To Mr. DRYDEN, by Jo. ADDISON, Efq;
OW long, great poet, fhall thy facred lays
Provoke our wonder, and transcend our praise !
Can neither injuries of time, or age,
Damp thy poetick heat, and quench thy rage
Not fo thy Ovid in his exile wrote;
Grief chill'd his breaft, and check'd his rifing thought; Penfive and fad, his drooping muse betrays
The Roman genius in its laft decays.
Prevailing warmth has ftill thy mind possest,
And second youth is kindled in thy breast.
Thou mak'st the beauties of the Romans known,
And England boasts of riches not her own:
Thy lines have heighten'd Virgil's majefty,
And Horace wonders at himself in thee.
Thou teacheft Perfius to inform our isle
In smoother numbers, and a clearer style :
And Juvenal, instructed in thy page,
Edges his fatire, and improves his rage.
Thy copy cafts a fairer light on all,
And still outshines the bright original.
Now Ovid boasts th' advantage of thy song,
And tells his story in the British tongue;
Thy charming verse, and fair translations show
How thy own laurel firft began to grow;
How wild Lycaon, chang'd by angry Gods,
And frighted at himfelf, ran howling thro' the woods.
O may'st thou still the noble tale prolong,
Nor age, nor fickness interrupt thy song:
Then may we wond'ring read, how human limbs
Have water'd kingdoms, and diffolv'd in streams,
Of those rich fruits that on the fertile mould
Turn'd yellow by degrees, and ripen'd into gold :
How fome in feathers, or a ragged hide,
Have liv'd a second life, and different natures try'd.
Then will thy Ovid, thus transform'd, reveal
A nobler change than he himself can tell.
Mag. Coll. Oxon.
June 2, 1693.
From Mr. ADDISON's Account of the ENGLISH POETS.
UT fee where artful Dryden next appears,
Grown old in rhyme, but charming ev'n in years. Great Dryden next! whose tuneful mufe affords The sweetest numbers and the fittest words.
Whether in comic founds, or tragick airs
She forms her voice, she moves our fmiles and tears. If fatire or heroic ftrains fhe writes,
Her hero pleases, and her fatire bites.
From her no harfh, 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! whose fancy's unexhausted store
Has given already much, and promis'd more.
Congreve shall still preserve thy fame alive,
And Dryden's muse shall in his friend furvive.
On ALEXANDER'S FEAST: Or, The POWER of MUSICK. An ODE.
From Mr. POPE'S ESSAY ON CRITICISM, 1. 376.
EAR how Timotheus' vary'd lays furprize,
And bid alternate paffions fall and rife!
While, at each change, the fon of Libyan Jove
Now burns with glory, and then melts with love;
Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,
Now fighs steal out, and tears begin to flow.
Perfians and Greeks like turns of nature found,
And the world's victor stood fubdu'd by found.
The pow'r of Mufick all our hearts allow,
And what Timotheus was is Dryden now.
Ehold, where Dryden's lefs presumptuous car,
Wide o'er the fields of glory bear:
Two courfers of ethereal race,
With necks in thunder cloath'd, and long-refounding
Hark, his hands the lyre explore!
Bright-ey'd Fancy hov'ring o'er,
Scatters from her pictur'd urn,
Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.
But, ah! 'tis heard no more --
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 eyes would run
Such forms, as glitter in the mufe's ray
With orient hues, unborrow'd of the fun :
Yet fhall he mount, and keep his diftant way
Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate
Beneath the good how far---but far above the great.
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