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though the scene of both these poems lies in the fame place; the speakers in them are of quite a different character, since the precepts of husbandry are not to be delivered with the fimplicity of a ploughman, but with the addrefs of a poet. No rules therefore, that relate to Paftoral, can any way affect the Georgics, fince they fall under that class of poetry, which consists in giving plain and direct instructions to the reader; whether they be moral duties, as those of Theognis and Pythagoras; or philofophical fpeculations, as those of Aratus and Lu-cretius; or rules of practice, as thofe of Hefiod and Virgil. Among these different kind of subjects, that which the Georgics go upon is, I think, the meanest and leaft improving, but the moft pleafing and delightful. Precepts of morality, befides the natural corruption of our tempers, which makes us averfe to them, are fo abstracted from ideas of fenfe, that they feldom give an opportunity for thofe beautiful defcriptions and images which are the spirit and life of poetry. Natural philofophy has indeed sensible objects to work upon; but then it often puzzles the reader with the intricacy of its notions, and perplexes him with the multitude of its difputes. But this kind of poetry I am now fpeaking of, addresses itself wholly to the imagination :: It is altogether converfant among the fields and woods, and has the most delightful part of nature for its province. It raifes in our minds a pleafing variety of fcenes and landskips, whilst it teaches us; and makes the dryeft of its precepts look like a description. "A 66 Georgic therefore is some part of the science of huf

"bandry.

"bandry put into a pleasing drefs, and fet off with all "the beauties and embellishments of poetry." Now fince this science of husbandry is of a very large extent, the poet fhews his skill in fingling out fuch precepts to proceed on, as are useful, and at the fame time most capable of ornament. Virgil was fo well acquainted with this fecret, that to set off his first Georgic, he has run into a set of precepts, which are almost foreign to his fubject, in that beautiful account he gives us of the figns in nature, which precede the changes of the weather.

And if there be fo much art in the choice of fit precepts, there is much more required in the treating of them; that they may fall-in after each other by a natural unforced method, and fhew themselves in the best and most advantageous light. They should all be fo finely wrought together in the fame piece, that no coarse feam may discover where they join; as in a curious brede of needle-work, one colour falls away by fuch just degrees, and another rises so infenfibly, that we see the variety, without being able to distinguish the total vanishing of the one from the first appearance of the other. Nor is it fufficient to range and difpofe this body of precepts into a clear and easy method, unless they are delivered to us in the most pleasing and agreeable manner; for there are feveral ways of conveying the fame truth to the mind of man; and to choose the pleasanteft of these ways, is that which chiefly distinguishes poetry from profe, and makes Virgil's rules of hufbandry pleasanter to read than Varro's. Where the

profe

profe writer tells us plainly what ought to be done, the poet often conceals the precept in a description, and represents his countryman performing the action in which he would instruct his reader. Where the one fets out, as fully and distinctly as he can, all the parts of the truth, which he would communicate to us; the other fingles out the most pleasing circumftance of this truth, and fo conveys the whole in a more diverting manner to the understanding. I shall give one instance out of a multitude of this nature that might be found in the Georgics where the reader may fee the different ways Virgil has taken to exprefs the fame thing, and how much pleasanter every manner of expreffion is, than the plain and direct mention of it would have been. It is in the second Georgic, where he tells us what trees will bear grafting on each other. "Et fæpe alterius ramos impune videmus "Vertere in alterius, mutatamque infita mala "Ferre pyrum, et prunis lapidofa rubefcere corna. Steriles platani malos geffere valentes,

"Caftaneæ fagos, ornufque incanuit albo "Flore pyri : glandemque fues fregere fub ulmis. Nec longum tempus : & ingens

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"Exiit ad cœlum ramis felicibus arbos ;

"Miraturque novas frondes et non fua poma."

Here we fee the Poet confidered all the effects of this union between trees of different kinds, and took notice of that effect which had the most furprize, and by confequence the most delight in it, to express the capacity that was in them of being thus united. This way of writing

race, and the greatest Poets, fcorned it; as indeed it is only fit for Epigram, and little copies of verses: one would wonder therefore how fo fublime a genius as Milton could fometimes fall into it, in fuch a work as an Epic Poem. But we must attribute it to his humouring the vicious taste of the age he lived in, and the false judgment of our unlearned English readers in general, who have few of them a relish of the more masculine and noble beauties of Poetry.

FAB. VI.

Ovid feems particularly pleafed with the fubject of this ftory, but has notoriously fallen into a fault he is often taxed with, of not knowing when he has faid enough, by his endeavouring to excel. How has he turned and twisted that one thought of Narciffus's being the perfon beloved, and the lover too?

"Cunctaque miratur quibus est mirabilis ipse. "Qui probat, ipfe probatur.

"Dumque petit petitur, pariterque incendit et ardet, "Atque oculos idem qui decipit incitat error. “ Perque oculos perit ipse fuos—

"Uror amore mei, flammas moveoque feroque, &c." But we cannot meet with a better inftance of the extravagance and wantonnefs of Ovid's fancy, than in that particular circumstance at the end of the story, of Narciffus's gazing on his face after death in the Stygian waters. The design was very bold, of making a boy fall in love with himself here on earth; but to torture him with the fame paffion after death, and not

to

to let his ghost rest in quiet, was intolerably cruel and uncharitable.

P. 161. 1. 8, But whilft within, &c.] "Dumque "fitim fedare cupit fitis altera crevit." We have here a touch of that mixed wit I have before spoken of; but I think the measure of pun in it out-weighs the true wit ; for if we exprefs the thought in other words the turn is almoft loft. This paffage of Narciffus probably gave Milton the hint of applying it to Eve, though I think her furprize, at the fight of her own face in the water, far more juft and natural than this of Narciffus. She was a raw unexperienced being, juft created, and therefore might easily be subject to the delufion; but Narciffus had been in the world fixteen years, was brother and fon to the water-nymphs, and therefore to he supposed converfant with fountains long before this fatal mistake.

P. 162. 1. 8. You trees, fays he, &c.] Ovid is very juftly celebrated for the paffionate speeches of his Poem. They have generally abundance of nature in them, but I leave it to better judgments to confider whether they are not often too witty and too tedious. The Poet never cares for fmothering a good thought that comes in his way, and never thinks he can draw tears enough from his reader: by which means our grief is either diverted or spent before we come to his conclufion; for we cannot at the fame time be delighted with the wit of the Poet, and concerned for the perfon that speaks it; and a great Critic has admirably well obferved, "Lamentationes debent effe breves et "concifæ,

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