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"concifæ, nam lacryma fubitò excrefcit, et difficile "eft Auditorem vel Lectorem in fummo animi affectu "diu tenere." Would any one in Narciffus's condition have cry'd out—“ Inopem me copia fecit ?” Or can any thing be more unnatural than to turn off from his forrows for the fake of a pretty reflexion?

❝ O utinam noftro fecedere corpore possem!

"Votum in amante novum; vellem, quod amamus, "abeffet."

None, I suppose, can be much grieved for one that is fo witty on his own afflictions. But I think we may every where observe in Ovid, that he employs his invention more than his judgment; and speaks all the ingenious things that can be said on the subject, rather than those which are particularly proper to the perfon and circumstances of the speaker.

F A B. VII.

P. 165. 1. 22. When Pentheus thus] There is a great deal of spirit and fire in this speech of Pentheus, but I believe none befide Ovid would have thought of the transformation of the ferpent's teeth for an incitement to the Thebans courage, when he defires them not to degenerate from their great forefather the Dragon, and draws a parallel between the behaviour of them both.

"Efte, precor, memores, quâ fitis ftirpe creati,

Illiufque animos, qui multos perdidit unus,
"Sumite ferpentis: pro fontibus ille, lacuque
"Interiit, at vos pro famâ vincite veftrâ.
"Ille dedit letho fortes, vos pellite molles,

"Et patrium revocate decus."

FAB.

FA B. VIII.

The story of Acœtes has abundance of nature in all the parts of it, as well in the description of his own parentage and employment, as in that of the failors characters and manners. But the fhort speeches fcattered up and down in it, which make the Latin very natural, cannot appear fo well in our language, which is much more ftubborn and unpliant; and therefore are but as fo many rubs in the story, that are still turning the narration out of its proper course. The transformation at the latter end is wonderfully beautiful.

FA B. IX.

Ovid has two very good fimilies on Pentheus, where he compares him to a river in a former story, and to a war-horse in the present.

AN E SSA Y

ON VIRGIL'S

GEORGICS.

VIRGIL may be reckoned the firft who introduced three new kinds of poetry among the Romans, which he copied after three of the greatest masters of Greece: Theocritus and Homer have ftill difputed for the advantage over him in Pastoral and Heroics, but I think all are unanimous in giving him the precedence to Hefiod in his Georgics. The truth of it is, the sweetnefs and rufticity of a Paftoral cannot be fo well expreffed in any other tongue as in the Greek, when rightly mixed and qualified with the Doric dialect; nor can the majesty of an heroic poem any where appear fo well as in this language, which has a natural greatnefs in it, and can be often rendered more deep and sonorous by the pronunciation of the Ionians. But in the middle style, where the writers in both tongues are on a level, we see how far Virgil has excelled all who have written in the fame way with him.

There has been abundance of criticism spent on Virgil's Pastorals and Æneids; but the Georgics are a subject which none of the critics have fufficiently taken into their confideration; most of them paffing it over in filence, or cafting it under the same head with Paftoral; a division by no means proper, unless we suppose the style of a husbandman ought to be imitated in a Georgic, as that of a fhepherd is in a Paftoral. But

though

though the scene of both these poems lies in the fame place; the speakers in them are of quite a different character, fince the precepts of husbandry are not to be delivered with the fimplicity of a ploughman, but with the address of a poet. No rules therefore, that relate to Paftoral, can any way affect the Georgics, fince they fall under that clafs of poetry, which consists in giving plain and direct inftructions to the reader; whether they be moral duties, as thofe of Theognis and Pythagoras; or philofophical fpeculations, as thofe 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 most pleasing and delightful. Precepts of morality, befides the natural corruption of our tempers, which makes us averfe to them, are fo abstracted from ideas of sense, 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, addreffes itself wholly to the imagination :: It is altogether conversant 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 scenes and landskips, whilst it teaches us; and makes the dryeft of its precepts look like a description. "A "Georgic therefore is fome part of the science of huf

bandry

writing is every where much in ufe among the Poets, and is particularly practifed by Virgil, who loves to fuggeft a truth indirectly, and without giving us a full and open view of it, to let us fee juft fo much as will naturally lead the imagination into all the parts that lie concealed. This is wonderfully diverting to the understanding, thus to receive a precept, that enters as it were through a by-way, and to apprehend an idea that draws a whole train after it. For here the mind, which is always delighted with its own discoveries, only takes the hint from the Poet, and feems to work out the reft by the strength of her own faculties.

But, fince the inculcating precept upon precept will at length prove tiresome to the reader, if he meets with no entertainment, the Poet must take care not to incumber his poem with too much bufinefs; but fometimes to relieve the fubject with a moral reflexion, or let it reft a while for the fake of a pleasant and pertinent digreffion. Nor is it fufficient to run out into beautiful and diverting digreffions (as it is generally thought) unless they are brought in aptly, and are fomething of a piece with the main defign of the Georgic for they ought to have a remote alliance at least to the fubject, that fo the whole poem may be more uniform and agreeable in all its parts. We fhould never quite lofe fight of the country, though we are fometimes entertained with a diftant profpect of it. Of this nature are Virgil's defcription of the original

riculture, of the fruitfulness of Italy, of a coun

d the like; which are not brought in by

force,

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