Richard Green Moulton

“ Southey's Kehama is an Epic poem cast in the medium of Hindoo mythology, just as the Iliad is an Epic of Greek mythology, or the Paradise Lost an Epic of Scripture Story.—Many different kinds of literary interest unite in it.
1. Southey is remarkable for "poetic" power in the strictest sense of the term, that is, power of "creating," or maintaining realisability in the region of pure imagination. ”

“ The Human Interest of the poem is the mutual devotion of Father and Daughter, becoming involved in a World-Struggle of Good and Evil, in which the intervention of Omnipotence is delayed to the last possible moment. ”

“ Forcing the secrets of Fate secures only Half-Truths: compare Macbeth 1. 3. 122. [The main crisis: xxiv.] The Sinner winning his way only to find it destruction. [Incident of Mariataly's Image: ii. 9-10.] The Sinner punished in that wherein he offends. ”