"Ant. Octavius, lead your battle foftly on, "Upon the left hand of the even field. "Oct. Upon the right hand I, keep thon the ❝ left. "Ant. Why do you cross me in this exigent? « Oct. I do not cross you, but I will do fo.” 'Twas a common opinion likewife among the ancients, that, when any great evil befel them, they were forfaken by their guardian Gods. How beautiful is this reprefented in Homer and Virgil? The heavenly power, that usually protected the hero, deferts him just before his ruin. Plutarch tells us in his life of Antony, that, before he killed himself, a great noife of all manner of inftruments was heard in the air, fuch as was ufually made at the feafts of Bacchus ; it feemed to enter at one gate of the city, and, traverfing it quite through, to go out at the gate which the enemy lay before: this fignified, as 'twas interpreted, that Bacchus, his guardian God, had forfaken him. This circumftance our poet has introduced in Antony and Cleopatra, A& IV. "2. Sold. Peace, what noise? "1. Sold. Lift, list! 66 2. Sold. Hark! 66 "1. Sold. "1. Sold. Mufick i'th' air "3. Sold. Under the earth "It fignes well, do's it not? "2. Sold. No. "1. Sold. Peace, I fay: what should this mean? "2. Sold. 'Tis the God Hercules, who loved "Antony. "Now leaves him." 8 Here is, Hercules, instead of Bacchus. There was a tradition that the Antonies were defcended from Hercules, by a fon of his called Anteon; and of this descent Antony was not a little vain. This might be the reason why Shakefpeare varied from Plutarch. But Bacchus was his tutelary God; and he made choice of him, perhaps, 8 Antony was fo fond of this imaginary descent that he had a lion ftruck on his coin, in allufion to the Nemean lion of Hercules. Hence Cicero in his Epift. to Atticus X, 13. may be perhaps explain'd.-Tu Antonii leones pertimef cas, cave. Though the commentators give the paffage a different turn. In Antony and Cleop, A&t I, Cleopatra calls him, This Herculean Roman." And Antony, ip A& V. fays, 9 66 "The fhirt of Neffus is upon me; teach me He was called the Junior Bacchus. Aióvucos véos. Plut. P: 944. A. and fo Velleius Paterculus, L. II. c. 82. and Seneca fuafor, l. 1. following following the example of his master Julius Caefar; who, had he not been killed, defigned, as Suetonius informs us, Parthis inferre bellum per Armeniam minorem, &c. c. 44. and to imi tate Bacchus, who had formerly conquered thefe parts, taking him for his tutelary God. Which paffage of Suetonius and the above comment will fhew in no bad light, what Virgil in Ecl. V. fays of Daphnis, by whom he plainly means Julius Caefar. Daphnis & Armenias curru fubjungere tigres Not only heroes, but cities and states had their " tutelar deities, who removed likewife before their destruction. Virg. II. 351. Exceffere omnes adytis arifque relictis What a fine turn has Milton given this in his fa? B. XII, 106. cred poem το Πολιέχοι, φύλακες. Hor. L. I. Od. 36. Cuftodes Numidae Deos. 11 'Till " 'Till God at laft, Wearied with their iniquities, withdraw But I am commencing commentator, when my province is only criticism: to return therefore→→ If the omiffion of a fingle letter occafions fuch confufion in modern languages, what will it not do in the Greek and Latin? I will just mention an instance of this fort. In Ovid. Amor. III. XII. 21. "Per nos Scylla, patri canos furata capillos, "Pube premit rabidos inguinibufque canes." But fome copies read caros, from which word a letter is omitted, and it fhould be written claros. "Patri claros furata capillos. For thus the hair of Nifus is defcribed in Ovid Met. VIII, 8. CUI SPLENDIDUS oftro "Inter honoratos medio de vertice canos "CRINIS inhaerebat, magni fiducia regni." Virg. Georg. I. 405. 11 Perhaps too Milton had in his mind what Josephus relates, that a voice was heard before the deftruction of Jerufalem, fuppofed of the guardian Angels forfaking the Jewish temple: Let us depart hence, pilabaírwyser ilD0EY. fofeph. de bell. Jud. L. 7. Et Et pro PURPUREO poenas dat Scylla capillo. Tibullus, I, 4. Carmine PURPUREA eft Nifi coma. Ovid. art. amat. 1. 1. Filia PURPUREOS Nifi furata capillos. Here purpureos capillos is exactly the fame as the above claros capillos: i. e. fplendid, fhining bright, &c. And Spencer ufes it in this fenfe. B. V. c. 10. ft. 16. "The Morrow next appear'd with PURPLE "hair." It follows therefore according to all critical rules, that instead of canos or caros, we should read, Patri CLAROS furata capillos. Again: Plutarch in the life of Caefar, p.717. E. tells us that the Belgae, a people of old Gaul, were conquered by the Romans, and that they fought like cowards, ΑΙΣΧΡΩΣ ἀγωνισαμένης. But Caefar himself, from whom Plutarch has the ftory, fays quite otherwife, L. II. c. x. ACRITER in eo loco pugnatum eft. Hoftes impeditos noftri in flumine aggressi, magnum eorum numerum occiderunt: per eorum corpora reliquos AUDACIS |