may be compofed in verse or profe. It is indeed commonly panegyrical; because we are seldom diftinguifhed with a ftone but by our friends; but it has no rule to restrain or modify it, except this, that it ought not to be longer than common beholders may be expected to have leifure and patience to perufe.

I.

On CHARLES Earl of DORSET, in the Church of Wythyham in Suffer.

Dorfet, the grace of courts, the Mufe's pride, Patron of arts, and judge of nature, dy'd. The fcourge of pride, tho' fanctify'd or great, Of fops in learning, and of knaves in ftate; Yet foft in nature, tho' fevere his lay, His anger moral, and his wifdom gay. Bleft fatyrift! who touch'd the mean to true, As fhow'd, Vice had his hate and pity too. Bleft courtier! who could king and country

please,

Yet facred kept his friendship, and his ease.

Bleft peer! his great forefathers every grace
Reflecting, and reflected on his race;

Where other Buckhurfts, other Dorfets fhine,
And patriots ftill, or poets, deck the line.

The firft diftich of this epitaph contains a kind of information which few would want, that the man, for whom the tomb was erected, died. There are indeed fome qualities worthy of praise afcribed to the dead, but none that were likely to exempt him from the lot of man, or incline us much to wonder that he fhould die. What is meant by judge of nature, is not easy to fay. Nature is not the object of human judgement; for it is vain to judge where we cannot alter. If by nature is meant, what is commonly called nature by the criticks, a juft reprefentation of things really exifting, and actions really performed, nature cannot be properly oppofed

pofed to art; nature being, in this fenfe, only the beft effect of art. The fcourge of pride

Of this couplet, the fecond line is not, what is intended, an illuftration of the former. Pride, in the Great, is indeed well enough connected with knaves in ftate, though knaves is a word rather too ludicrous and light; but the mention of fanlified pride will not lead the thoughts to fops in learning, but rather to some species of tyranny or oppreffion, fomething more gloomy and more for midable than foppery.

Yet foft his nature—

This is a high compliment, but was not first bestowed on Dorfet by Pope. The next verfe is extremely beautiful.

Bleft fatyrift!

In this diftich is another line of which Pope was not the author.

Y 4

I do not

mean

mean to blame thefe imitations with much harshness; in long performances they are scarcely to be avoided, and in fhorter they may be indulged, because the train of the compofition may naturally involve them, or the fcantinefs of the fubject allow little choice. However, what is borrowed is not to be enjoyed as our own, and it is the business of critical juftice to give every bird of the Mufes his proper feather.

Bleft courtier!

Whether a courtier can be properly commended for keeping his eafe facred, may perhaps be difputable. To please king and country, without facrificing friendship to any change of times, was a very uncommon inftance of prudence or felicity, and deferved to be kept fcparate from fo poor a commendation as care of his eafe. I wish our poets would

attend

attend a little more accurately to the ufe of the word facred, which *furely fhould never be applied in a serious compofition, but where fome reference. may be made to a higher Being, or where fome duty is exacted or implied. A man may keep his friendship sacred, because promises of friendship are very awful ties; but methinks he cannot, but in a burlefque fenfe, be faid to keep his cafe facred.

Bleft peer!

The bleffing afcribed to the peer has no connection with his peerage: they might happen to any other man, whose ancestors were remembered, or whofe pofterity were likely to be regarded.

I know not whether this epitaph be worthy either of the writer, or of the man entombed.