to reach to heaven, which they began to build in a plain, and without confidering that the very laws of matter, on which the operation of building proceeds, entailed impracticability on their scheme. The epithet potovalalos, bestowed by an ancient Critick on Euripides, may, with propriety, be transferred to Gray; as may alfo his description of the ftrained and laboured elevation of that Poet's tragical imagery, in which he is ludicrously compared to Homer's Lion, "lafhing his hips with his tail, and for*cing himself forward to fight."

XXV. XXVI. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX,

Nor is much of the Poet's character unfolded by the ruftic; though many words are used. "That he was a man given to mufing; that he " loved to meet the fun in the morning, and to ** repòse in the shade at noon; that he walked by "the fide of a wood, and lounged on the bank "of a brook; and that, after having been two "days a miffing, he was decently buried on the "third at the foot of an old thorn"-is all that the hoary-headed fwain can fay about him; for the rest he refers to the Epitaph, or, as he calls it, the Lay, engraved upon his tombLongin. de Sublim.

ftone:

ftone; and which, from the kindred spirit's knowing him by this Elegy, he doubts not he is qualified to read. Here is little gratification to curiofity: and, as for the original question about his fate, we are left almost as much in the dark as before. That he is now dead and buried, is all of his fate we know though the shortness of the interval between his burial, and the time when he was last seen, with his loitering fo much by the fide of the water, furnifhes, in the cafe of fo melancholy a man, matter for further conjecture, and wakes fufpicion of fuicide.

Of the three-ftanza'd Epitaph, which the ruftic terms a Lay, the fupplemental information is not great." That he was poor, obscure, pen"five, not unlearned, fympathifing, and blessed "with a friend [I fuppofe of his own fex], with "fomething more that might be mentioned, "were it not unneceffary to go deep into the "character of a dead man"-is all the information we draw from it; information not momentous enough to make us regret the want of more.

The manner in which the character is " made out," though in particular inftances fortunate, is not without faults. The haftiness of his fteps in mounting" the upland lawn," and the purpose for which he mounts it, are cir cumstances more affociable with the Allegro character,

character, than with the Penferofo. So thought the great Difcriminator of thefe Characters.. His Man of Cheerfulness is eager to obferve the glory of the rifing fun; his Penfive Man's morning is not bright, but "kerchief'd in a "comely cloud.' So alfo Thomfon, to

whofe authority, on most occafions, he has not scorned to pay fome regard.

As, through the falling glooms,

Penfive I ftray; or, with the rifing dawn,
On Fancy's eagle wing excurfive foar *.

In Thomson these actions belong to two defcriptions of character. Gray has wrought both into one. If the "steps" must be "hasty,” the operation of brushing the dew from the grafs will not help him to mend his pace; it is an action tending rather to impede accelerated motion, than promote it.

" Chance," in the twenty-fifth Stanza, used adverbially, though juftified by a Latin idiom, is rebuting to an English ear. But the Poet was in diftrefs. The neceffity of his fituation called for the idea twice within the compafs of three lines. A word of two fyllables brought him relief in the one cafe; and a word of one fyllable in the other. He could not use "haply" twice. "Lonely contemplation," is not

* Summer.

well

III.

They fee't too well, who at my fires repine,
Nay, th' un-concern'd themselves do prove
Quick-ey'd enough to spy my love.

Nor does the cause in thy face clearer fhine,
Than the effect appears in mine.

XIV.

Fair infidel! by what unjust decree,
Muft I, who, with fuch reftlefs care,'
Would make this truth to thee appear,-
Muft I, who preach, and pray for't, be
Damn'd, by thy incredulity?

V.

I, by thy unbelief am, guiltlefs, flain.
Ö have but faith, and then, that you
That faith may know for to be true,
It shall itself b' a miracle maintain 1;
And raise me from the dead again.-&c.

What an heterogeneous mass is here! what a chaos of jarring elements! Frigida pugnantia calidis, bumentia ficcis. This fad Mistress is, firft, an infidel; then fhe is a gainer of battles; which battles are begot; and their father is her eye. That eye however is a blind one; as blind as a comet. Then he becomes the idol Baal; and is not only blind but deaf; and without the fense of smelling: but that does not hinder ber face from foining. Next he is transformed into

Caufe;

Cause; and her lover into Effect: after which the becomes an infidel again, and her lover is transformed into a priest; in which character he both preaches and prays, to convert her; but all to no purpose: for, after having run the rifk of damnation, he is actually put to death: yet that does not damp his zeal. He is refolved to make one trial more; and, finding all other arguments fail, propofes the great one of miracles; undertaking, if the will firft believe on truft, to rife, himself, from the dead, in order to confirm her faith.

Such is the procefs in this piece; a process, in the contemplation of which Reafon feels herfelf humbled; and Fancy, put to fhame; whilft Religion reclaims indignant, that her mysteries fhould fuffer profanation by fuch abfurd and wanton allufions.

What now remains of the Elegy, partakes of the nature of an After-piece. In his "Elegy "to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady," the vanity of Pope had tempted him to introduce himself. For this he had fome plaufible colour; as with this Lady (who seems to have been more foolish than unfortunate, and to dif cover whofe family and private history Curiofity has laboured in vain) he had, or thought