THE

PROGRESS OF POES Y.

A

PINDARIC ODE.

νᾶνα συνελοῖσιν. ἐς

Δὲ τὸ πῶν ἑρμηνέων χαλίζει. PINDAR. OLYMP. II.

ADVERTISE

M EN T.

WHEN the Author first published this and the following Ode, he was advised, even by his Friends, to fubjoin some few explanatory Notes; but had too much refpect for the understanding of his Readers to take that liberty.

I. I.

AWAKE, Æolian lyre, awake,

And give to rapture all thy trembling ftrings.

From Helicon's harmonious fprings

A thousand rills their mazy progress take:

* Awake, my glory: awake, lute and harp.

DAVID'S PSALMS. Pindar styles his own poetry with its musical accompanyments, Αἰοληὶς μολπὴ, Αἰόλιδες χορδαὶ, Αἰολίδων @roat duhay. Æolian fong, Æolian ftrings, the breath of the Æolian flute.

The laughing flowers, that round them blow,
Drink life and fragrance as they flow.

Now the rich stream of mufic winds along,
Deep, majeftic, finooth, and ftrong,

Through verdant vales, and Ceres' golden reign:

Now rolling down the steep amain,
Headlong, impetuous, see it pour:

The rocks, and nodding groves, rebellow to the rear.

I. 2.

* Oh! Sovereign of the willing foul, Parent of sweet and folemn-breathing airs, Enchanting fhell! the fullen Cares,

And frantic Paffions, hear thy foft control,
On Thracia's hills the Lord of War

Has curb'd the fury of his car,

And drop'd his thirsty lance at thy command. † Perching on the fcepter'd hand

The fubject and fimile, as ufual with Pindar, are united. The various fources of poetry, which gives life and luftre to all it touches, are here defcribed; its quiet majeftic progrefs enriching every fubject (otherwife dry and barren) with a pomp of diction and luxuriant harmony of numbers; and its more rapid and irrefiftible courfe, when fwoln and hurried away by the conflict of tumultuous paffions.

* Power of harmony to calm the turbulent fallies of the foul. The thoughts are borrowed from the first Pythian of Pindar.

This is a faint imitation of fome incomparable lines in the fame Ode.

of

Of Jove, thy magic lulls the feather'd king
With ruffled plumes, and flagging wing:
Quench'd in dark clouds of flumber lie

The terror of his beak, and lightning of his eye.

I. 3.

Thee the voice, the dance, obey,

Temper'd to thy warbled lay,

O'er Idalia's velvet-green

The rofy-crowned Loves are feen.
On Cytherea's day

With antic fports, and blue-ey'd pleasures,
Frifking light in frolic meafures;
Now purfuing, now retreating,
Now in circling troops they meet

To brifk notes in cadence beating
Glance their many-twinkling feet.

Slow melting trains their Queen's approach declare a
Where'er the turns, the Graces homage pay.
With arms fublime, that float upon the air,.
In gliding ftate fhe wins her eafy way:

O'er her warm cheek, and rifing bofom, move

The bloom of young Defire, and purple light of
Love.

*Power of harmony to produce all the graces of motion in the body.

† Μαρμαρυγὰς θηεῖτο ποδῶν· θαύμαζε δὲ θυμῷ.

HOMER. Od. ☺.

† Λάμπει δ ̓ ἐπὶ πορφυρέησι Tapeinos pus ipwT. PHRYNICHUS, apud Athe

naum.

II. I.

II. 1.

Man's feeble race what ills await,
Labour, and Penury, the racks of Pain,
Disease, and Sorrow's weeping train,

And Death, fad refuge from the ftorms of Fate!
The fond complaint, my fong, difprove,

And juftify the laws of Jove.

Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Mufe?
Night, and all her fickly dews,

Her spectres wan, and birds of boding cry,
He gives to range the dreary sky:

Till down the eastern cliffs afar

Hyperion's march they spy, and glittering fhafts of

war.

II. 2.

In climes beyond the folar | road, Where fhaggy forms o'er ice-built mountains roam, The Mufe has broke the twilight-gloom

To chear the shivering native's dull abode.

To compenfate the real and imaginary ills of life, the Mufe was given to mankind by the fame Providence that fends the day, by its chearful prefence, to difpel the gloom and terrors of the night.

Or feen the morning's well-appointed ftar

Come marching up the eaftern hills afar. CowLEY, Extenfive influence of poetic genius over the remoteft and moft uncivilized nations: its connection with liberty, aud the virtues that naturally attend on it. [See the Erfe, Norwegian, and Welfh Fragments, the Lapland and American fongs.]

Extra anni folifque vias-"

VIRGIL.

"Tutta lontana dal camin del fole." Petrarch, Canzon 2.

And

And oft, beneath the odorous shade
Of Chili's boundless forefts laid,

She deigns to hear the favage youth repeat
In loose numbers wildly sweet

Their feather-cinctur'd chiefs, and dusky loves.
Her track, where'er the goddefs roves,

Glory pursue, and generous Shame,

Th' unconquerable mind, and Freedom's holy flame.

II. 3.

* Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's keep,
Ifles, that crown th' Ægean deep,
Fields, that cool Iliffus laves,
Or where Mæander's amber waves
In lingering labyrinths creep,
How do your tuneful Echoes languifh
Mute, but to the voice of Anguish?
Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breath'd around :

Every fhade and hallow'd fountain
Murmur'd deep a folemn found:

* Progress of Poetry from Greece to Italy, and from Italy to England. Chaucer was not unacquainted with the writings of Dante, or of Petrarch. The Earl of Surrey, and Sir Thomas Wyatt, had travelled in Italy, and had formed their tafte there; Spenfer imitated the Italian writers; Milton improved on them: but this fchool expired foon after the Restoration, and a new one arofe on the French model, which has fubfifted ever fince.

Till