What time her bard immortal dared to pierce*
The sacred fountains of Ascræan verse,
And bade th' imperial Consul deign to rove,
Led by the NINE, through each exalted grove.
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Truth rules his numbers, as they glide along,
And taste and judgment consecrate the song.
Seeming consent in taste we often see,
While men in judgment seem to disagree;
But when from generals the question's brought,
And through particulars the truth is sought,
Deceived at first, we ultimately find
The semblance had no substance in the mind.
All laud the true sublime with one accord,
To wit and elegance due praise afford;
With one accord the turgid swell condemn,
And affectation with one voice contemn;
With Critics of all sizes, great or small,
Thou, NATURE, art the goddess of them all.
So far, in general terms they meet; but see
How far in fact the parties disagree.
Sanctos ausus recludere fontes,
Ascræumque cano Romana per oppida carmen.
† Si canimus sylvas, sylvæ sint consule dignæ.
Is Mæon's son the subject of your praise?
Lord Byron claims precedence for the bays. (n)
Commend you MARO's chastely splendid line?
Yes-Scott and VIRGIL both are very fine.
You look astonished-he insists; or, worse,
Visits your ears with black Kehama's curse;
On Wordsworth's nature fervently dilates,
And Moore and Horace soberly collates.
But tastes admit of no dispute, you say,
And each with reason follows his own way;
Why, then, if taste take reason for its guide,
At the decision judgment must preside;
Weak by themselves, unequal to the course,
Each from the other borrows fire or force.
Taste is like appetite; it seeks for food,
Or wrong, or right, as vicious, or as good.
If true to nature, faithful to the heart,
Informed by study, undebauched by art,
Its prompt decision reason's test abides,
And judgment sanctions what its tone decides.
United thus, in social compact join'd,
These powers to excellence direct the mind,
Spurn at low mediocrity, nor rest*
Till their aspiring flight have reach'd the best.
A bosom pregnant with ethereal fires,†
Warm with that heat, which heav'n itself inspires,
By sacred instinct taught alike to trace
The flights of genius, and the forms of
May thrill with rapture at the Dorian strain
Of Mantuan shepherd, or Sicilian swain.
But, when, at length, the CHIAN'S mightier song
Rolls the deep tide of harmony along,
The kindred spirit glows; beyond control
Bursts forth the inborn splendour of the soul!
The charger thus, in luxury of blood,
With ample chest divides the crystal flood,
Sports on the hills, around the meadow roves,
And lies, or loiters, near the shady groves.
But if the trumpet's clangours pierce his ears,
O'er his arch'd neck his beauteous mane he rears,
Non homines, non Dî, non concessere columnæ.
† Perlegenti quidem bucolica, aut Maronis, aut Theocritis, tacitum quædam gaudia pectus mihi pertentare videntur. At postquam clarescunt Tubæ epicæ sonitus, ingruitque auribus Cabuμeλoo istud, ut ita dicam, Homericum, tum verò, wσTEL yap ITπoσ duyevno, abiit in flammam spiritus, emicatque ingenitum animo lumen ingenii,
Whilst doubtful transports in his bosom rise,*
And wake the living glories of his eyes.
Trembling and maddening with the fierce desire,
His chest, his limbs expand with martial ire,
His burning nostrils roll collected fire. †
Impell'd by force divine, the generous horse,
invades his fiery course,
Hangs on the foamy bit, in lengthened rein,
Tears up the ground, and shoots along the plain; With neck in thunder clothed, he pours along, And bears his rider on the hostile throng.
Love HOMER, then; his sterling worth revere ; ‡
But let that love and reverence be sincere :
Not for his name, though that, indeed, be great,
Beyond the reach of power, and pomp of state;
Not for his name, although his name extends
To heav'n itself, and earth's remotest ends ;
*The epithet doubtful was suggested, and will be best explained, by the following sublime passage-"He" (the war-horse) "swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage; neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet!"
+ Collectumque premens volvit sub naribus ignem.
Aimez donc ses ecrits, mais d'un amour sincere.
But for that mother wisdom, fraught with rules *
More full, more perfect, than the ethic schools;
For that unwearied fire, whose rays unfold†
The bloom of verse, and turn e'en dross to gold;
That grace, which still with equal grandeur proves‡
Alcides' cestus, and the Queen of love's;
* Qui quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non,
Pleniùs et meliùs CHRYSIPPO et CRANTORÉ dicit.
† Ομηρου ακαματον πυρ" της μεν ῳδησ ανθοσ εκπεταννύμενον, και πανία καταχρυσουν.
The first of Roman critics describes the subject of the Iliad thus:
Stultorum regum et populorum continet æstus;
Seditione, dolis, scelere, atque libidine, et irâ,
Iliacos intra muros paccatur, et extra.
It is over such materials, over such dross, as the Rhapsodist terms them, that the axapalov Tup, the unwearied fire of Homer's genius diffuses "a bloom of verse, and a golden splendour, that we look for in vain in any other poet.
Homerus, etsi in sublimi versetur genere, in quo perpetuus splendor et δεινότης est, tamen sape το χαριεν amat, et το γλαφυρον.
If the reader wishes to see this observation beautifully illustrated, let him consult and compare the descriptions of the belt of Hercules, and of the zone of Venus, the one in the Odyssey, and the other iu the Iliad. They may be considered as the rρonai Exo, the tropics of the sun of Homer's genius.
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