So when bold Homer makes the Gods engage, 45 And heav'nly breasts with human paffions rage; 'Gainft Pallas, Mars; Latona, Hermes arms; And all Olympus rings with loud alarms:

Jove's thunder roars, heav'n trembles all around, 49 Blue Neptune storms, the bellowing deeps refound: Earth shakes her nodding tow'rs, the ground gives way, And the pale ghosts start at the flash of day!

NOTES.

VER. 45. So when bold Homer] Homer, Il. xx.

Triumphant

P.

The ridicule is most artfully heightened by introducing one of

the moft fublime paffages in Homer;

σε 3 Αμφί δ' εσαλπιγξεν μέγας έρανος, &λυμπος τε
Εδδεισεν δ' υπένερθεν αναξ ενέρων Αίδωνευς,

Δείσας δ' εκ θρονα αλτο και ιαχε, μη οι επειτα
Γαιαν αναρρήξειε Ποσειδάων ενοσίχθων
Οικια δε θνητοισι και αθανατοισι φανείη,

Σμερδαλές ευρωενία, τα τε συγίεσι θεοι περ.

Well might Longinus exclaim, "Do you fee, O my friend, how the earth bursts afunder to its centre, Tartarus itself is laid open and naked, all things mortal and immortal combat together, and share the danger of this tremendous conflict?"

In none of his many imitations has Virgil fhewn his inferiority to Homer fo much as in this paffage;

"Non fecus ac fi qua penitus vi terra dehifcens
Infernas referet fedes, & regna recludat
Pallida, Dîs invifa; fuperque immane barathrum
Cernatur, trepidentque immiffo lumine Manes."

Æneid. viii. v. 243.

For not to mention that what is part of the Action in Homer, is only a fimile in Virgil, how tame is fuperque immane barathrum (even though a magnificent image) to

Δείσας δ' εκ θρονες αλτο και ιαχε

How or where has terror ever been fo ftrongly painted as by this circumstance of Pluto himself, fuddenly leaping from his throne and shrieking aloud?

Clap'd his glad wings, and fate to view the fight: Prop'd on their bodkin fpears, the Sprites furvey 55 The growing combat, or affift the fray.

While through the prefs enrag'd Thaleftris flies, And scatters death around from both her eyes, A Beau and Witling perifh'd in the throng, One dy'd in metaphor, and one in fong. "O cruel Nymph! a living death I bear," Cry'd Dapperwit, and funk befide his chair. A mournful glance Sir Fopling upwards cast, "Those eyes are made fo killing"- -was his laft.

60

VARIATIONS.

Thus

VER. 53. Triumphant Umbriel] Thefe four lines added for the reafon before mentioned.

Added with great dexterity, beauty, and propriety!

NOTES.

P.

VER. 55. Prop'd on their] Like the heroes in Homer, when they are Spectators of a combat.

VER. 64. Thofe eyes] It was the common cant of all the wits and poets of this time to depreciate and laugh at Italian operas. See what Addison has faid of them, Spectator 18. They would have been of a different opinion, if they could have read what Dr. Burney has faid on this fubject in his History of Music.

IMITATIONS.

VER. 53. Triumphant Umbriel] Minerva in like manner, during the battle of Ulyffes with the Suitors in the Ody ff. perches on a beam of the roof to behold it,

P.

VER. 64. Thofe eyes are made fo killing] The words of a fong in the Opera of Camilla.

P.

65

Thus on Maeander's flow'ry margin lies

Th' expiring Swan, and as he fings he dies.
When bold Sir Plume had drawn Clariffa down,
Chloe stepp'd in, and kill'd him with a frown;
She fmil'd to fee the doughty hero flain,
But, at her fmile, the Beau reviv'd again.

Now Jove fufpends his golden fcales in air,
Weighs the Men's wits against the Lady's hair ;
The doubtful beam long nods from fide to fide;
At length the wits mount up, the hairs fubfide.
See fierce Belinda on the Baron flies,
With more than ufual lightning in her eyes:
Nor fear'd the Chief th' unequal fight to try,
Who fought no more than on his foe to die.
But this bold Lord with manly ftrength endu'd,

She with one finger and a thumb fubdu’d:
Just where the breath of life his nostrils drew,
A charge of fnuff the wily virgin threw;

70

75

80

NOTES.

