Me miferable! which way fhall I fly
Infinite wrath and infinite despair?
Which way I fly is hell: myself am hell:
And in the lowest deep, a lower deep
Still threat'ning to devour me, opens wide;
To which, the hell I fuffer feems a heav'n.

Paradife Loft, book 4.

Of the third branch, take the following famples.

Lucan, talking of Pompey's fepulchre,

Romanum nomen, et omne

Imperium Magno est tumuli modus. Obrue faxa
Crimine plena deûm. Si tota eft Herculis Oete,
Et juga tota vacant Bromio Nyfeia; quare
Unus in Egypto Magno lapis? Omnia Lagi
Rura tenere poteft, fi nullo cefpite nomen
Hæferit. Erremus populi, cinerumque tuorum,
Magne, metu nullas Nili calcemus arenas.

L. 8. 1. 798.

Thus in Rowe's tranflation:

Where there are feas, or air, or earth, or skies, Where-e'er Rome's empire ftretches, Pompey

lies.

Far

Far be the vile memorial then convey'd!
Nor let this stone the partial gods upbraid.
Shall Hercules all Oeta's heights demand,
And Nyfa's hill for Bacchus only stand;
While one poor pebble is the warrior's doom
That fought the cause of liberty and Rome?
If fate decrees he muft in Egypt lie,
Let the whole fertile realm his grave fupply,
Yield the wide country to his awful shade,
Nor let us dare on any part to tread,

Fearful we violate the mighty dead.

The following paffages are pure rant. Coriolanus fpeaking to his mother,

What is this?

Your knees to me? to your corrected fon?
Then let the pebbles on the hungry beach
Fillop the stars: then let the mutinous winds
Strike the proud cedars 'gainst the fiery fun:
Murd'ring impoffibility, to make
What cannot be, flight work.

Cafar.

Coriolanus, att 5. fe. 3.

Danger knows full well,

That Cæfar is more dangerous than he.
We were two lions litter'd in one day,

And I the elder and more terrible.

Julius Cæfar, att 2. sc. 4.
Aimabide.

Almabide. This day

I gave my faith to him, he his to me,

Almanzor. Good Heav'n, thy book of fate bcfore me lay

But to tear out the journal of this day.

Or if the order of the world below,

Will not the gap of one whole day allow,

Give me that minute when she made that vow.

That minute ev'n the happy from their blifs might

And those who live in grief a fhorter time would

live.

So fmall a link if broke, th'eternal chain

Would like divided waters join again.

Almanzor,

Conquest of Granada, at 3.

I'll hold it faft

As life; and when life's gone, I'll hold this last.

And if thou tak'ft it after I am flain,

I'll fend my ghoft to fetch it back again.

Conquest of Granada, part 2. að 3.

Lyndiraxa. A crown is come, and will not fate allow.

And

yet I feel fomething like death is near.

My guards, my guards

Let not that ugly skeleton appear.

Sure Destiny mistakes; this death's not mine;

She doats, and meant to cut another line.

VOL. II.

C c

Tell

but 'tis too late;

Tell her I am a queen

Dying, I charge rebellion on my fate;

Bow down, ye flaves

Bow quickly down and your fubmiffion fhow;
I'm pleas'd to taste an empire ere I go.

[Dies.

Conquest of Granada, part 2, act 5.

Ventidius. But you, ere love misled your wand'ring eyes,

Were, fure, the chief and beft of human race,
Fram'd in the very pride and boast of nature,

So perfect, that the gods who form'd you wonder'd
At their own skill, and cry'd, A lucky hit

Has mended our design.

Dryden, All for Love, alt 1.

Not to talk of the impiety of this fentiment, it is ludicrous instead of being lofty.

The famous Epitaph on Raphael is not lefs abfurd than any of the foregoing paffages:

Raphael, timuit, quo fofpite, vinci

Rerum magna parens, et moriente mori.

Imitated by Pope in his Epitaph on Sir God

frey Kneller ;

Living,

Living, great Nature fear'd he might outvie
Her works; and dying, fears herself may die.

Such is the force of imitation; for Pope of himself would never have been guilty of a thought fo extravagant.