306 
This was an action which any other 
sacrificing priest was equally qualitied 
and entitled to perform, but let us mark 
what immediately follows: 
Ecce autem gemini 3 Tenedo tranquilla per 
alta 
(Horresco referens) immensis orbibus angues 
-Incumbunt pelago, pariterque ad littora ten- 
dunt. wv. 203. 
Here is the beginning of a grand event, 
expressed by the verb in the present 
‘tense, although it be the description of a 
past action: yet how absurd it would 
be to construe “ incumbunt” are stretch. 
ing themselves, or “tendunt,” are di- 
recting their course! ‘The serpents we 
know, atter having dispatched the mise- 
rable priest and his sons (long before 
JEneas’s narration of it to Queen Dido), 
had escaped to the temple for sanctuary 
(as many two-legged serpents have done 
since ;) gained a snug birth under the 
feet and shield of the palladiam, aud 
must be dead by now in all human pro- 
ability (which, by the way, pocts have 
been often privilezed to despise), so that 
their exploits require at least a pluperfect 
tense, in a chronological sense. 
At gemini lapsu delubra ad summa dracones 
Effugiunt, seveque petunt Tritonidis arcem, 
Sub pedibusque Dew, clypeique sub orbe te- 
guntur. vu. 225. 
From what has been adduccd, I con- 
ceive the inference to be evident, that, 
although past actions, in strictness of lo- 
gic, require to be expressed in the past 
tense, yet such a law js not equally bind- 
- jng on poetry or declamation; and from 
the choice of Virgil (the Prince of Latin 
heroicks), it is plam that he regarded the 
present as amore forcible engine than 
the past tense, to express many events 
which had actually happened, or were 
supposed to have happened; which as to 
the present argunient amounts to the 
same. 
I will now produce a passage from the 
first book of the Eueid, in which the po- 
et describes phanomena that are gene- 
rally observable nearly at the same time 
(and often exactly together), by two dif- 
ferent tenses. 
Intonuére poli, & crebris micat ignibus zthe 
wu 90. 
According te Mr. Westman’s argu- 
ment, the word micaé ought to be chan- 
ged to micuit, upon the supposition that 
the verse would admit it, 
A few lines further we find 
Bxtemplo 4Enex solvuntur frigore membra. 
klere we have the present tense for 
3 
Use of the Present Tense for the Perfect. [Sept. I, 
the perfect, and it is notable, that Ovid, 
in the very fable that has excited this ex- 
amination, attributes the same action to 
Phaéton, placing the verb in the perfect 
tense. 
Ut vero terras despexit ab ethere summo 
Infelix Phaéton, penitus penitusque 
Palluit, & subito genua intremuére timore. 
vu. 179. 
Let us lastly observe how the begin- 
ning of the liquid conflagration is de- 
scribed:— 
Nec sortita loco distantes flumina ripas 
Tuta manent. v. 241. 
He then proceeds in the perfect tense 
of the verbs. 
———Mediis Tanais fumavit in undisy 
Peneusque senex, Teuthranteusque Caycus, 
Et celer Ismenos, cum Phocaico Erymantho, 
Arsurusqueiterwm Xanthus, flavasque Lycormas, 
Quique recurvatis ludit Maander in undis, 
Mygdoniusque Melas, & Tenareus Eurotass¢ 
Arsit & Euphrates Babylonius, artit Orontes, 
Thermodoonque citus, Gangesque & Phasis, 
& Ister. 
In all these lines, Mr. W. (upon. his. 
own grounds of argument) will acknow- 
ledge that the rivers therein mentioned 
were burnt up, exsiccated, rendered 
wholly void of moisture, since all the 
verbs expressing burning are placed ip 
the perfect tense, 
Ile then goes. on in the present tense, 
for three lines:— 
ZEstuat Alphéus, ripe Sperchiades ardent ; 
Quodque suo Tagus amne vehit, flue ignibus 
aurum, 
Et que Mzunias celebrarant carmine ripds. 
wv. 250. 
In the next, he resumes the perfect:— 
Fluminez volucres medio ca/uére Caystro. 
The 257th line commences with 
Sors eadem Ismarios Hebrum cum Strymone 
siccat, 
Hesperiosque amnes, Rhenum, Rhodanumque 
Panumque, 
Cuique fuit rerum promissa potentia Tibrim. 
What are we to understand by son 
eadem 2 
What was the sors alicra of the fore 
mer unfortunate rivers? Does it not 
clearly appear that they were scorched - 
or burnt up entirely? And by what just 
mode of reasoning are we to infer that 
these latter streams had a milder fate, 
merely because the verbs denoting their 
destruction are expressed in the present 
instead of the past tense? And -what is 
to me absolutely conclusive in deciding 
the entire exsiccation of them all, fol- 
lows in these hnes:;— 
Nilus 
