Spenser was a long-established favourite of Thomson's, and he therefore took up a very congenial piece of work when he began his Castle of Indolence, avowedly based upon the great epic narrative of the 'poet's poet.' The poem was begun, according to his own words, as early as 1733, and engaged his attention at intervals of more or less duration till its publication in 1748. It formed another 'departure' in his poetry. The intention of the writer obviously was that the work should be a reflection of his ideas and capabilities as an artist—as an artist especially of the effects of poetical cadence, and of the literary grace of language. The result fully justified his aim. No imitation of a similar kind ever made has attained so near a rank of excellence to the original as do certain passages of The Castle of Indolence to The Faery Queen. Although Thomson's poem was the principal achievement of the sort in his day, Spenser awakened an active spirit of enthusiasm among English writers in the first half of the eighteenth century. In 1736 Gilbert West published his Education, written 'in imitation of the style and manners of Spenser's Faery Queen,' which was rewarded with considerable popular favour. This was followed by Akenside's Virtuoso in 1737, and by Shenstone's Schoolmistress in 1742. But none of these productions takes any serious place as a faithful replica of Spenser's style. The stanza is correctly and fluently written; but so bereft is it in every case of its engaging beauty that the manner of its use approaches perilously near to travesty. These imitations in general fully merit the criticism passed in the Lives of the Poets upon those of West. 'Works of this kind may deserve praise as proofs of great industry, and great nicety of observation; but the highest praise, the praise of genius, they do not claim. The noblest beauties of art are those of which the effect is co-extended with rational nature, or at least with the whole circle of polished life; what is less than this can be only pretty, the plaything of a fashion, and the amusement of a day.' But The Castle of Indolence baffles the dire condemnation of this category. A professed and successful imitation of Spenser, it is also much more: a quite spontaneous and living poem.

The comparison in method between The Seasons and The Castle of Indolence is fraught with suggestive interest. In The Seasons we have the poet, in his most representative character, dealing with the intrinsic imaginative elements of his art, with the conception, vividness, and lively comprehension of his ideas; in The Castle of Indolence he seeks to emphasise the power of expression of his thought, the aptness and felicity of his language, the beauty and tunefulness of phrase and rhythm. In The Seasons we recognise chiefly the hand of the poet; in The Castle of Indolence the hand of the artist. In the one he achieves distinction beside those whose special office it has been to grasp and vivify some poetic truth; in the other he enters the select ranks of the formal stylists of our literature. Here he belongs of right to the school of Coleridge and Keats. In deft and curious arrangement of topic, and in the exercise of subtle peculiarities of form and diction, The Castle of Indolence bears adequate consideration beside the masterpieces of the great romanticists of our own century. Nor does this excellence in point of outward form remain its simple recommendation. The poet's imagination asserts its capacity to answer to the particular demands made upon it by the conditions of the form upon which he works; and the result is something of that ethereal temper which characterises alone the best products in rare and delicate romance. Realistic, in a sense, in The Seasons, Thomson now becomes the exponent of an idealism in poetry. The region of The Castle of Indolence has no locality or name. It is a region of dream, of entrancing vision and enticing sound, of sun-flushed skies and radiant air, of bright sward and purple hill, of murmurous forest and melodious river, but where there lurks, moreover, depth of horror, and where landscape not far removed shines fair beneath a temperate day. It is a region consecrated indeed by the 'light that never was on sea or land.'

No work of poetry between the time of Spenser and Thomson is so marked by this absolutely delicate idealising tendency; nothing like it appears again till the time of Keats. We do not hear much about the significance of Thomson's part in setting forth anew the 'sweet-slipping movement' and charm of the Spenserian manner as a model for the poets of the nineteenth century literary renaissance; but there can be no doubt about the validity of his right in this matter. In the romantic method, so excellently represented by Thomson, Keats may be taken as the most direct successor who understood the extraordinary richness of the note that was struck in The Castle of Indolence; for though there is its mystic glamour in the poetry of Coleridge, Keats, in his work, combines in a more general way, the main aims in the literary design of Thomson. The supreme greatness of Coleridge and of Keats has tended to dim the less splendid glory of their distinguished predecessor; but the claim of his accomplishment in this direction demands acknowledgment. The matter is valuable if only as an item in the historical development of our literature. Mr Theodore Watts-Dunton, in an admirable essay on Chatterton, contributed to Ward's English Poets, points out with conclusive force that the gracefully light and flexible octosyllabic rhythms, which became so great a power in the hands of Coleridge and Scott, had already received efficient illustration from the bright genius of Chatterton. The brilliancy of conception, the wealth of imagery, the ample command of the musical resources of language displayed in The Castle of Indolence, certainly seem to constrain the like recognition of a strong claim on the part of its author as a master of style in which worked some of the greatest who came after him.

