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NOTES FROM BOOKS.

IN

FOUR ESSAYS.

BY

HENRY TAYLOR.

AUTHOR OF "NOTES FROM LIFE,'
," "PHILIP VAN ARTEVELDE," ETC.

LONDON:

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.

1849.

LONDON:

BRADBURY AND EVANS, PRINTERS, WHITEFRIAKS,

PREFACE.

ALTHOUGH I have always intended to reprint those few writings of mine in periodical works, which are not necessarily and by the nature of the subjects ephemeral, I should not have chosen for the republication this time of political excitement, were it not that there is to be found in one of these Essaysthe second of the series-an exposition of the views taken by our greatest Poets of the nature of liberty; which exposition, if it justly represent those views, will not be unaptly put forward for present consideration. Our great Poets have been, perhaps, our best political philosophers; and if the reading and study of poetry be put aside by political commotions,

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