He, fince that toy, his death [c],

Does fill all mouths, and breathes in all men's breath. 'Tis true, the two immortal fyllables [d] remain, But, o ye learned men, explain,

What effence, what existence this,

What fubftance; what fubfiftence, what hypoftafis, In fix poor letters is?

In those alone does the great Cæfar live,

'Tis all the conquer'd world could give.

miliar ftyle. He might have faid, more fuitably to the style of an ode

"Great Cæfar's felf".

[b] Supernatural, intellectual, unintelligible being. COWLEY.

[c] that toy, his death] Called a toy, because the play-thing of every declaimer, from that time to this, and, by paffing through fo many hands, more inftrumental to the propagation of Cæfar's faine, than all the glories of his life.

[d] two immortal fyllables] This lively ridicule, on posthumous fame, is well enough placed in a poem, or declamation: but we are a little furprized to find fo grave a writer, as Mr. Wollafton, diverting himfelf with it. In reality (fays he) the man is not "known ever the more to pofterity, because his 66 name is tranfmitted to them: he doth not live, be"cause his name does. When it is faid, J. Cæfar "fubdued Gaul, beat Pompey, changed the Roman commonwealth," &c.-Rel. of Nat. Sect. v. fophiftry is apparent. Put Cato in the place of Cæfar, and then fee whether that great man do not live in his name, fubftantially, that is, to good purpose, if the impreffion, which those two immortal Jyllables make on the mind, be of ufe in exciting pofterity, or any one man, to the love and imitation of Cato's virtue,

-The

We

We poets, madder yet than all,
With a refin'd fantastic vanity,

Think, we not only have, but give eternity.
Fain would I fee that prodigal,

Who his to-morrow would bestow For all old Homer's life, e'er fince he died, till now.

XVI.

Ο

D

E.

ACME and SEPTIMIUS:
Out of CATULLUS.

WE

HILST on Septimius' panting breast, (Meaning nothing less than reft)

Acme lean'd her loving head,

Thus the pleas'd Septimius faid;

My dearest Acme, if I be

Once alive, and love not thee
With a paffion far above

All that e'er was called love,
In a Libyan defert may
I become fome lion's prey;
Let him, Acme, let him tear

My breast, when Acme is not there.

The god of love, who ftood to hear him,
(The god of love was always near him)
Pleas'd and tickled with the found,
Sneez'd aloud; and all around
The little loves, that waited by,
Bow'd, and blefs'd the augury.
Acme, inflam'd with what he said,
Rear'd her gently-bending head,
And, her purple mouth with joy
Stretching to the delicious boy,

Twice (and twice could fcarce fuffice)
She kifs'd his drunken, rowling eyes.

My little life, my all (faid she)
So may we ever servants be

To this best god, and ne'er retain
Our hated liberty again,

So may thy paffion last for me,
As I a paffion have for thee,

Greater and hercer much than cản

Be conceiv'd by thee, a man.

Into my marrow is it

gone,

Fix'd and fettled in the bone,

It reigns not only in my heart,
But runs, like life, through ev'ry part.
She spoke; the god of love, aloud,
Sneez'd again; and all the crowd
Of little loves, that waited by,
Bow'd, and blefs'd the augury.

This good omen thus from heaven,

Like a happy fignal, given,

Their loves and lives (all four) embrace,

And hand in hand run all the race.

To poor Septimius (who did now
Nothing else but Acme grow)
Acme's bofom was alone

The whole world's imperial throne,
And to faithful Acme's mind

Septimius was all human kind.

If the gods would please to be
But advis'd for once by me,
I'dadvise them, when they spy
Any illuftrious piety,

To reward her, if it be fhe;
To reward him, if it be he;
With fuch a husband, fuch a wife [e],
With Acme's and Septimius' life.

[e]-fuch a husband, such a wife.] It is to be obferved, to the honour of our author's morals, and good tafte, that, by this little deviation from his original, he has converted a loose love-poem into a fober epithalamium. We have all the grace, and, what is more, all the warmth of Catullus, without his indecency.

THE