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.

*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 pleafures,

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
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. : + Μαρμαρυγάς θηεῖτο ποδῶν· θαύμαζε δὲ θυμῷ. HOMER. Od. '.

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

naum.

II. I.

II. I.

*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 storms of Fatel
The fond complaint, my fong, difprove,

And juftify the laws of Jove.

Say, has he given in vain the heavenly Muse?
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 fpy, 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 star

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

66 Extra anni folifque vias-" VIRGIL. "Tutta lontana dal camin del fole." Petrarch, Canzon 2.

And

And oft, beneath the odorous fhade

Of Chili's boundless forefts laid,

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

Their feather-cinctur'd chiefs, and dusky loves.

Her track, where'er the goddess 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
Infpiration 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 taste there; Spenfer imitated the Italian writers; Milton improved on them: but this fchool expired foon after the Reftoration, and a new one arofe on the French model, which has fubfifted ever fince.

Till

Till the fad Nine, in Greece's evil hour,
Left their Parnaffus, for the Latian plains.
Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant-power,
And coward Vice, that revels in her chains.
When Latium had her lofty fpirit loft,

They fought, oh Albion! next thy fea-encircled coaft.

III. 1.

Far from the fun and fummer-gale,
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon ftray'd,
To him the mighty mother did unveil
Her awful face: The dauntless child
Stretch'd forth his little arms, and fmil'd.
This pencil take (the faid) whofe colours clear
Richly paint the vernal year:

Thine too thefe golden keys, immortal boy!
This can unlock the gates of Joy;

Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears,

Or ope the facred fource of fympathetic Tears.

III. 2.

Nor fecond he †, that rode fublime

Upon the feraph-wings of Extafy,

The fecrets of th' abyfs to spy.

He pafs'd the flaming bounds of Place and Time:

* Shakespeare.

† Milton.

I "

- flammantia monia mundi." LUCRETIUS.

The

The living throne, the fapphire-blaze,
Where Angels tremble, while they gaze,
He faw; but, blasted with excess of light,
+ Clos'd his eyes in endless night.

Behold, where Dryden's lefs prefumptuous car,
Wide o'er the fields of Glory bear

Two courfers of ethereal race,

§ With necks in thunder cloath'd, and long-resound

Hark, his hands the lyre explore! Bright-ey'd, Fancy hovering o'er Scatters from her pictur'd urn

- Thoughts, that breathe, and words, that burn. ** But ah ! 'tis heard no more→→→

For the Spirit of the living creature was in the wheels-And above the firmament, that was over their heads, was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a fapphire-ftone.-This was the appearance of the glory of the Lord. Ezekiel i. 20, 26, 28. † ̓ ὀφθαλμῶν μὲν ἄμερσε· δίδε δ ̓ ἡδεῖαν ἀοιδήν. Hom.OD. Meant to exprefs the ftately march and founding energy of Dryden's rhymes.

§ Haft thou cloathed his neck with thunder? Job. Words, that weep, and tears, that fpeak. Cowley. ** We have had, in our language, no other odes of the fublime kind, than that of Dryden on St. Cecilia'sday: for Cowley (who had his merit) yet wanted judgement, ftyle, and harmony, for fuch a task. That of Pope is not worthy of fo great a man. Mr. Mafon,

indeed, of late days, has touched the true chords, and with a masterly hand, in fome of his Chorufes-above all, in the laft of Caractacus,

Hark! heard ye not yon footstep dread? &c.

Oh!