to the dramatic. But the merits of Melendez in his own sphere are too great, and his fame is too well-founded to lose by acknowledgements which must be made in truth and justice. It is not improbable that he had been urged by his admirers to these attempts, to which his own inclinations would not have led him, and it might thus have been the easiness of his disposition that made him yield to suggestions which ended in failure.
In the prologue which he affixed to this edition, Melendez attempted to prove that poetic studies derogated nothing from the judicial dignity, and that they had no incompatibility with the duties and talents of a public man or man of business. But without following him or his biographer into such a discussion, we may concede the point so far, that any one undertaking responsible duties from the State, is bound to give them his best and undivided energies. If, however, he has any hours of leisure free from those responsibilities, it is surely only an extension of his duty for him to employ them in attempting to make his fellow-men wiser and better, or happier, in the manner most congenial to his disposition or talents. Melendez certainly had no need to exculpate himself in this respect, having been "long remembered at Zaragoza and Valladolid as a model of integrity and application, for his zeal in arranging amicably all disputations in his power, for his affability and frankness in listening to complaints, and for the humane and compassionate interest with which he visited the prisoners, accelerating their causes, and affording them assistance, with an inseparable adhesion to justice." It was for his detractors,[1]—and Melendez had them, notwithstanding the amiability of his character and the superiority of his talents,—to make these objections, if they could have done so. His resorting to such apologies only gave
- ↑ Hermosilla, author of a work, 'Juicio Critico de los principales Poetas Españoles de la ultima era,' published after his death, Paris 1840, gives in it, as Mr. Ticknor pithily observes, "a criticism of the poems of Melendez so severe that I find it difficult to explain its motive;" at the same time that he gives "an unreasonably laudatory criticism of L. Moratin's works." Hermosilla appears to have been a man of considerable learning, but little judgement. His criticisms are generally worthless, and the only excuse for him, with regard to his book, is, that he did not publish it. With regard to Melendez, taking every opportunity to depreciate his merits, he is constantly found constrained to acknowledge them, and sometimes even in contradiction to himself. Thus, having several times intimated, as at p. 31, that the erotic effusions of Melendez only were praiseworthy, he says, at p. 297, when speaking of his Epistles, that they are "his best compositions; thoughts, language, style, tone and versification, all in general are good." In another part he censures Melendez for his poems addressed to different ladies, especially some to 'Fanny,' who appears to have been an Englishwoman; and yet those epistles, addressed to her, on the death of her husband, are among the purest and most elegant specimens that can be pointed out of consolation to a mourner. It is but justice to his editor, Salva, to say, that he has expressed his dissent from these criticisms, though he thought proper to publish the work.
