time to Gray, whilst perhaps
half-smiling at his own enthusiasm, to repeat to his
fascinating shade the invocation

Vagliami 1 lungo studio e '1 grande amore
Che m' ban fatto cercar lo tuo volume.

late; but Mr Lowell pays him a very great one in attributing
to Gray his saying "Jeremy Taylor is the Shakespeare of
divines."



	INTBODUCTOKY ESSAY. 3g And though Gray lived so much in the past, he is receptive in the present, cognizant of new tendencies and apt to resign himself to them, and to forego his penetration when these are concerned; he would willingly helieve in Macpherson's Ossian; he is perhaps the only Englishman of note whom it affects, as it affected the Continentals; this is because his sensitive genius has a little shudder of presentiment, at this first breath of the reviving spirit of Eomance. It is these characteristics which make him, as I have said, still modern for us in the best sense and justify the curious and minute interest which some feel in him now; it is at any rate the best account I am able to give of a sort of homage which seems to belong to much greater names, and yet which inclines one who has given much time to Gray, whilst perhaps half-smiling at his own enthusiasm, to repeat to his fascinating shade the invocation Vagliami 1 lungo studio e '1 grande amore Che m' ban fatto cercar lo tuo volume.

	late; but Mr Lowell pays him a very great one in attributing to Gray his saying "Jeremy Taylor is the Shakespeare of divines."