every greatly amiable muje Of elder ages in thy Milton met; His was the treasure of two thousand years, THOMSON. THE VERSE. TH HE measure is English heroic verse without rime, as that of Homer in Greek, and Virgil in Latin; rime being no neceffary adjunct or true ornament of poem or good verfe, in longer works efpecially, but the invention of a barbarous age, to fet off wretched matter and lame meter; grac'd indeed fince by the use of fome famous modern poets, carried away by cuftom, but much to their own vexation, hindrance, and conftraint to exprefs many things otherwise, and for the most part worse than else they would have exprest them. Not without cause therefore some both Italian and Spanish poets of prime note have rejected rime both in longer and fhorter works, as have also long fince our beft English tragedies, as a thing of itself, to all judicious ears, trivial and of no true mufical delight; which confifts only in apt numbers, fit quantity of fyllables, and the sense variously drawn out from one verse into a. |