transplanted all the lyric beauties to his odes, 
opened a rich vein of satiric poetry ; and 
Virgil, having equalled Theocritus, without 
temerity aspired to emulate Homer. In the 
.(Eneid it may be acknowledged that he some- 
times fell short of his master. His characters 
possess not the same features of durability 
and grandeur ; nor are his scenes equally 
animated and dramatic. To atone for these 
defects, he unites every charm thM gives in- 
terest to narrative of lends enchantment to 
description ; occasionally he rises to the sub- 
lime, but the beautiful is his natural element; 
he can excite terror, but he is more prone to 
inspire tenderness and pity. In the delicate 
touches of nature and pathos, he seems to 
have grown enamoured of his subject, and to 
have lingered affectionately on the endearing 
scenes and charities of domestic life. The 
four first books of the iEneid contain a tale so 
sweetly told, that was it transferred to a rude 
language totally unsusceptible of its literary 
graces, it would still be read and remember- 
•ed by all who had capacities for sympathy 
and tenderness. 
In tiie Georgies, Virgil lias left a model of 
didactic composition, ennobled by a strain of 
philosophical sentiment, pure, graceful, and 
persuasive. Ovid, whose talents were not 
less versatile than those of his contemporaries, 
adorned the fables of mythology with de- 
scription, and illustrated in his epistles almost 
I •every romantic story of antiquity. The style 
of his elegies is not unlike that of his epistles : 
he paints to the eye, but he lias often too 
much wit and fancy to touch the heart. 
Tibullus has exceeded every other eiegiac 
writer in simplicity and tenderness. Lucan 
and Statius were also epic. poets, but they are 
•seldom quoted, and not often read. Lucan 
possessed a genius of an exalted order; but his 
subject was peculiarly unfortunate, and his 
beauties are now neglected because ihey are 
found in scenes repulsive to the imagination, 
and uncongenial with the f '-Lies. 
Among the last poets >f ' vex •• ■eared 
Juvenal and Persiu pi v. h<*,v • he inner was 
one of the most origi; a ■ see had pro- 
duced. He pi ofesses to exhibit a picture of 
his times ; and there is in his manner an un- 
dissembled and almost a holy fervour that 
atones for his occasional ruggedness and as- 
perity. _ ■ 
Origin of modern pQttnj, 
The Gothic nations who over-ran Lome, 
though ignorant of the polite arts, were not 
insensible to the charms of poetry. Their 
bards were no less venerated than their priests; 
Slid whatever instruction they received, what- 
ever knowledge they possessed, was com- 
municated in metre, and probably in rhyme. 
In the age of Charlemagne, the minstrels 
of Provence, or, as they were called, the 
troubadours, introduced the metrical tales 
or ballads, which, from the dialect in which 
they were written, acquired the name of ro- 
mances. Their poems were all composed in 
rhyme ; but whether this practice was bor- 
rowed from the Arabs or the Goths, is uncer- 
tain. The Italian language, which of all the 
corrupt dialects introduced by the barbarians, 
assimilated most with the Roman, soon ac- 
quired a tincture of elegance. In the middle 
ages Dante wrote ; Ariosto followed ; and Pe- 
trarch, the enthusiastical votary of classical 
genius, appeared among the first founders of 
modern literature. The passion for al- 
Vol. II. 
POETRY 4 : 
Iegorv, so long the characteristic of the I 
Italian school, was by Chaucer rendered as 
prevalent in England as it had previously 
been on the continent. During several ages, 
Italy continued to be the Poets’ Land of Eu- 
rope; and in that interval was produced the 
Jerusalem Delivered, a poem not unworthy 
ot a Roman bard, or an Augustan age. 
In Spain, poetry was early cultivated, but 
with little attention to classical taste. In 
France, it emerged not from barbarism till 
the reign of Francis the First, and arrived at 
its ultimate point of perfection in the era of 
Louis the Fourteenth. La Fontaine and 
Boileau, Corneille and Racine, had then lived, 
and produced works destined to immortalize 
their names. Unfortunately for French poets, 
criticism was then almost coeval with poetry; 
and a pedantic attention to rules was soon 
permitted to repress the native energies of 
genius. 1 lie modern drama, it is well known, 
originated in themysteries ; a sort of religious 
farce, imported from the East. To the 
mysteries succeeded allegorical plays, called 
moralities : these produced the mask, which 
became the favourite amusement of the court 
in the time of Charles the First, and is re- 
deemed from opprobrium and oblivion by 
Milton’s . Comus. Gondibert, written by 
lord Sackville, was the first tragedy repre- 
sented on an English stage. Till the com- 
mencement of the eighteenth century, the 
German language was almost a stranger to 
poetry. Klopstock invented hexameter verse, 
in which the mechanism of classical numbers 
is rather perceived than felt by the reader. 
