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For now no more these climes their influence boast,
Fall'n is their glory, and their virtue lost :
From tyrants, and from priests, the Muses fly,
Daughters of Reason and of Liberty.

Nor Baix now, nor Umbria's plain they love,
Nor on the banks of Nar, or Mincia rove;
To Thames's flow'ry borders they retire,
And kindle in thy breast the Roman fire.
So in the shades, where, cheer'd with summer rays,
Melodious linnets warbled sprightly lays,
Soon as the faded, falling leaves complain
Of gloomy Winter's inauspicious reign,
No tuneful voice is heard of joy or love,
But mournful silence saddens all the grove.
Unhappy Italy! whose altered state

Has felt the worst severity of fate :
Not that barbarian hands her fasces broke,
And bow'd her haughty neck beneath their yoke;
Nor that her palaces to earth are thrown,
Her cities desart, and her fields unsown;
But that her ancient spirit is decay'd,
That sacred wisdom from her bounds is fled,
That there the scource of science flows no more,
Whence its rich streams supply'd the world before,
Illustrious names! that once in Latium shin'd,
Born to instruct, and to command mankind;

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Chiefs, by whose virtue mighty Rome was rais'd, 35
And poets, who those chiefs sublimely prais'd!
Oft I the traces you have left explore,
Your ashes visit, and your urns adore,

Oft kiss, with lips devout, some mould'ring stone,
With ivy's venerable shade o'ergrown ;
Those hallowed ruins better pleas'd to see
Than all the pomp of modern luxury.

As late on Virgil's tomb fresh flow'rs I strow'd,
While with th' inspiring muse my bosom glow'd,
Crown'd with eternal bays, my ravish'd eyes
Beheld the poet's awful form arise.
Stranger, he said, whose pious hand has paid
These grateful rites to my attentive shade,
When thou shalt breathe thy happy native air,
To Pope this message from his master bear:
"Great bard, whose numbers I myself inspire,
To whom I give my own harmonious lyre,
If high exalted on the throne of Wit,
Near me and Homer, thou aspire to sit,
No more let meaner satire dim thy rays,
That flow majestic from thy nobler bays;
In all the flow'ry paths of Pindus stray,
But shun that thorny, that unpleasing way;
Nor, when each soft engaging Muse is thine,
Address the least attractive of the Nine.

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Of thee more worthy were the task to raise A lasting column to thy country's praise; To sing the land which yet alone can boast That liberty corrupted Rome has lost; Where Science in the arms of Peace is laid, And plants her palm beneath the olive's shade. Such was the theme for which my lyre I strung, Such was the people whose exploits I sung; Brave yet refin'd, for arms and arts renown'd, With different bays by Mars and Phoebus crown'd, Dauntless opposers of tyrannic sway, But pleas'd a mild Augustus to obey.

"If these commands submissive thou receive, Immortal and unblam'd thy name, shall live; Envy to black Cocytus shall retire, And howl with furies in tormentin fire; Approving Time shall consecrate thy lays, And join the patriot's to the poet's praise."

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GEORGE LYTTLETON.

WITH A

DISCOURSE ON PASTORAL POETRY*.

WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1704.

Rura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes,
Flumina amem, sylvasque, inglorius !

VIRGIL.

THERE are not, I believe, a greater number of any sort of verses than of those which are called pastorals, nor a smaller, than of those which are truly so. It therefore seems necessary to give some account of this kind of poem; and it is my design to comprise, in this short paper, the substance of those numerous dissertations the critics have made on the subject, without omitting any of their rules in my own favour: you will also find some points reconciled about which they seem to differ, and a few remarks which, I think, have escaped their observation.

* Written at sixteen years of age. P.

The original of poetry is ascribed to that age which succeeded the creation of the world; and as the keeping of flocks seems to have been the first employment of mankind, the most ancient sort of poetry was probably pastoral*. It is natural to imagine, that the leisure of those ancient shepherds admitting and inviting some diversion, none was so proper to that solitary and sedentary life as singing; and that in their songs they took occasion to celebrate their own felicity. From hence a poem was invented, and afterwards improved to a perfect image of that happy time; which, by giving us an esteem for the virtues of a former age, might recommend them to the present. And since the life of shepherds was attended with more tranquility than any other rural employment, the poets chose to introduce their persons, from whom it received the name of pastoral.

A pastoral is an imitation of the action of a shepherd, or one considered under that character. The form of this imitation is dramatic, or narrative, or mixed of both; the fable is simple, the manners not too polite nor too rustic: the thoughts are plain, yet admit a little quickness and passion, but that short and flowing the expression humble, yet as pure as the language will afford; neat, but not florid; easy, *Fontenelle's discourse on Pastorals. P, Heinsius in Theocr. P.