The steer and lion at one crib shall meet,
And harmless *serpents lick the pilgrim's feet. 80
The smiling infant in his hand shall take
The crested basilisk and speckled snake,
Pleas'd, the green lustre of the scales survey,
And with their forky tongue shall innocently play.
Rise, crown'd with light, imperial + Salem, rise! 85
Exalt thy tow'ry head, and lift thy eyes!
See, a long race thy spacious courts adorn;
See future sons, and daughters yet unborn,

NOTES.

Ver. 87. See the very animated prophecy of Joad, in the seventh scene of Racine's Athaliah, perhaps the most sublime piece of poetry in the French language, and a chief ornament of that which is one of the best of their tragedies. In speaking of these para

IMITATIONS.

phrases

"The goats shall bear to the fold their udders distended with milk: nor shall the herds be afraid of the greatest lions. The serpent shall die, and the herb that conceals poison shall die."

Isaiah, ch. xi. ver. 16, &c. "The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together: and a little child shall lead them. And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the den of the cockatrice."

P.

Ver. 80. From the words occidet et serpens, it was idly concluded the old serpent, Satan, was meant. Warton.

Ver. 85. Rise, crown'd with light, imperial Salem, rise!] The thoughts of Isaiah, which compose the latter part of the poem, are wonderfully elevated, and much above those general exclamations of Virgil, which make the loftiest parts of his Pollio:

66

Magnus

Isaiah, ch. lxv. ver. 25.

† Ch. lx. ver. 1.

Ch. lx. ver. 4.

90

In crouding ranks on ev'ry side arise,
Demanding life, impatient for the skies!
See barb'rous *nations at thy gates attend,
Walk in thy light, and in thy temple bend;
See thy bright altars throng'd with prostrate kings,
And heap'd with products of +Sabæan springs!
For thee Idume's spicy forests blow,

And seeds of gold in Ophir's mountains glow.
See heav'n its sparkling portals wide display,
And break upon thee in a flood of day.
No more the rising Sun shall gild the morn,
Nor ev'ning Cynthia fill her silver horn;
But lost, dissolv'd in thy superior rays,
One tide of glory, one unclouded blaze

95

100

O'erflow thy courts: the Light himself shall shine Reveal'd, and God's eternal day be thine!

The seas shall waste, the skies in smoke decay, Rocks fall to dust, and mountains melt away;

NOTES.

phrases from the sacred scriptures, I cannot forbear mentioning Dr. Young's nervous and noble paraphrase of the book of Job, and Mr. Pitt's, of the third and twenty-fifth chapters of the same book, and also of the fifteenth chapter of Exodus.

IMITATIONS.

"Magnus ab integro sæclorum nascitur ordo

-toto surget gens aurea mundo!

-incipient magni procedere menses!

Aspice, venturo lætentur ut omnia sæclo!" &c.

Warton.

The reader needs only to turn to the passages of Isaiah, here cited.

* Isaiah, ch. lx. ver. 3.

Ch. lx. ver. 19, 20.

P.

+ Ch. lx. ver. 6. § Ch. li. ver. 6. and ch. liv. ver. 10.

But fix'd his word, his saving pow'r remains :
Thy realm for ever lasts, thy own MESSIAH reigns!

THIS is certainly the most animated and sublime of all our Author's compositions, and it is manifestly owing to the great original which he copied. Isaiah abounds in striking and magnificent imagery. See Mr. Mason's paraphrase of the 14th chapter of this exalted prophet. Dr. Johnson, in his youth, gave a translation of this piece, which perhaps has been praised and magnified beyond its merits. Warton.

Dr. Johnson's Latin translation of this Poem is certainly inaccurate, and it contains many expressions which, as Dr. Warton observes, are not classical. I have another Latin translation before me, with which I was favoured by Mr. Todd, printed at Naples 1760, and entitled, "Messias, Ecloga sacra Anglice, ab Alexandro Popio, Latine reddita a Gulielmo Bermingham, Presbytero." This translation is in some parts well executed, but in general it is deficient in poetic harmony and effect, and often offends taste and propriety. Bowles.

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TRANSLATIONS

AND

IMITATIONS.