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From Mr. ADDISON'S Account of the

B

ENGLISH POETS.

UT fee where artful Dryden next appears,

Grown old in rhyme, but charming ev'n in years. Great Dryden next! whose tuneful muse affords The sweetest numbers and the fittest words.

Whether in comic founds, or tragic airs,

She forms her voice, fhe moves our fimiles and tears. If fatire or heroic ftrains the writes,

Her hero pleases, and her fatire bites.

From her no harsh, unartful numbers fall,
She wears all dreffes, and fhe charms in all:
How might we fear our English poetry,
That long has flourish'd, should decay in thee;
Did not the Mufes' other hope appear,
Harmonious Congreve, and forbid our fear!
Congreve! whofe fancy's unexhausted store
Has given already much, and promis'd more.
Congreve fhall ftill preferve thy fame alive,
And Dryden's mufe fhall in his friend furvive.

On

On ALEXANDER'S FEAST: Or, The POWER of MUSICK. An ODE.

From Mr POPE'S ESSAY on CRITICISM, 1. 376.

HEAR how Timotheus' vary'd lays furprize,

And bid alternate paffions fall and rise!

While, at each change, the son of Libyan Jove
Now burns with glory, and then melts with love;
Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,
Now fighs fteal out, and tears begin to flow.
Perfians and Greeks like turns of nature found,
And the world's victor stood subdued by found.
The power
of Mufick all our hearts allow,
And what Timotheus was is Dryden now.

CHARACTER of DRYDEN,

From an ODE of GRAY'S.

Behold, where Dryden's lefs prefumptuous car,
Wide o'er the fields of glory bear :

Two courfers of ethereal race,

With necks in thunder cloath'd, and long-refounding pace.

Hark, his hands the lyre explore!

Bright-ey'd Fancy hovering o'er,

Scatters from her pictur'd urn,

Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.

But, ah! 'tis heard no more

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Oh! lyre divine, what daring fpirit
Wakes thee now? though he inherit
Nor the pride, nor ample pinion,
That the Theban eagle bear,
Sailing with fupreme dominion
Through the azure deep of air:

Yet oft before his infant would run

eyes

Such forms, as glitter in the Mufe's ray
With orient hues, unborrow'd of the fun :
Yet fhall he mount, and keep his distant way
Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate

Beneath the good how far-but far above the great.

MR.

MR. DRYDEN'S

ORIGINAL POEMS.

Upon the DEATH of Lord HASTINGS.

M

UST noble Haftings immaturely die,
The honour of his ancient family,
Beauty and learning thus together meet,

To bring a winding for a wedding fheet?
Muft virtue prove death's harbinger? muft fhe,
With him expiring, feel mortality?

Is death, fin's wages, grace's now ? shall art
Make us more learned, only to depart ?
If merit be disease; if virtue death;

To be good, not to be; who'd then bequeath
Himfelf to difcipline? who'd not esteem
Labour a crime? study self-murther deem ?
Our noble youth now have pretence to be
Dunces fecurely, ignorant healthfully.

Rare linguist whofe worth speaks itself, whose praise,
Though not his own, all tongues beides do raife:
Than whom great Alexander may seem lefs;
Who conquer'd men, but not their languages.
In his mouth nations fpake; his tongue might be
Interpreter to Greece, France, Italy.

His native foil was the four parts o'th' earth;
All Europe was too narrow for his birth.
A young apostle; and with reverence may
I speak it, infpir'd with gift of tongues, as they.
Nature gave him a child, what men in vain
Oft strive, by art though further'd, to obtain.
His body was an orb, his fublime foul

Did move on virtue's, and on learning's pole :
Whofe regular motions better to our view,
Than Archimedes' sphere, the heavens did shew.
Graces and virtues, languages and arts,
Beauty and learning, fill'd up all the parts.
Heaven's gifts, which do like falling stars appear
Scatter'd in others; all, as in their fphere,
Were fix'd, conglobate in his foul; and thence
Shone through his body, with sweet influence;
Letting their glories fo on each limb fall,
The whole frame render'd was celeftial.
Come, learned Ptolemy, and tryal make,
If thou this hero's altitude canft take :
But that tranfcends thy fkill; thrice happy all,
Could we but prove thus aftronomical.

Liv'd Tycho now, ftruck with this ray which fhone
More bright i'th' morn', than others beam at noon,
He'd take his aftrolabe, and feek out here
What new ftar 'twas did gild our hemifphere.
Replenish'd then with fuch rare gifts as thefe,
Where was room left for fuch a foul disease?
The nation's fin hath drawn that veil, which shrouds
Our day-fpring in fo fad benighting clouds,

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