From that era, Germany has been more pro- 
ductive of books than “all the rest of Europe ; 
and during this period, many fine writers 
have arisen of real and original genius : but 
the literary commerce of the country is 
chiefly supported by translation ; the Ger- 
mans having arrived at no less distinction as 
the general translators, than did their neigh- 
bours the Dutch as the carriers, of Europe. 
Of English ve rsif cation . 
In (lie English language, versification de- 
pends not on the quantities, or the length and 
shortness, of the syllables : but on the modula- 
i ion of the accents, and the disposition of the 
pauses; to which- is generally added the re- 
currence of rhy me. r l he heroic verse consists 
of ten syllables ; its harmony is produced by 
a certain proportionate, distribution of accent- 
ed and unaccented syllables ; and its specific 
character, whether lively or solemn, soft or 
slow, is determined by their order and ar- 
rangement. When unaccented and accented 
syllables are regularly alternated, it is called 
the iambic verse ; as, 
“ A shepherd’s boy, he seeks no higher name, 
Led forth his flock beside the silver Thame.” 
When this order is inverted, and the unac- 
cented is preceded by the accented syllable, 
it is called a trochaic verse; as, 
“Ambition {rust sprung from theblest abodes.” 
“ Take, holy earth, all that my soul holds 
dear.” 
The frequent intervention of the trochaic is 
apt to produce harshness. The monotony 
which it might be expected should result 
from a succession of iambic lines, is obviated 
by the freedom with which the pause is trans- 
ferred from one syllable to another ; a free- 
dom which constitutes the charm, aud pro- 
405 
duces all the variety, of English verse. 'Die 
pause or cesura is that interval of suspension 
which must naturally arise in every verse, 
the position of which the English poet is al- 
lowed to change and diversify at pleasure. 
M hen the pause falls on the fourth syllable, 
the strain is smooth and airy; as, 
“ Soft is the strain ] when Zephyr gently 
blows, 
And tiie smooth stream j in smoother num- 
bers flows.” 
Vi hen it falls on the second it is commonly- 
accelerated; as, 
“ Not so | when swift Camilla scours, the 
plain.” 
Occasionally the pause dwells on the first, 
second, or penultimate syllable: 
“O friend! | may each domestic bliss be 
thine: 
Be no unpleasing melancholy j mine. 
M e , | let the tender office long engage, 
To rock the cradle of declining age.” 
A second pause is sometimes happily, intro- 
duced : 
“ O ever beauteous | ever lovely ! j tell. 
Is it in heaven a crime to love too well?” 
In the following examples, the first passage 
has all the spirit and energy of the ode ; the 
second, the slow and plaintive melody of the 
elegiac strain: 
“ Come then, my friend, my genius, come 
along, 
0 master of the poet and the song ! 
And while the muse now stoops/ J and now 
ascends, 
1 o man’s low passions, | or their glorious 
ends, 
Teach me. like thee, [ in various nature wise. 
Total! with dignity, J with temper rise; 
Form'd by thy converse, | happily to steer 
From grave to gay, I from lively to severe ; 
Correct with spirit, j eloquent with ease. 
Intent to reason, | or polite to please.” 
“ In these deep solitudes, | and awful cells. 
Where heavenly pensive contemplation I 
dwells. 
And ever-musing melancholy reigns.” 
The heroic verse is often diversified by (lie 
intervention of an Alexandrine line of twelve 
syllables, which is liberally used b\ Dryden: 
its abuse is pointedly censured .by "Pope": 
“ A needless Alexandrine erfos the song, 
Which, like a wounded snake, diags its slow 
length along.” 
It forms a noble termination: 
“ Teach me to love and to forgive; 
Exact my own defects to scan, 
What others are to feel, and know m y’self 
a man.” 
Triplets often occur in heroic verse ; a prac- 
tice to which Dryden was strongly addicted 
but which is now generally avoided by cor- 
rect writers. 
The stanza of nine lines, in imitation of 
the Italian, was introduced by Spenser. Of 
this verse, which, if not. impracticable, was at 
least repugnant, to the English language, 
the following extract is a favourable speci- 
men : 
“ A gentle knight was pricking on the plaiue, 
Yclad in mightie arms, and silver shield, * 