The Faery Queen was not only the model upon which Thomson based his Castle of Indolence, but it supplied him with a definite hint as to the very scene in which he should set his narrative. This was the House of Sleep, whence the wizard Archimago sent for a dream by which to cast a spell over the Red Cross Knight:

But this hint given him, Thomson owed nothing more with respect to the actual evolution of his story. With the playful picture of the little society at North Haw as a nucleus, he wove his own fascinating romance, original, picturesque, and stored with new and strange allusions. The figures who act in the drama, if not altogether novel, are freshly and decisively drawn; while the circumstances by which they are surrounded, and the light in which their activity is made clear and captivating, take their origin from no source but that of the moulding imagination of the poet himself. The difference in the matter of allusiveness between Spenser and Thomson is emphatic enough. The bounteous fields from which Spenser chiefly garnered his imposing array of literary allusions were medieval legend and classical mythology. In The Faery Queen no surprise attends the reader should he now and again even meet the co-existence of persons and events from these sources so widely separated by time and space; when perhaps Venus and the Graces are introduced side by side with historic personages of a new era,

Knights of Logres and of Lyonesse,
Tristrem, and Pelleas, and Pellenore.

In The Castle of Indolence, a totally different fund of illustration is utilised. Now it is Oriental story that lends its personages and its incidents as enriching factors; the literary treasures of Chaldea and Arabia and their neighbouring kingdoms, and these almost solely, afford the material wherewith the poet of The Castle of Indolence adorns his story.

Although the art, rather than the subject-matter, of the allegory may be fairly premised—indubitably so from the superiority of the art to the story with which it deals—to have given the poet most concern, the theme which he strove to elaborate is important enough. This designates the old and perennial story of the conflict between Pleasure and Duty. The poetical literature of the eighteenth century evinced a special leaning to this subject. This bias, ultimately borrowed from the supremely ethical tone which pervaded the religious discussion of the day, affected alike all and sundry in the busy class of poetical writers. No doubt Thomson's choice was also considerably guided by the precise nature associated with allegory in the pages of Spenser. But the didactic spirit was abroad in the eighteenth century with a power of exceeding energy. It did not, however, enter into poetical art with very satisfactory result. The doctrine that poetry is a criticism of life has much to commend it; but, as far as it is pertinent, there must be the admission that the poetical outcome should be conditioned by laws of beauty as well as of truth. The heroic measure of the eighteenth century writers with its inflexible and unvaried rhythmical arrangement, approximating in a hazardous degree to the bald usage of prose, did not offer a medium at all attractive for the unreserved enunciation of moral and philosophical truth. Not that it is utterly inimical to the statement of such solid truth. Wordsworth's Happy Warrior, though not so successful a poem as his Ode to Duty, is, nevertheless, far from an unsuccessful poem. Yet the professedly didactic poets of the early part of the eighteenth century, with their love of paradox, of hazy abstraction, and the mere gratification, as it sometimes seems, of a forcible iteration of words, produced no great didactic poem. It has been said with a good deal of justice even of Pope's Essay on Man that he 'spins the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument.' Young, in the main merely a follower of Pope, succeeded in placing the didactic poem in a still less agreeable light. With an occasional evanescent gleam of poetry in his Night Thoughts, Young, as a rule, simply forges his way through the extensive and unrelieved course of his ascetic message with a solemnity at once depressing and amusing. With Young, morality is not only a serious but a sombre affair. Little wonder is it that Madam de Staël ingenuously associated him with Ossian and the Northern Scalds as the prime cause of our national melancholy. The poetical transition made in passing from the perusal of a writer like Young, to the allegorical method of Thomson, is of the most significant character. Both works alike inculcate momentous truth; both works are alike sound and decisive in what they aim to enforce. But in the entire legitimate appeal of the argument of each, how far does the one outvie the other! Inasmuch as both are to be judged as poetry, the predominant merit of the one stands out with singular clearness. The morality of the one cannot be dissevered from that of the formal tractate; that of the other partakes in a very great degree of the transforming and heightening power of imagination.

