all his poem, that rule so sacred among the Romans, "That there should be no art allowed, which did not tend to the improvement of the people in virtue." And this was the principle too of our excellent Mr Waller, who used to say, that he would raze any line out of his poems, which did not imply some motive to virtue: but he was unhappy in the choice of the subject of his admirable vein in poetry. The Countess of Carlisle was the Helen of her country. There is nothing in Pagan philosophy more true, more just, and regular, than Virgil's ethics; and it is hardly possible to sit down to the serious perusal of his works, but a man shall rise more disposed to virtue and goodness, as well as most agreeably entertained; the contrary to which disposition may happen sometimes upon the reading of Ovid, of Martial, and several other second-rate poets. But of the craft and tricking part of life, with which Homer abounds, there is nothing to be found in Virgil; and therefore Plato, who gives the former so many good words, perfumes, crowns, but at last complimentally banishes him his commonwealth, would have entreated Virgil to stay with him, (if they had lived in the same age,) and entrusted him with some important charge in his government. Thus was his life as chaste as his style; and those who can critic his poetry, can never find a blemish in his manners; and one would rather wish to have that purity of mind, which the satirist himself attributes to him; that friendly disposition, and evenness of temper, and patience, which he was master of in so eminent a degree, than to have the honour of being author of the "Eneïs," or even of the "Georgics" themselves. Having therefore so little relish for the usual amusements of the world, he prosecuted his studies without any considerable interruption, during the whole course of his life, which one may reasonably conjecture to have been something longer than fiftytwo years; and therefore it is no wonder that he became the most general scholar that Rome ever bred, unless some one should except Varro. Besides the exact knowledge of rural affairs, he understood medicine, to which profession he was designed by his parents. A curious florist; on which subject one would wish he had writ, as he once intended: so profound a naturalist, that he has solved more phenomena of nature upon sound principles, than Aristotle in his Physics: he studied geometry, the most opposite of all sciences to a poetic genius, and beauties of a lively imagination; but this promoted the order of his narrations, his propriety of language, and clearness of expression, for which he was justly called the pillar of the Latin tongue. This geometrical spirit was the cause, that, to fill up a verse, he would not insert one superfluous word; and therefore deserves that character which a noble and judicious writer has given him, "That he never says too little, nor too much." Nor could any one ever fill up the verses he left imperfect. There is one supplied near the beginning of the First Book. Virgil left the verse thus, Hic illius arma, the rest is none of his. He was so good a geographer, that he has not only left us the finest description of Italy that ever Essay on Poetry," by Sheffield, Marquis of Normanby, originally Earl of Mulgrave, and afterwards Duke of Buckingham. was, but, besides, was one of the few ancients who knew the true system of the earth, its being inhabited round about, under the torrid zone, and near the poles. Metrodorus, in his five books of the "Zones," justifies him from some exceptions made against him by astronomers. His rhetoric was in such general esteem, that lectures were read upon it in the reign of Tiberius, and the subject of declamations taken out of him. Pollio himself, and many other ancients, commented him. His esteem degenerated into a kind of superstition The known story of Mr Cowley is an instance of it f. But the sortes Virgiliana were condemned by St Austin, and other casuists. Abienus, by an odd design, put all Virgil and Livy into iambic verse; and the pic *The Sortes Virgiliana were a sort of augury, drawn by dipping at random into the volume, and applying the line to which chance directed the finger, as an answer to the doubt propounded. Cowley seems to have been a firm believer in this kind of sooth-saying. When at Paris, and secretary to Lord Jermin, he writes to Bennet his opinion concerning the probability of concluding a treaty with the Scottish nation; and adds, " And, to tell you the truth, which I take to be an argument above all the rest, Virgil has told the same thing to that purpose." There is a story, that Charles I. and Lord Faulkland tried this sort of divination at Oxford concerning the issue of the civil war, and that the former lighted upon this ominous response: -Jacet ingens littore truncus, Avulsumque humeris caput, et sine nomine truncus. Lord Faulkland drew an answer equally prophetic of his fate. These follies seem to have been founded upon the vulgar idea still current at Naples, that Virgil was a magician. Gervas of Tilbury was an early propagator of this scandal, which was current during the middle ages, so that Naudæus thinks it necessary to apologize for Virgil, among other great men accused of necromancy. These legends formed the contents of a popular ro mance. tures of those two were hung in the most honourable place of public libraries; and the design of taking them down, and destroying Virgil's works, was looked upon as one of the most extravagant amongst the many brutish phrenzies of Caligula. |