The sweets her virgin-breath contains
Are fitted to remove my pains;

There will healing nectar fip,
And, to be fav'd, approach her lip,
Though, if I touch the matchlefs dame,
I'm fure to burn with inward flame.
Thus, when I would one danger shun,
I'm ftraight upon another thrown:
I feek a cure, one fore to eafe,
Yet in that cure's a new disease:
But Love, though fatal, ftill can blefs,
And greater dangers hide the less;
I'll go where paffion bids me fly,
And choose my death, fince I must die;
As Doves, pursued by birds of prey,
Venture with milder man to stay.

ON

THE NUMBER THREE.

BEAUTY refts not in one fix'd place,
But seems to reign in every face;
'Tis nothing fure but fancy then,
In various forms, bewitching men;
Or is its shape and colour fram'd,
Proportion juft, and Woman nam'd?
If Fancy only rul'd in Love,

Why should it then so strongly move?

Or why should all that look agree,
To own its mighty power in Three?
In Three it fhews a different face,
Each shining with peculiar grace.
Kindred a native likeness gives,
Which pleases, as in all it lives;
And, where the features disagree,
We praise the dear variety.

Then Beauty furely ne'er was yet,
So much unlike itself, and fo complete.

E S S A Y

ON

THE DIFFERENT STYLES OF POETRY*.

I

TO HENRY LORD VISCOUNT BOLINGBROKE.

"-Vatibus addere calcar,

"Ut ftudio majore petant Helicona virentem.”

HOR. Ep. II. 1.

HATE the vulgar with untuneful mind; Hearts uninfpir'd, and fenfes unrefin'd. Hence, ye prophane: I raise the founding ftring, And Bolingbroke defcends to hear me fing.

* Allegory is in itself fo retired a way of Writing, that it was thought proper to say something beforehand concerning this Piece, which is entirely framed upon it. The defign, therefore, is to fhew the feveral Styles which have been made use of by

thofe

When Greece could truth in Myftic Fable fhroud, And with delight inftruct the liftening crowd,

those who have endeavoured to write in verse. The scheme, by which it is carried on, fuppofes an old Grecian Poet couching" his obfervations or inftructions within an Allegory; which Allegory is wrought out upon the fingle word Flight, as in the figurative way it fignifies a thought above the common level: here Wit is made to be Pegafus, and the Poet his Rider, who flies by feveral countries where he must not touch, by which are meant so many vicious Styles, and arrives at last at the Sublime. This way of Writing is not only very engaging to the fancy whenever it is well performed; but it has been thought also one of the first that the Poets made use of. Hence arose many of those stories concerning the Heathen Gods, which at first were invented to infinuate Truth and Morality more pleasingly, and which afterwards made Poetry itself more folemn, when they happened to be received into the Heathen Divinity. And indeed there feems to be no likelier way by which a Poetical Genius may yet appear as an Original, than that he should proceed with a full compafs of thought and knowledge, either to defign his plan, or to beautify the parts of it, in an allegorical manner. We are much beholden to Antiquity for thofe excellent compofitions by which Writers at prefent form their minds; but it is not fo much required of us to adhere merely to their fables, as to obferve their manner. For, if we preclude our own invention, Poetry will confift only in expreffion, or fimile, or the application of old stories; and the utmost character to which a Genius can arrive will depend on imitation, or a borrowing from others, which we must agree together not to call stealing, because we take only from the Ancients. There have been Poets amongst ourselves, such as Spenfer and Milton, who have fuccessfully ventured further. These inftances may let us fee that Invention is not bounded by what has been done before: they may open our imaginations, and be one method of preserving us from Writing without schemes. As for what relates

any

An ancient Poet (Time has loft his name)
Deliver'd ftrains on Verse to future fame.
Still, as he fung, he touch'd the trembling lyre,
And felt the notes a rifing warmth inspire.
Ye fweetening Graces, in the Mufic throng,
Affift my genius, and retrieve the fong
From dark oblivion. See, my genius goes
To call it forth.

'Twas thus the Poem rofe.

"WIT is the Mufes' horse, and bears on high The daring rider to the Mufes' fky:

Who, while his ftrength to mount aloft he tries,
By regions varying in their nature flies.

At first, he rifeth o'er a land of toil,
A barren, hard, and undeferving foil,
Where only weeds from heavy labour grow,
Which yet the nation prune, and keep for show;
Where couplets jingling on their accent run,
Whofe Point of Epigram is funk to Pun;
Where* wings by fancy never feather'd fly,
Where lines by measure form'd in Hatchets lie;

any further particularly to this Poem, the Reader will obferve, that its aim is Inftruction. Perhaps a representation of several mistakes and difficulties, which happen to many who write Poetry, may deter fome from attempting what they have not been made for: and perhaps the description of several beauties belonging to it may afford hints towards forming a Genius for delighting and improving mankind. If either of these happen, the Poem is useful; and upon that account its faults may be more eafily excused. PARNELL.

*These and the like conceits of putting Poems into feveral fhapes by the different lengths of lines, are frequent in old Poets of moft languages. PARNELL.

Where Altars ftand, erected Porches gape,

And fenfe is cramp'd while words are par'd to fhape;
Where mean Acroftics, labour'd in a frame

On scatter'd letters, raise a painful scheme;
And, by confinement in their work, control
The great enlargings of the boundless foul;
Where if a warrior's elevated fire
Would all the brighteft ftrokes of verse require,
Then straight in Anagram a wretched crew
Will pay their undeferving praises too;
While on the rack his poor disjointed name
Must tell its mafter's character to Fame.
And (if my fire and fears aright presage)
The labouring writers of a future age

Shall clear new ground, and grots and caves repair,
To civilize the babbling echoes there.

Then, while a lover treads a lonely walk,
His voice shall with its own reflection talk,
The clofing founds of all the vain device
Select by trouble frivolously nice,

Refound through verfe, and with a false pretence
Support the dialogue, and pass for sense.
Can things like these to lasting praise pretend?
Can any Muse the worthless toil befriend?
Ye facred Virgins, in my thoughts ador'd,
Ah, be for ever in my lines deplor'd,
If tricks on words acquire an endless name,
And trifles merit in the court of Fame!"

At this the Poet stood concern'd a while,
And view'd his objects with a scornful smile: