But see, the shepherds shun the noon-day heat, The lowing herds to murm'ring brooks retreat, To closer shades the panting flocks remove; Ye Gods! and is there no relief for Love? But soon the sun with milder rays descends To the cool ocean, where his journey ends. On me love's fiercer flames for ever prey, By night he scorches, as he burns by day. NOTES. 90 extravagance, when he makes the stream not only "listening," but "hang listening in its headlong fall." Mr. Stevens in his MS. notes, quotes Lucan, in a passage where the image is precisely the same, though possibly Pope never saw it: -" de rupe pependit Abscissâ fixus torrens!" But as it is here used, it is too hyperbolical, and only allowable in a very young writer. An idea of this sort will only bear just touching, if I may say so; the mind then does not perceive its violence if it be brought before the eyes too minutely, it becomes almost ridiculous. This is often the fault of Cowley. Oldham has a passage of the same stamp: : "For which the list'ning streams forgot to run, And trees lean'd their attentive branches down." How much more judiciously and poetically has Milton given the same idea? "Thirsis, whose artful strains have oft delay'd The huddling brook to hear his madrigal, VARIATIONS. Ver. 91. Me love inflames, nor will his fires allay. Ver. 88. Ye Gods, &c.] IMITATIONS. Bowles. P. “Me tamen urit amor, quis enim modus adsit amori ?" Virg. P. AUTUMN: THE THIRD PASTORAL,* OR HYLAS AND EGON. TO MR. WYCHERLEY.+ BENEATH the shade a spreading Beech displays, This mourn'd a faithless, that an absent Love, Ye Mantuan Nymphs, your sacred succour bring; 5 NOTES. * This Pastoral consists of two parts, like the viiith of Virgil: The Scene, a Hill; the Time at Sun-set. P. His intrigues with the Duchess of Cleveland, his marriage with the Countess of Drogheda, Charles the Second's displeasure on this marriage, his debts and distresses, and other particulars of his life, are well related by Dennis in a Letter to Major Pack, 1720. In Dennis's collection of Letters, published in two volumes, 1721, to which Mr. Pope subscribed, Lord Lansdown has drawn his character, as a Writer, in an elegant manner; chiefly with a view of shewing the impropriety of an epithet given to him by Lord Rochester, who called him Slow Wycherley; for that, notwithstanding his pointed wit, and forcible expression, he composed with facility and haste. Warton. Thou, whom the Nine, with Plautus' wit inspire, The art of Terence, and Menander's fire; Whose sense instructs us, and whose humour charms, Whose judgment sways us, and whose spirit warms! NOTES. Ver. 7. Thou, whom the Nine,] Mr. Wycherley, a famous author of Comedies; of which the most celebrated were the PlainDealer and Country-Wife. He was a writer of infinite spirit, satire, and wit. The only objection made to him was, that he had too much. However, he was followed in the same way by Mr. Congreve, tho' with a little more correctness. Surely with much more correctness, taste, and judgment. P. Warton. Ver. 8. The art of Terence, and Menander's fire;] This line alludes to that famous character given of Terence, by Cæsar: "Tu quoque, tu in summis, ô dimidiate Menander, Lenibus atque utinam scriptis adjuncta foret vis So that the judicious critic sees he should have said—with Menander's fire. For what the Poet meant, was, that his friend had joined to Terence's art, what Cæsar thought wanting in Terence, namely, the vis comica of Menander. Besides, and Menander's fire, is making that the Characteristic of Menander which was not. He was distinguished for having art and comic spirit in conjunction, and Terence having only the first part, is called the half of Menander. Warburton. Ver. 9. Whose sense instructs us,] He was always very careful in his encomiums not to fall into ridicule, the deserved fate of weak and prostitute flatterers, and which they rarely escape. For sense, he would willingly have said moral; propriety required it. But this dramatic Poet's moral was remarkably faulty. His plays are all shamefully profligate both in the Dialogue and Ac tion. Warburton. Oh, skill'd in Nature! see the hearts of Swains, Their artless passions, and their tender pains. 15 Now setting Phoebus shone serenely bright, And fleecy clouds were streak'd with purple light; When tuneful Hylas with melodious moan, Taught rocks to weep, and made the mountains groan. Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away! As some sad turtle his lost love deplores, Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along! Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away! Curs'd be the fields that cause my Delia's stay; Fade ev'ry blossom, wither ev'ry tree, Die ev'ry flow'r, and perish all, but she. 30 What have I said? where'er my Delia flies, 35 Let spring attend, and sudden flow'rs arise; NOTES. Ver. 25.] This rich assemblage of very pleasing pastoral images, is yet excelled by Shenstone's beautiful Pastoral Ballad in four parts. Warton. Let op'ning roses knotted oaks adorn, And liquid amber drop from ev'ry thorn. Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along! The birds shall cease to tune their ev'ning song, 40 The winds to breathe, the waving woods to move, And streams to murmur, ere I cease to love. Not bubbling fountains to the thirsty swain, Not balmy sleep to lab'rers faint with pain, NOTES. Ver. 43. Not bubbling] The turn of these four lines is evidently borrowed from Drummond of Hawthornden, a charming but neglected Poet. He was born 1585, and died 1649. His verses are as smooth as Waller's, whom he preceded many years, having written a poem to King James, 1617; whereas Waller's first composition was to Charles I, 1625. His Sonnets are exquisitely beautiful and correct. He was one of our first, and best imitators of the Italian Poets, and Milton had certainly read and admired him, as appears by many passages that might be quoted for that purpose. The four lines mentioned above follow: To virgins flow'rs, to sun-burnt earth the rain, Cool shades to pilgrims, whom hot glances burn, And afterwards again our author borrows in Abelard; The grief was common, common were the cries. I will just add, that Drayton's Pastorals, and his Nymphidia, do not seem to be attended to so much as they deserve. Warton. Mala ferant quercus; narcisso floreat alnus, Pinguia corticibus sudent electra myricæ." Ver. 43, &c. Virg. Ecl. viii. P. "Quale sopor fessis in gramine, quale per æstum Dulcis aquæ saliente sitim restinguere rivo." Ecl. v. P. |