...he early poetry of America, we must remember that the poetic product of England was of secondary value from the death of Milton, in 1674, till the publication of Burns's Scotch poems, in 1786, and of Coleridge 's and Wordsworth's lyrical ballads, in 1798. We cannot wonder that in America, during the same period, among all the tasks of colonial and Revolutionary life, no poetry of abiding power was produce...