The two parts of The Castle of Indolence have a kind of antithetical relation. The first canto, describing the abode and circumstances of the wizard Indolence, teems with rich and resplendent imagery; the vein in which the narrative is conveyed is of the most delicately-wrought sweetness. The more restrained gift of the poet is revealed in the second canto. Now, the pictures are less finely-drawn and less gorgeous; the music of the verse is touched with less aerial tone; the diction has not so much subtlety and skilful refinement of workmanship. The allegory, in short, assumes conditions that do not so readily kindle in the glow of the poet's imagination. The story of the triumph of Industry brings him back to the concrete affairs of the everyday world, and to the necessity of emphasising the value and character of its normal activities. The didactic element more decidedly prevails, and though to Thomson as well as to Spenser it was vouchsafed to inspire brightness into the didactic note of poetry, it was scarcely given to either to form it, 'musical as is Apollo's lute.'

Interesting alike from their biographical interest and their nice elaboration is the group of portraits that are introduced in the first canto, and that formed the first suggestive draft of the whole poem. The least distinct is the first, which may be a composite presentment. Were it not that the author speaks of Paterson, to whose personality it answers with considerable faithfulness, the resemblance might be as aptly referred to Collins. Perhaps the original idea was taken from the character of Paterson, to be afterwards developed and coloured with various hints from that of Collins, who was no infrequent dweller in the society of Thomson in his last years. The second portrait also bears some slight divergence from the original of Armstrong, to whom tradition has generally applied it. Thomson, indeed, averred that Armstrong was the victim of a 'certain kind of spleen that is both humane and agreeable, like Jacques in the play;' but another report speaks of Armstrong's ready share in London social affairs, and makes it plain that 'pensiveness' was certainly not a prominent feature of his character. Welby, who is said to have been the third of the group, did not belong to the choice literary coterie at Richmond. He must have gained admittance to this poetical distinction from sheer merit of his personal characteristics, which receive such pointed and humorous setting in the poem. The fourth portrait was in all likelihood that of young Forbes of Culloden, but this, like the first two, is a somewhat generalised drawing. Any young man of sprightly and masculine character would answer equally well. The friendship of Thomson with Forbes, however, gives much reliableness to the conjecture that the description is one from life. Lyttelton's portrait is faithfully and gracefully done. The poet does not err, as he was so prone to do, on the side of exaggeration; but presents a clear and natural picture of the estimable friend of his later life. The last three portraits—those of Quin, the poet himself, and Murdoch—have the most piquant character, and are perhaps most felicitous of all. Quin is drawn with sympathetic firmness. Lyttelton has generally received the credit of writing the inimitable account of Thomson himself. If so, he accomplished a portraiture of rare spirit and exactness. Familiar enough in some of its particulars, the whole stanza may be cited as reflecting with quaintly humorous precision and effect the character of the poet.

The contrast between the artistic method of The Seasons and that of The Castle of Indolence is most definitely brought out in the first canto of the second poem. No approach is made in The Seasons, vivid and striking as are so many of its descriptive passages, to the superb imagery of the introductory part of The Castle of Indolence; and of the marvellously fine rhythmical cadences of the Spenserian imitation there may, indeed, be said to be no trace at all in the earlier poem. No better summary of this salient factor of The Castle of Indolence could be desired than that expressed in these words of Mr Logie Robertson:—"Now the style is serious, grave, and solemn; now it is cheerful, lively, and gay. It sometimes borders on burlesque, mostly of a brisk and airy character. There are, however, numerous descriptive passages of clear ringing and exalted melody, sufficient in themselves to rank Thomson as a genuine singer of commanding rank." As a typical instance of these passages, where it may be added, the poet proves that he possessed the gift of harmonious movement, which is so lacking in the blank verse of The Seasons, there is here given the stanza which describes the music of the harp of Œolus. Christabel contains nothing better.

