SOURCE: "Abraham Cowley (1618-1667)," in Lives of the Poets, Dolphin Books, pp. [22-65].
The following excerpt begins with Johnson's famous censure of seventeenth-century metaphysical poets for excessive concern with novelty, slavish adherence to fashionable style, and self-conscious displays of erudition. He considers Cowley "almost the last of that race, and undoubtedly the best, " and offers commentary on a wide range of his work. Johnson praises particular poems in the Miscellanies as well as Cowley's essays and critical writings but blames the poet for not putting his remarkable wit and learning to better advantage.
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