Sepulchral Lies, our holy Walls to grace, 45 And New-year Odes, and all the Grub-street race. REMARKS. VER. 43. Sepulchral Lies,] Is a juft fatire on the Flatteries and Falfhoods admitted to be infcribed on the walls of Churches, in Epitaphs; which occafioned the following Epigram: "FRIEND! in your Epitaphs, I'm griev'd, So very much is faid: One half will never be believ'd, The other never read." W. The Epigram here inferted, alludes to the too long, and fometimes, fulfome Epitaphs, written by Dr. FRIEND, in pure Latinity indeed, but full of Antithefes. VER. 44. New-year Odes,] Made by the Poet Laureate for the time being, to be fung at court on every New-year's-day, the words of which are happily drowned in the voices and inftruments. W. VER. 50. Who hunger and who thirst, &c.] "This is an allufion to a text in Scripture, which fhews, in Mr. Pope, a delight in prophaneness," said Curl upon this place. But it is very familiar with Shakespear to allude to paffages of Scripture. Out of a great number I will select a few, in which he not only alludes to, but quotes the very Text from holy Writ. In All's well that knows no fears Of biffes, blows, or want, or lofs of ears:] "Quem neque pauperies, neque mors, neque vincula terrent." HOR. Prudence, whofe glass presents th' approaching jail: Poetic Juftice, with her lifted scale, Where, in nice balance, truth with gold she weighs, Here the beholds the Chaos dark and deep, REMARKS. 55 How well that ends well, I am no great Nebuchadnezzar, I have not much fkill in grafs. Ibid. They are for the flowery way that leads to the broad gate and the great fire, Matt. vii. 13. In Much ado about nothing, All, all, and moreover God saw him when he was hid in the Garden, Gen. iii. 8. (in a very jocose scene). In Love's Labour Loft, he talks of Samfon carrying the gates on his back; in the Merry Wives of Windfor, of Goliah and the weaver's beam; and in Henry IV. Falstaff's foldiers are compared to Lazarus and the prodigal fon.--The first part of this note is Mr. CURL's, the reft is Mr. Theobald's, Appendix to Shakespear reftor'd, p. 144. W. It seems to be rather an odd and a weak defence of using a phrafe of Scripture lightly and profanely, to say that Shakespear did fo. VER. 55. Beholds the Chaos] This paffage from hence down to verfe 78, is an inftance of great power and elegance of Style on a fubject that with fuch difficulty admits of either. VER. 57. Jacob,1] A race of bookfellers, that did honor to their profeffion, for integrity and encouragement of authors. Jacob Tonfon was admitted to the familiarity and friendship of the most eminent writers of his time; who made him a present of their portraits by good mafters. IMITATIONS. VER. 55. Here he beholds the Chaos dark and deep, Where nameless Somethings, &c.] That is to fay, unform'd things, which are either made into Poems or Plays, as the Bookfellers or the Players bid moft. G4 Thefe How hints, like fpawn, fcarce quick in embryo lie, Maggots half form'd in rhyme exactly meet, Here one poor word an hundred clenches makes, There motley Images her fancy ftrike, She fees a Mob of Metaphors advance, бо 65 How REMARKS. VER. 63. Here one poor word an hundred clenches makes,] It may not be amifs to give an instance or two of these operations of Dulness out of the Works of her Sons, celebrated in the Poem. A great Critic formerly held these clenches in fuch abhorrence, that he declared, he that would pun, would pick a pocket." Yet Mr. Dennis's works afford us notable examples in this kind; "Alexander Pope hath fent abroad into the world as many Bulls as his namefake Pope Alexander.—Let us take the initial and final letters of his name, viz. A. P-E, and they give you the idea of an Ape.-Pope comes from the Latin word Popa, which fignifies a little wart: or from poppyfma, because he was continually popping out fquibs of wit, or rather Popyfmata or Popyfmus," DENNIS on Hom. and Daily Journal, June 11, 1728. IMITATIONS. P. Thefe lines allude to the following in Garth's Difpenfary, Cant. vi. "Within the chambers of the globe they spy The beds where fleeping vegetables lie, Till the glad fummons of a genial ray Unbinds the glebe, and calls them out to day." W. VER. 64. And ductile Dullness, &c.] A parody on a verse in Garth, Cant. i. "How ductile matter new meanders takes." W. How Tragedy and Comedy embrace; How Farce and Epic get a jumbled race; How Time himself stands ftill at her command, 70 75 All these, and more, the cloud-compelling Queen Beholds through fogs that magnify the scene. REMARKS. 80 She VER. 70, &c. How Farce and Epic-How Time himself, &c.] Allude to the tranfgreffions of the Unities in the Plays of fuch poets. For the miracles wrought upon Time and Place, and the mixture of Tragedy and Comedy, Farce and Epic, fee Pluto and Proferpine, Penelope, &c. if yet extant. W. VER. 73. Egypt glads with show'rs,] In the Lower Egypt rain is of no ufe, the overflowing of the Nile being fufficient to impregnate the foil.-These fix verses reprefent the inconfiftences. in the descriptions of poets, who heap together all glittering and gaudy images, though incompatible in one feason, or in one fcene. See the Guardian, No 40. parag. 6. See alfo Eufden's whole works, if to be found. It would not have been unpleasant to have given examples of all these fpecies of bad writing from thefe Authors, but that it is already done in our Treatife of the Bathos. SCRIBL. VER. 79. The cloud-compelling ] Gray has left a very fine fragment of an hymn to Ignorance, very much in the manner of the Dunciad; "Many of the lines of this fragment (fays Mr. Mafon) IMITATIONS. are VER, 79. The cloud-compelling Queen] From Homer's Epithet of Jupiter, νεφεληγερέτα Ζευς, W. She tinsel'd o'er in robes of varying hues, With felf-applaufe her wild creation views; Sees momentary monsters rife and fall, And with her own fools-colours gilds them all. 'Twas on the day, when ** rich and grave, Like Cimon, triumph'd both on land and wave: (Pomps without guilt, of bloodless fwords and maces, Glad chains, warm furs, broad banners, and broad faces) 85 VARIATIONS. Now VER. 85. in the former Editions, "Twas on the day when Thorold, rich and grave. Sir George Thorold, Lord Mayor of London in the year 1720, REMARKS. W. are fo ftrong, and the general caft of the verfification fo mufical, that I believe it will give the generality of readers a higher opinion of his poetical talents, than many of his lyrical productions have done. I fpeak of the generality; because it is a certain fact, that their tafte is founded upon the ten-fyllable couplets of Dryden and Pope, and upon these only." P. 176. VER. 85, 86. 'Twas on the day, when ** rich and grave, Like Cimon, triumph'd] Viz. a Lord Mayor's Day, his name the author had left in blanks, but most certainly could never be that which the Editor foifted in formerly, and which no way agrees with the chronology of the poem. BENTL. The proceffion of a Lord Mayor is made partly by land, and partly by water.-Cimon, the famous Athenian General, obtained a victory by fea, and another by land, on the fame day, over the Perfians and Barbarians. W. VER. 88. Glad chains,] The ignorance of thefe Moderns! This was altered in one edition to Gold chains, fhewing more regard to the metal of which the chains of Aldermen are made, than to the beauty of the Latinifm and Graecifm, nay of figurative speech itself: Lactas fegetes, glad, for making glad, &c. SCRIBL. |