ud 
1905.]. Epigrams, Fragments, and Fugitive Pieces, from the Greek. 543 
where the poet feems to have been carried 
beyond himlelf, and lays hold of our pat 
fions with an almoft fupernatural force, to 
awaken the ftrongeft emotions of horror 
and compaffion in our minds, The whole 
picture, from the fir appearance of, the 
unfortunate victim, is lively and expreffive 
tothe greatelt degree. Weat length fee 
him proftrate on the ground, embracing 
the knees of his conqueror, and imploring 
mercy by the ftronge(t arguments and the 
moft ingenisufly calculated to obtain his 
boon. His moving tale, the fimple man- 
ner in which he relates it, the artful yet 
natural words by which he endeavours to 
avert the rage of Achilles from him, by dif- 
claiming, as far as poffible, all alliance and 
affinity with Heétor, his youth, his tears, 
his long fufferings, all plead moft power- 
fully in his favour. Then we fee the 
dark, majeftic, terrible figure of the con- 
queror, bending with a gloomy frown 
over the proftrate wretch, his {word up- 
lifted to ftrike, his hand twifted in his 
hair, while he lulpends the blow, unfhaken 
from the murderous purpofe of his. foul, 
to fpeak to him a few words of truly {a- 
vage confolation. ‘* Why doft thou 
mourn and howl? Patroclus_ perifhed, 
who was a far greater man than thou. 
Doft thou not fee what Iam, the beautiful 
and the mighty? I claim ‘my defcent 
from a great and noble father. A god- 
defs was my mother, Yet over me alfo 
death impends, and all-powerful Fate will 
ene day fallon me, either in the morning, 
or in the evening, or in the middle of the 
day, when fome other warrior fhall tear 
my foul away, by thediftant javelin or the 
winged arrow.” The fame idea after- 
wards recurs on the death of Hector, but 
beautilully varied according to the cir- 
cumitances of the fubjeét. The expiring 
hero, with his laf breath, prophecies the 
approaching fate of his conqueror. A kind 
of religious awe appears for a moment to 
take pofleffion of the foulof Achilles; he 
gazes penfively on the corpfe, and only 
makes this fhort and hurried exclamation : 
Tébvads- ution Y iyd vore DéLopeat, ‘owmdre nev Oi 
Devs Grn verhegasy nd abavarer Bed dAAaL. 
«* Die thou the firft.; When Jove and Heav’n 
ordain, 
Tl follow thee !” Port. 
The beautiful lamentations of Mofchus, 
at the clofe of his idyll on the death of 
Bion, and the famous verfes of Catullus, 
in his ** Viwamus. mea Lefbia,’ which 
feem to be imitated from it, are calculated 
to leave that fort of melancholy void fen- 
/ 
fation in the mind, which, to an animated 
and (according to our better philofcphy ) 
immortal foul, is the moft painful of all 
poflible feelings, and which perhaps occa- 
honally comes, like a dark thadow, acrofs 
the thoughts of the moft pious and reli- 
gious man. But neither of the pafiages 
above-mentioned are equal in fublimity to 
the celebrated addrefs to the fun in Offian’s 
Works ; and this is, perhaps, excelled 
by the facred poet. ** For there 1s hope 
of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will 
yet fprout, and the branches thereof will 
not ceafe. Though the root of it wax 
old in the earth, and the ftock thereof be 
dead in the ground, yet by the fent of 
waters it will bud and bring forth boughs 
like a plant. But man is fick, and dieth, 
and man perifheth, and where is he? As 
the waters pafs from the fea, and as the 
flood decayeth and drieth up, fo man fleep- 
eth and rifeth not ; for he fhall not wake 
again, nor be raifed from his fleep, till . 
the heaven be no more.”’ Job, cap. xive. 
Vong: 
As human life has more objects to efi- 
g4ge its attention, as the progrefs of civi- 
lization introduces arts and commerce, 
and with them a thoufand various antitfe- 
ments and occupations unknown to the 
ruder ftate of mankind, we have lefs'room 
for this feeling of fatiety, we are afhamed 
of indulging it, and we feldom complain 
of it as one of the common evils of Jife.— 
Yet among thany men it ftill prevails toa 
fufficient degree to make us doubt with 
reafon of the intrintc happinefs of the mott 
eafy and apparently delightful fituations in 
the worid. I myfelf was acquainted with 
a gentleman of fortune and character, of 
a gay and lively difpofition, not at all ad- 
dicted to melancholy, who, in the midft of 
apparent enjoyment, far funerior to the 
common lot of humanity, with youth, and 
health, and fociety, and friends in abun- 
dance, without the Jeaft diminution, as it 
appeared, of any of thefe bleffings, fud- 
denly put an end to his exiftence. After 
his death, a paper was found among his 
writings, which was dated fome days pre- 
vious to the execution of his fatal purpofe, 
declaring, that he had feen the world in all 
its different forms, that he had made trial 
of all its enjoyments, but found none 
worth repeating ; that the continual recur- 
rence of the fame amufements and the 
fame occupations produced no longer any 
‘thing but difguft ; and that he conceived 
he was right in putting an end to an ex. 
iftence which had not further for him any 
tafte of happinefs. bade 
4A Ter 
