COLLINS, William, English poet: b. Chi chester, England, 25 Dec. 1721; d. there, 12 June 1759. He was educated at Winchester school and at Oxford where he was noted for °genius and indolence? and where he was graduated in 1743. While at college he wrote his (Persian Eclogues,) printed in 1742. Their success was moderate, and in 1744 the author went to Lon don as a literary adventurer. In 1746 he gave his (Odes, Descriptive and Allegorical,) to the public; but the sale did not pay for the printing, and the poet burned all the unsold copies. These he was enabled to buy back from the publisher, Millar, through the generosity of an uncle who bequeathed him a small legacy. They were never widely read and their imisical verse, lyric fervor and exquisite imagery remained unappreciated by the public for many years. Yet among these odes were many pieces which at present rank with the finest lyrics in the lan guage. His head was always full of schetnes, though few of them matured with any degree of success to him, and finding it more difficult to win fame than he had anticipated, he soon became dissipated and extravagant, and ex hausted his slender means. During these times he planned worIcs entirely beyond his power of execution,- and even advertised one, 'Pro posals for a History of the Revival of Learn ing,' but did not write it. He subsequently be gan several tragedies; but his indolence and irresolution retarded his progress, and the trage dies rarely advanced beyond the preliminary stage of devising the plot. Constantly in debt and in fear of the bailiff, he finally persuaded a bookseller to advance money to leave London, in return for which he was to translate Aris totle's 'Poetics) and write a commentary, but he probably did not fulfil his agreement. Col
lins was always weak in body, and when still a young man was affected by a mental disease. Originally too laxly strung, his nervous system was disorganized by disappointment, distress and irregularity. Months of despondency were followed by periods of madness until he was finally talcen to Chichester and cared for by a sister. His best known poems are (The Ode on the Passions,) those to Mercy and Evening, 'The Dirge in Cymbeline) and the famous (How Sleep the Brave.) His odes are now al most universally regarded as among the best productions of the kind in English for vigor of conception, boldness and variety of personifi cation and genuine warmth of feeling. Of his (Ode to the Evening) Hazlitt has said that °the sounds steal slowly over the ear like the grad ual coming on of evening itself.° Swinburne said, in spealcing of the (Ode to the Passions,) °Its grace and vigor, its vivid and pliant dex terity of touch, are worthy of their long in heritance of praise? He occupies a midway position between Gray and Wordsworth. His (Works) have been edited by J. Langhorne (1765), Mrs. Barbauld (1797), A. Dyce (1827), etc., and his (Poems) by Bronson (Boston 1898) and Stone (Oxford 1907). Consult also Johnson's (Lives of the Poets) (Oxford 1781); and Beers, (English Romance in the 18th Cen tury) (New York 1899).