flections, suited to the occasion; and which he compares with other speeches of the same nature in the Iphigenia and Hecuba. "Omnes (he says) locis communibus refertæ sunt, quarum multo patientiores fuerunt Athenienses quam nostri homines." This observation might very properly be extended beyond the province of the drama: for, indeed, the Athenians were not only patient of this moral instruction, but placed it in a very eminent rank. It was not unknown in painting, as well as poetry, and the noblest among the ancient artists were the painters of manners, the 'Hooypάpo. Aristides Thebanus is omnium primum Animum pinxit, et sensus omnes expressit quos vocant Græci Ethe.* It was the advice of Aristotle, in his Politics, (lib. viii. c. 5,) to those who had the care of youth, that only pictures, that had a moral tendency, should be seen by them; and especially the pictures of Polygnotus. Plato also makes a similar remark:† Δεῖ μὴ τὰ ΠΑΥΣΩΝΟΣ, θεωρεῖν τους νέους, ἄλλα τὸν ΠΟΛΥΓΝΩΤΟΝ κ ̓ ἄν εἳ τὶς ἄλλος τῶν γραφέων, ἢ τῶν ἀγαλμάτων ἔστιν ἤθικος.

To conclude this branch of the subject, when it is said that instruction forms a part of the province of poetry, it should be understood that moral instruction is meant: that instruction which is most generally interesting, and most important in its nature, "quod magis ad nos pertinet, et nescire

* Vide Plinii N. Hist. Lib. xxxv. c. 10.
+ Vide Platonem de Republ. viii. 5.

malum est;" and which, in the language of Harris,* is that master-knowledge, without which all other knowledge will prove of little or no utility. This is what Horace calls,

Speciosa locis, morataque recte-
Fabula-"

"a fable abounding with moral reflection, and where the manners are properly expressed." And thus (to use the words of Sir Philip Sidney), "Mistress Philosophy will very often borrow the masking raiment of Poesy. For even those hard-hearted evil men who think virtue a school-name, and know no other good but "indulgere genio," and therefore despise the austere admonitions of the philosopher, and feel not the inward reason they stand upon; yet will be content to be delighted, which is all the good fellow poet seems to promise; and so steal to see the form of goodness; which seen, they cannot but love, ere themselves be aware." The intention of conveying knowledge in arts and sciences, through the medium of poetry. has seldom proved successful, and the genius of the poet, as Scaliger says of Claudian, will be “ignobiliori materia depressus."

I hardly need observe, that the transitions in Gray are of a different nature from those in Pindar. The difference arises partly from the license

* See Harris's Three Essays, p. 85, 8vo. and Trappii Prælect. Poet, p. 60, and Irving's Life of Buchanan, p. 242.

*

assumed by the Grecian poet, and partly from the nature of his subjects. The transitions in Pindar are such as he makes in departing from his original subject, to a field more fruitful of ornament, and productive of pleasure. The forgetfulness of the peculiar circumstances under which the Pindaric odes were written, misled our English writers, who possessed the command of their subject-matter, but who still took advantage of the license in which their predecessor had indulged. In the irregularity of the metre, in the epigrammatic and quaint manner of expression, in their witty and subtle associations, and in their harsh and dissonant numbers, these Pindaric odes were most dissimilar to their original. It must however be observed, before I quit this subject, that many later odes of this kind have failed from the very reverse of this objection, namely, from having little or no transi

66

* Dr. Warton says, that the character of Pindar (as commonly taken) seems not to be well understood. We hear nothing but of the impetuosity and the sublimity of his manner; whereas he abounds in strokes of domestic tenderness." (Warton on Pope, i. p. 389.) This is true; but Horace had fully remarked it :

"Flebili sponsæ, juvenemve raptum
Plorat; et vires animumque mores-

Que aureos educit in astra, nigro

Que invidet Orco."

Od. IV. ii. 21.

On the austere style of Pindar, and Gray's Ode to Adversity, see Huntingford's Apology for the Monostrophies, p. 47, on the Transitions of Pindar, see Sir W. Jones on Eastern Poetry.

tion; the thoughts being preserved in a regular and philosophical connection, by which the poem takes the cast of a narrative, and loses all the spirit and strength which arises from the sudden contrast in matter and numbers from the rapid and various changes, from the fine transitions, and from the bold and frequent personifications peculiar to the lyrical style. In rank next, and only next, to the poems of Gray, must be placed the odes of Collins and indeed, as I have before observed, Collins caught, in an eminent degree, the sublimity of conception, and grandeur of style, peculiar to the father of the ancient drama.*

VI. I have only a few words to say concerning the notes to this edition of Gray. Their primary purpose is to lay before the reader either the intentional and direct imitations in the Poems of Gray; as in The Progress of Poetry;

"The dauntless child

Stretch'd forth its little arms, and smil'd;"

Stretch'd forth its little arms, and on him smil'd."+

And in The Hymn to Adversity;

* I cannot agree with the author of the article, (Edinb. Rev. No. xcv. Sept. 1828, p. 49.) when he says of Collins, That he was a great master of delicate and fine diction, though poor in thought and matter.'

↑ I may remark in what a fine manner Gray has made

"Whose iron scourge, and torturing hour;"

Or else to mark those indirect imitations, in which

the image bears a very strong resemblance to that used by another poet, as in the Elegy;

"Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries;"

from the Anthologia ;

"Crede mihi vires aliquas Natura sepulchris
Adhibuit, tumulos vindicat umbra suos."

Or, thirdly, to trace an allusion, either in subject or style, made to ancient customs or expressions; to open the sources from which the poet ornamented the productions of his fancy; to shew the materials which he connected for new combinations and fresh imagery; and to elucidate the allusions which he remotely made to the idioms, phrases, and images of foreign writers. The very first lines of the poem on the Spring, for instance, abound with allusions to the expressions of the ancient poets:*

the general picture of a child smiling, and stretching out its hands, in this instance appropriate, by the epithet "dauntless," and how admirably it characterizes the infant genius of Shakespeare.

* From Meleager's Hymn to Spring, see Sir W. Jones' Poes. Asiat. p. 410.