Eurydice the woods, 115 VI. Eurydice the floods, Eurydice the rocks, and hollow mountains rung. Our joys below it can improve, And antedate the bliss above. And to her Maker's praise confin'd the Th' immortal pow'rs incline their ear, Borne on the swelling notes our souls aspire, While solemn airs improve the sacred fire; TWO CHORUS'S TO THE TRAGEDY OF BRUTUS'. [Julius Cæsar, after undergoing a previous process of emasculation, was converted by the Duke of Buckinghamshire into two five act tragedies, entitled respectively Julius Cæsar and Marcus Brutus, each being supplied with a Prologue and choruses between the acts. They were published in 1722. Pope's choruses occur after the Ist and the IInd Act of Brutus respectively. The best excuse for Buckinghamshire's attempt lies in what is really a fault in Shakspere's work-its duality of heroes; but the manner in which he executed this task speaks ill for the judgment of one who himself avers that the hope of mending Shakspere is 'such a jest would make a stoic smile.' The concluding lines of his Casar may be quoted as a specimen of his additions: 'Ambition, when unbounded, brings a curse, But an assassinate deserves a worse.' As to John Sheffield Duke of Buckinghamshire see note to Essay on Crit. v. 724.] Altered from Shakespear by the Duke of Buckingham, at whose desire these two Chorus's were composed to supply as many wanting in his play. They were set many years afterwards by the famous Bononcini, and performed at Buckingham-house. P. Or bid the furious Gaul be rude no more? | Some Athens perishes, some Tully bleeds. Ο CHORUS OF YOUTHS AND VIRGINS3. SEMICHORUS. H Tyrant Love! hast thou possest The prudent, learn'd, and virtuous breast? Wisdom and wit in vain reclaim, And Arts but soften us to feel thy flame. Love, soft intruder, enters here, 5 [In the play this chorus is composed 'of Athenian Philosophers,' and succeeds a scene at Athens between Brutus and Cassius, founded in part on Shaksp.-Act. iv. Sc. 3.] 2 Where heavenly visions Plato fired, And Epicurus lay inspired!] The propriety of these lines arises from hence, that Brutus, one of the heroes of this play was of the old Academy; and Cassius, the other, was an Epicurean; but, this had not been enough to justify the poet's choice, had not Plato's system of Divinity, and Epicurus's system of Morals, been the most rational amongst the various sects of Greek phi losophy. Warburton. I cannot be persuaded that Pope thought of Brutus and Cassius as being followers of different sects of philosophy. Warton. [In the play we read 'godlike Zeno,' instead of Epicurus.'] 3 [This chorus follows a scene in which Varius, a young Roman bred at Athens, has confessed to Brutus his hopeless passion for the sister of the latter, Junia, the wife of Cassius.] 4 Why, Virtue, etc.] In allusion to that famous conceit of Guarini, "Se il peccare è si dolce, etc."-Warburton. APPY the man whose wish and care In health of body, peace of mind, A few paternal acres bound, HA Content to breathe his native air, Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, 5 Whose flocks supply him with attire, Whose trees in summer yield him shade, In winter fire. Blest, who can unconcern'dly find 9 Hours, days, and years slide soft away, This was a very early production of our Author, written at about twelve years old. P. Though this Ode is said to be his earliest Quiet by day, Sound sleep by night; study and ease, Thus let me live, unseen, unknown, production, yet Dodsley, who was honoured with his intimacy, had seen several pieces of a still earlier date. Roscoe. THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL. [WRITTEN 1712.] THIS Ode was written, we find, at the desire of Steele; and our Poet, in a letter to him on that occasion, says,—'You have it, as Cowley calls it, just warm from the brain; it came to me the first moment I waked this morning; yet you'll see, it was not so absolutely inspiration, but that I had in my head, not only the verses of Hadrian, but the fine fragment of Sappho.' It is possible, however, that our Author might have had another composition in his head, besides those he here refers to: for there is a close and surprising resemblance between this Ode of Pope, and one of an obscure and forgotten rhymer of the age of Charles the Second, Thomas Flatman. Warton. [The following was Pope's first 'notion of the last words to Adrian,' sent to Steele for insertion in the Spectator: Ah fleeting Spirit! wand'ring fire, That long hast warm'd my tender breast, Prior also translated this little Ode, but with manifest inferiority to Pope. Bowles. [Mrs Piozzi, in a letter to Sir James Fellowes (Hayward's Autobiography, Letters and Literary Remains of Mrs Piozzi, II. 287) declares it odd that her correspondent should prefer her version of Hadrian's lines to those of better poets.] |