Ver. 5.

THE MESSIAH. P. 105.

O thou my voice inspire,

Who touch'd Ifaiah's hallow'd lips with fire!

Milton had already made the fame allufion to Ifaiah, vi. 7. at the clofe of his Hymn on the Nativity:

And join thy voice unto the angel quire,

From out his facred altar touch'd with hallow'd fire.

Cowley alfo, David. i. 25. admits comparison :

Ev'n thou my breaft with such bleft rage inspire, '
As mov'd the tuneful ftrings of David's lyre.

But a noble paffage in Milton's Reafon of Church Government is ftill more appofite; By devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit, "who can enrich with all utterance and knowledge, and sends "out his Seraphim, with the hallow'd fire of his altar, to touch "and purify the lips of whom he pleases.”

Ver 22. Oh spring to light, aufpicious babe! be born. This feems a palpable imitation of Callimachus, but where our ́Poet fell upon it, I cannot difcover: Hymn. Del 214.

Γείνεο, γείνεο, καρε και ηπιο εξαθε κολπά

Ver. 39. He from thick films fhall

purge the vifual

ray.

Thus Milton, Par. Loft, iii. 620.

and th' air,

No where fo clear, fharpen'd his vifual ray

To objects diftant far:

and in his Samfon Agonistes, ver. 162.

For inward light alas !

Puts forth no visual beam.

Ver. 99. No more the rifing fun fhall gild the morn,

Nor ev'ning Cynthia fill her filver horn.

There is a general resemblance in these charming lines to the be ginning of Ovid's Metamorphofes, and Sandys's excellent tranfla

tion there :

Nullus adhuc mundo præbebat lumina Titan,
Nec nova crescendo reparabat cornua Phoebe.

No

No Titan yet the world with light adornes.

Nor waxing Phœbe fill'd her wained hornes.

Our Poet's attachment to Sandys from early intimacy is well

known.

WINDSOR FOREST. P. 121.

Ver. 1. Thy foreft, Windfor, and thy green retreats,
At once the Monarch's and the Mufe's feats,
Invite my lays.

Thus Hopkins, in his History of Love, published in the fame

at least, if not earlier, than the poem before us :

Ye woods and wilds, ferene and blest retreats,
At once the lovers' and the Mufes' feats,

To you I fly.

Ver. 331. His treffes dropt with dews, and o'er the stream
His fhining horns diffus'd a golden gleam.

year

Spenfer has a fine paffage like this before us, Faery Queene, iv.

II. 25.

But Thame was ftronger, and of better stay, Yet feem'd full aged by his outward fight,

With head all hoary, and his beard all gray,

Dewed with filver drops that trickled downe alway.

But our Poet feems to have imitated the first verses of a parallel representation in Claudian, de VI. Conf. Honor. ver. 160. wrought with the customary richness of that author. The entire paffage is well worthy of perusal; replete with ornament; and that ornament appropriate and original: to which I refer the reader. He is fpeaking of the Po:

Ille caput placidis fublime fluentis.
Extulit; et, totis lucem fpargentia ripis,

Aurea roranti micuerunt cornua vultu.

He fpake the Flood rears up his towering head

O'er the smooth furface of his fwelling bed.

His horned front, through ftreams of glistening dew,
Round the wild banks a golden radiance threw.`

The reader will be pleased also with some lines of Milton's Lycidas,

ver. 105.

APPENDIX.

Next Camus, reverend fire, went footing flow,
His mantle hairy, and his bonnet fedge,

Inwrought with figures dim.

383

Ver. 340. The reader will be gratified by the fame fubject in

the hands of Spenfer, F. Q. iv. 11. 29.

And round about him many a pretty page

Attended, duely ready to obey;
All little rivers, which owe vaffallage

To him, as to their lord, and tribute pay-:
The chaulky Kenet, and the Thetis gray,

The morish Cole, and the foft flyding Breare,
The wanton Lee, that oft doth loose his way,

And the ftill Darent, in whose waters cleare

Ten thousand fishes play, and decke his pleasant streame.

