Thefe thoughts are pretty: they fuit Pope, but not Eloifa.

Satan, enraged by a threatening of the angel Gabriel, anfwer thus:

Then when I am thy captive talk of chains,
Proud limitary cherub; but ere then
Far heavier load thyfelf expect to feel
From my prevailing arm, though Heaven's King
Ride on the wings, and thou with thy compeers,
Us'd to the yoke, draw'ft his triumphant wheels
In progrefs through the road of heav'n far-pav'd.
Paradife loft, book 4.

The concluding epithet forms a grand and delightful image, which cannot be the genuine offspring of rage.

Fourth. Sentiments too artificial for a ferious paffion. I give for the first example a speech of Piercy expiring:

O, Harry, thou haft robb'd me of my growth:

I better brook the lofs of brittle life,

Than thofe proud titles thou haft won of me;

They wound my thoughts, worse than thy fword my

fieth.

But thought's the flave of life, and life time's fool;
And time, that takes furvey of all the world,

Must have a top.

First part, Henry IV. a&i 5. fc. 9.

Livy inferts the following paffage in a plaintive oration of the Locrenfes, accufing Pleminius the Roman legate of oppreffion.

In hoc legato veftro, nec hominis quicquam eft, Patres Confcripti, præter figuram et fpeciein; neque Ro

mani civis, præter habitum veftitumque, et forum linguæ Latine. Peitis et bellua immanis, quales fretum, quon dam, quo ab Sicilia dividimur, ad perniciem navigantium circumfediffe, fabulæ ferunt.*

The fentiments of the Mourning Bride are for the most part no lefs delicate than juft copies of nature; in the following exception the picture is beautiful, but too artful to be fuggefted by fevere grief.

Almeria. O no! Time gives increase to my afflictions.
The circling hours, that gather all the woes
Which are diffus'd through the revolving year,
Come heavy laden with th' oppreffive weight
To me; with me, fucceffively they leave

The fighs, the tears, the groans, the reftlefs cares,
And all the damps of grief, that did retard their fight
They thake their downy wings, and scatter all
The dire collected dews on my poor head;
Then fly with joy and fwiftnefs from me.

La 1. fc. T.

In the fame play, Almeria feeing a dead body, which fhe took to be Alphonfo's, expreffes fentiments ftrained and artificial, which nature fuggefts not to any perfon upon fuch an occafion :

Had they, or hearts, or eyes, that did this deed?
Could eyes endure to guide fuch cruel hands?
Are not my eves guilty alike with theirs,
That thus can gaze, and yet not turn to stone?

I do not weep! The fprings of tears are dry'd?
And of a fadden I am calm, as if

All things were well; and yet my husband's murder'd! Yes, yes, I know to mourn: I'll fluice this heart,

The fource of wo, and let the torrent loose.

Lady Trueman. How could you be fo cruel to defer giving me that joy which you knew I must receive from your prefence? You have robb'd my life of fome hours of happinefs that ought to have been in it.

Drummer, a 5.

Pope's Elegy to the memory of an unfortunate lady, expreffes delicately the moft tender concern and forrow that one can feel for the deplorable fate of a perfon of worth. Such a poem, deeply ferious and pathetic, rejects with difdain all fiction. Upon that account, the following paffage deferves no quarter; for it is not the language of the heart, but of the imagination, indulging its flights at eafe; and by that means is eminently difcordant with the fubject. It would be a ftill more fevere cenfure, if it fhould be afcribed to imitation, copying indifcreetly what has been faid by others :

What though no weeping loves thy afhes grace,
Nor polith'd marble cmulate thy face?
What though no facred tarth allow thee room,
Nor hallow'd dirge be mutter'd o'er thy tomb ?
Yet fall thy grave with rifing flowr's be dreft,
And the green turf lie lightly on thy breaft:
"There shall the moru her earheit tears beftow,
There the first rofes of the year fhall blow;
While angels with their filver wings o'ertha de.
The ground, now facred by thy reliques made.

Fifth. Fanciful or finical fentiments. Sentiments that degenerate into point or conceit, however they may amufe in an idle hour, can never be the offspring of any ferious or important paflion. In the Jerufalem of Taffo, Tancred, after a fingle combat, fpent with fatigue and lois of blood, falls into a fwoon; in which fituation, understood to be dead, he is difcoverd

covered by Erminia, who was in love with him to dif traction. A more happy fituation cannot be imagined, to raise grief in an instant to its height; and yet, in venting her forrow, fhe defcends moft abominably into antithefis and conceit, even of the loweft kind:

E in lui versò d'inefficabil vena
Lacrime, e voce, di fofpiri mista.
In che mifero punto hor qui me mena
Fortuna a che veduta amara e trifta ?
Dopo gran tempo i' ti ritrovo à pena
Tancredi, e ti riveggio, e non fon vista,
Vifta non fon da te, benche presente
E trovando ti perdo eternamente.

Canto 19. ft. 105.

Armida's lamentation refpecting her lover Rinaldo,* is in the fame vicious taste.

Queen. Give me no help in lamentation,
I am not barren to bring forth complaints:
All fprings reduce their currents to mine eyes
That I being govern'd by the wat'ry moon,
May fend forth plenteous tears to drown the world,
Ah, for my husband, for my dear Lord Edward.

King Richard, III. aðt 2. fc. 2.

Jane Shore. Let me be branded for the public fcorn, Turn'd forth, and driven to wander like a vagabond, Be friendlefs and forfaken, feck my bread. Upon the barren wild, and defolate wafte, Feed on my fighs, and drink my falling tears; Ere I content to teach my lips injuftice,

Or wrong the Orphan who has none to fave him.

Jane Share, at 4.

Give me your drops, ye foft-defcending rains,
Give me your ftreams, ye never-ccafing fprings,

VOL. I..

* Canto 20, flan, 124, 125. & 126,
A2

That

That my fad eyes may ftill fupply my duty,
And feed an everlafting flood of forrow.

Jane Shore, alt 5.

Jane Shore utters her last breath in a witty conceit.

Then all is well, and I fhrall fleep in peace-
'Tis very dark, and I have loft you now-
Was there not formething I would have bequeath'd you?
But I have nothing left me to bestow,

Nothing but one fad figh. Oh mercy, Heav'n! [Dies.

Aa 5.

Guilford to Lady Jane Gray, when both were condemned to die:

"Thou ftand't unmov'd;

Calm temper fits upon thy beauteous brow;
Thy eyes that flow'd fo faft for Edward's lofs,
Gaze unconcern'd upon the ruin round thee,
As if thou hadst resolv'd to brave thy fate,
And triumph in the midst of defolation.
Ha! fee, it fwells, the liquid cryftal rifes,
It starts in fpite of thee-but I will catch it,
Nor let the earth be wet with dew fo rich.

Lady Jane Gray, alt 4. near the end.

The concluding fentiment is altogether finical, unfuitable to the importance of the occafion, and even to the dignity of the paffion of love.

Corneille in his Examen of the Cid,* anfwering an objection, That his fentiments are fometimes too much refined for perfons in deep diftrefs, obferves, that if poets did, not indulge fentiments more ingenious or refined than are prompted by paffion, their performances would often be low, and extreme grief would never fuggeft but exclamations merely. This is in plain language to affert, that forced thoughts are more agreeable than thofe that are natural, and ought to be preferred.

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