The

VER. 71. Now Jove, &c.] Vid. Homer, Il. viii. and Virg. Aen. xii.

P.

VER. 74. At length the wits] This parody from Homer and Virgil is admirable. Milton improved on this fine fiction in Paradife Loft, Book iv. v. 997. by faying, "that when the Almighty weighed Satan in such scales, the mounting of his scales denoted ill fuccefs;" and alfo by alluding artfully to the fign of Libra in the heavens,

IMITATIONS.

VER. 65. Thus on Maeander's flow'ry margin lies]

"Sic ubi fata vocant, udis abjectus in herbis,

Ad vada Maeandri concinit albus olor."

The Gnomes direct, to ev'ry atom just,

The pungent grains of titillating duft.

Sudden, with starting tears each eye o'erflows,
And the high dome re-echoes to his nose.

85

Now meet thy fate, incens'd Belinda cry'd, And drew a deadly bodkin from her fide. (The fame, his ancient perfonage to deck, Her great great grandfire wore about his neck, go In three feal-rings; which after, melted down, Form'd a vast buckle for his widow's gown: Her infant grandame's whistle next it grew, The bells fhe jingled, and the whistle blew;

VARIATIONS.

Then

VER. 83. The Gnomes direct,] Thefe two lines added for the above reafon.

NOTES.

P.

VER. 84. Titillating duft.] Boileau and Garth have also each of them enlivened their pieces with a mock-fight. But Boileau has laid the scene of his action in a neighbouring bookfeller's fhop; where the combatants encounter each other by chance. This conduct is a little inartificial; but has given the fatyrift an opportunity of indulging his ruling paffion, the exposing bad poets, with which France, at that time, abounded. Swift's Battle of the Books, at the end of the Tale of a Tub, is evidently taken from this battle of Boileau (Cant. v.), which is excellent in its kind. The fight of the Phyficians in the Difpenfary, is one of its most shining parts. There is a vaft deal of propriety in the weapons Garth has given to his warriors. They are armed, much in character, with cauftics, emetics, and cathartics; with buck-thorn, and fteel-pills; with fyringes, bed-pans, and urinals. The execution is exactly proportioned to the deadlinefs of Tuch irrefiftible weapons; and the wounds inflicted, are fuitable to the nature of each different inftrument faid to inflict them.

IMITATIONS.

VER. 89. The fame, his ancient perfonage to deck,] In imitation of the progrefs of Agamemnon's fceptre in Homer, Il. ii.

P

Then in a bodkin grac'd her mother's hairs,

Which long she wore, and now Belinda wears.)

Boast not my fall (he cry'd) insulting foe!
Thou by fome other fhalt be laid as low,
Nor think, to die dejects my lofty mind;
All that I dread is leaving you behind!
Rather than fo, ah let me ftill furvive,
And burn in Cupid's flames-but burn alive.
Reftore the Lock! fhe cries; and all around
Reftore the Lock! the vaulted roofs rebound.
Not fierce Othello in fo loud a strain!

95

100

105

Roar'd for the handkerchief that caus'd his pain.
But fee how oft ambitious aims are crofs'd,
And chiefs contend till all the prize is loft!
The Lock, obtain'd with guilt, and kept with pain,
In ev'ry place is fought, but fought in vain :

NOTES.

IIO

With

VER. 105. Fierce Othello] Rhymer, with a tafteless infenfibility, laughed at the incident of lofing the handkerchief, as trifling. Neither he, nor the Spectator, feem to have known, that this incident, fo beautifully natural, is in the Italian novel, which Shakespeare copied.

VER. 109. Obtain'd with guilt,] We are now arrived at the grand catastrophe of the poem; the invaluable Lock which is fo eagerly fought, is irrecoverably loft! And here our poet has made a judicious ufe of that celebrated fiction of Ariofto; that all things loft on earth, are treasured in the moon. How fuch a fiction can properly have place in an epic poem, it becomes the defenders of this agreeably extravagant writer to justify; but in a comic poem, it appears with grace and confiftency. The whole paffage in Ariosto is full of wit and satire; for wit and satire were, perhaps, among the chief and characteristical excellencies of this incomparable Italian.