Note 54 — LORD BYRON: (continued 4)

Between Wieland, the author of this Romance, and Lord Byron, may be observed some of those generic points of resemblance which it is so interesting to trace in the characters of men of genius. The German poet, it is said, never perused any work that made a strong impression upon him, without being stimulated to commence one, himself, on the same topic and plan; and in Lord Byron the imitative principle was almost equally active,—there being few of his poems that might not, in the same manner, be traced to the strong impulse given to his imagination by the perusal of some work that had just before interested him. In the history, too, of their lives and feelings, there was a strange and painful coincidence,—the revolution that took place in all Wieland's opinions, from the Platonism and romance of his youthful days, to the material and Epicurean doctrines that pervaded all his maturer works, being chiefly, it is supposed, brought about by the shock his heart had received from a disappointment of its affections in early life. Speaking of the illusion of this first passion, in one of his letters, he says,—"It is one for which no joys, no honours, no gifts of fortune, not even wisdom itself can afford an equivalent, and which, when it has once vanished, returns no more."