Nothing of this bewitching music is to be heard in the second canto, where the Knight of Industry and his energetic train are depicted. The solemnity of his position lends to the poet's verse something of its soberness. The epithets lack the brightness and lucidity of the first canto; the rhythm is more moderated and exact. But one or two passages, especially that in which appears the hortatory song of the bard, are written in well-compounded verse of great excellence—nervous, fluent, and graceful. This is, perhaps, best noticeable in the comparison made between the vigour belonging to Nature and its reflection in man.

The realistic scene of horror with which the poem concludes, though terminating somewhat abruptly, is drawn with intense and masterly force. Slight as it is, and thrown into denser obscurity by the magnificence and extent of the scenes in which it is enclosed, it takes a noteworthy place in its own line of poetical art. It may not have suggested, but certainly deserves a place beside, the description of the final terrors that beset the path of Browning's 'Childe Roland.'

The apparent value of The Castle of Indolence as an example of the application of careful æsfhetic conditions in poetry makes it less needful to dwell upon the character of the work as an allegory. Thomson himself, although he published the poem as an avowed effort in allegorical reflection, probably did not feel that this feature of the story was of paramount note. His preface, in truth, declares as much. It runs as follows:— 'This poem being writ in the manner of Spenser, the obsolete words, and a simplicity of diction in some of the lines which borders on the ludicrous, were necessary to make the imitation more perfect. And the style of that admirable poet, as well as the measure in which he wrote, are, as it were, appropriated by custom to all allegorical poems writ in our language; just as in French the style of Marot, who lived under Francis the First, has been used in tales and familiar epistles of the age of Louis the Fourteenth.' Clearly, the material and strain of the allegory do not bulk very largely in the consideration of the author. But in the matter of just evolution of the allegorical materials of the story, Thomson reached a requisite amount of success. The scene is perfectly realised; the characters are drawn with distinctiveness and breadth; the moral to be derived from the story does not thrust itself unpleasantly upon the attention. In respect of structural arrangement, indeed, the allegory of The Castle of Indolence is sufficiently praiseworthy. Especially has this to be said of the balance preserved throughout the development of the allegorical narrative. Though it were scarcely justifiable to bring an allegorical effort so much less ambitious into any sort of comparison with the great allegories of Spenser and Bunyan, yet the merit of adequate discrimination as to the respective places of allegory and romance in a narrative of the kind seems, at least, to be carried out with signal faithfulness by the author of The Castle of Indolence. The clear outlines of Bunyan's landscapes and the actuality of his personages save his work from the overpowering depression incidental to the general arrangement of his didactic narrative; while Spenser's gorgeous scenes and moving episodes fulfil a like virtue for his great epic. Both of these allegories are weighed down by unvitalised material, by ethical or theological doctrine, and other matters, that hardly come with perfect right into the natural progress of the story. There is good reason to think even from the slighter performance which Thomson achieved, that had he extended the plan of his work, built turret and pinnacle on the pleasing edifice which he raised, the result would have been a great and very convincing testimony to the genius of the designer and builder.

Tennyson, in the recent biography of the late laureate by his son, is reported to have declared that Thomson was his earliest model. The appreciation thus begun was not abandoned, we may infer, in the critical conclusions of his later years. He has, at any rate, signified his sincere approval of The Castle of Indolence in the imaginative beauty, rich colouring, and finished literary form of The Lotos Eaters. The imitation, though individual enough, plainly intimates the closeness and fulness with which the earlier artistic masterpiece had enlisted his regard. The sun-tinted sky, the soothing streams, the sombre pine, the 'joy of calm,' all point to one undoubted source. Tennyson's power of limpid and magical expression was all his own; and so too was his gift of intricate and delicious harmony; but it may be said with every truth that in this poem, at least, he was not forgetful of the unique picturesqueness and winning music of the art of The Castle of Indolence.