Ver. 379. I fee, I fee, where two fair cities bend

Their ample bow, a new Whitehall ascend.
This feems imitated from Hopkins' Court Profpect in Dryden's
Mifcellanies, ii. p. 385.

As far as fair Augufta's buildings reach,
Bent, like a bow, along a peaceful beach.

ODE ON ST. CECILIA'S DAY, P. 163.

Ver. 96. No crime was thine, if 'tis no crime to love. Dryden's tranflation of Dido to Æneas:

Who know no crime, but too much love of thee:

and afterwards in the fame epiftle:

Some pity let a fuppliant princess move,

Whofe only fault was an excefs of love.

FIRST CHORUS TO THE TRAGEDY OF BRUTUS.

P. 174.

Ver. 2. Where heav'nly visions Plato fir'd,

And Epicurus lay infpir'd.

This is an imitation of fome verfes by 7. 4. of King's College, Cambridge, to Creech on his Lucretius :

I thought

I thought indeed, before I heard your fame,
No laurels grew but on the banks of Cam;
Where Chaucer was by facred fury fir'd,
And everlafting Cowley lay infpir'd;

Where Milton first his wond'rouз vision saw,
And Marvel taught the painter how to draw.
For the second verfe Pope originally gave,
And godlike Zeno lay infpir'd.

ESSAY ON CRITICISM. P. 193

Ver. 144.-nameless graces, which no methods teach.
A writer in Dryden's Mifcellanies, ii. p. 343.
Ah! where the nameless graces, that were seen
In all thy motions, and thy mien ?

Ver. 193. Nations unborn your mighty names fhall found,
And worlds applaud that must not yet be found!

An imitation of Cowley, David. ii. 833.

Round the whole earth his dreaded name shall sound,
And reach to worlds that must not yet be found.

Ver.

243.

In wit as nature, what affects our hearts,
Is not th' exactness of peculiar parts;

'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call,

But the joint force and full refult of all.

e:

h

f

This feems an improvement on fome lines in Dryden's of Poetry, Canto i.

'Tis not enough, when swarming faults are writ,.pt

That here and there are scattered sparks of wit;

Each object must be fix'd in the due place,
And differing parts have corresponding grace:

Till, by a curious art difpos'd, we find
One perfect whole, of all the pieces join'd.

Ver. 623. Nor is Paul's church more safe than Paul's church

yard.

3

The

The propriety of the specification in this proverbial remark is founded on a circumstance no longer exifting in our Poet's time, and derived therefore by him from older writers. "In the reigns

"of James I. and Charles I. (says Pennant in his London,

66

p. 382.) the body of St. Paul's cathedral was the common "refort of the politicians, the news-mongers, and idle in general. "It was called Paul's walk, and the frequenters known by the 46 name of Paul's walkers, &c.

"England need fear no outward enemies. The lufty lads " verily be in England. I have feen on a Sunday more likely 66 men walking in St. Paul's church, than I ever yet saw in "Augufta." Afcham's Letters.

Ver. 627. It fill looks home, and fhort excurfions makes. As Virgil, Geo iv 194.

Nor forage far, but short excursions make. Dryden. Below, ver. 738. our Poet comes ftill closer to Virgil's words : But in low numbers fort excurfiens tries.

THE RAPE OF THE LOCK.

CANTO I. P. 303.

n

Ver. 134. And all Arabia breathes from yonder box. in, Amor. fect. 39. ὁποσαις δε αρκειν ἡ μελαινα χαίτη νομίζεται, τον αμηκότων πλετον εις ταυτην αναλισκόσιν, ὅλην Αραβίαν σχεδόν εκ των έχων αποπνεύσαι "But those women, that are contented with own black hair, confume all their husbands' wealth upon reathing almost all Arabia from their locks."

Ver. 16.

CANTO II. P. 314.

if belles had faults to hide.

This exception is in that true ftyle of elegance and urbanity, which characterises this exquifite performance; and from a spirit,

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