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Muft they be Blockheads, Dolts, and Fools,
Who write not up to Grecian Rules?
Who tread in Bufkins or in Socks,
Muft they be damn'd as Hetoredox,
Nor Merit of good Works prevail,
Except within the claffic Pale?

'Tis Stuff that bears the Name of Knowledge,
Not current half a Mile from College;
Where half their Lectures yield no more
(Befure I fpeak of Times of Yore)
Than juft a niggard Light, to mark
How much we all are in the Dark.
As Rufhlights in a spacious Room,
Juft burn enough to form a Gloom.

When Shakespeare leads the Mind a Dance,
From France to England, hence to France,
Talk not to me of Time and Place;
I own I'm happy in the Chace.
Whether the Drama's here or there,
'Tis Nature, Shakespeare every where.
The Poet's Fancy can create,
Contract, enlarge, annihilate,
Ering paft and prefent clofe together,
In Spite of Distance, Seas, or Weather.

And fhut up in a fingle Action,

What colt whole Years in its Tranfaction.

So, Ladies at a Play, or Rout,
Can flirt the Universe about,
Whofe geographical Account

Is drawn and pictur'd on the Mount.

Yet, when they pleafe, contract the Plan,
And fhut the World up in a Fan.

True Genius, like Armida's Wand,
Can raise the Spring from barren Land.
While all the Art of Imitation,
Is pilf ring from the first Creation;
Tranfplanting Flowers with useless Toil,
Which wither in a foreign Soil.

As

As Confcience often fets us right,
By its interior active Light,
Without th' Affiftance of the Laws
So combat in the moral Cause;
To Genius, of itself difcerning,
Without the myftic Rules of Learning,
Can from its present Intuition,
Strike at the Truth of Composition.

Yet those who breathe the claffic Vein,
Enlifted in the mimic Train,

Who ride their Steed with double Bit,
Not run away with by their Wit,
Delighted with the Pomp of Rules,
The Specious Pedantry of Schools;
(Which Rules, like Crutches, ne'er became
Of any Ufe but to the Lame)

Pursue the Method fet before 'em,
Talk much of Order and Decorum,
Of Probability of Fiction,

Of Manners, Ornament, and Diction,
And with a Jargon of hard Names,
(A Privilege which Dulness claims)
And merely us'd by way of Fence,
To keep out plain and common Sense,
Extol the Wit of antient Days,
The fimple Fabric of their Plays;
Then from the Fable, all fo chaste,
Trick'd up in antient-modern Tafte,
So mighty gentle all the While,
In fuch a fweet descriptive Stile,
While Chorus marks the fervile Mode
With fine Reflexion, in an Ode,
Prefent you with a perfect Piece,
Form'd on the Model of old Greece.
Come, prithee Critic, fet before us,
The Ufe and Office of a Chorus.
What! filent! Why then, I'll produce
Its Services from antient Ufe.

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'Tis to be ever on the Stage,
Attendants upon Grief or Rage,
To be an arrant Go-between,
Chief-Mourner at each dismal Scene;
Shewing its Sorrow, or Delight,
By fhifting Dances, left and right.
Not much unlike our modern Notions,
Adagio or Allegro Motions;

To watch upon the deep Distress,
And Plaints of Royal Wretchedness ;
And when, with Tears, and Execration,
They've pour'd out all their Lamentation,
And wept whole Cataracts from their Eyes,
To call on Rivers for Supplies,

And with their Hais and Hees and Hoes
To make a Symphony of Woes.

Doubtlefs the Antients want the Art
To strike at once upon the Heart.
Or why their Prologues of a Mile
In fimple call it-humble Stile,
In unimpaffion'd Phrafe to fay
• 'Fore the beginning of this Play,
I, hapless Polydore, was found
By Fishermen, or others, drown'd?
Or, I, a Gentleman, did wed,
The Lady I wou'd never bed,
• Great Agamemnon's royal Daughter,
Who's coming hither to draw Water.'
Or need the Chorus to reveal
Reflexions, which the Audience feel;
And jog them, left Attention fink,
To tell them how and what to think?
Oh, where's the Bard, who at one View,
Cou'd look the whole Creation through,
Who travers'd all the human Heart,
Without Recourse to Grecian Art?
He fcorn'd the Modes of Imitation,

Of Altering, Pilfering, and Tranflation,

Net

Nor painted Horror, Grief, or Rage,
From Models of a former Age;
The bright Original he took,

And tore the Leaf from Nature's Book.
'Tis Shakespeare, thus who ftands alone-
Why need I tell what You have fhown?
How true, how perfect, and how well,
The Feelings of our Hearts must tell.

ODE

[ 348 ]

ODE TO GENIUS.

The

ΤΗ

I.

HOU Child of Nature, Genius ftrong,
Thou Mafter of the Poet's Song,
Before whofe Light, Art's dim and feeble Ray
Gleams like the Taper in the Blaze of Day:
Thou lov'ft to fteal along the fecret Shade,

Where Fancy, bright aërial Maid!
Awaits thee with her thoufand Charms,
And revels in thy wanton Arms.
She to thy Bed, in Days of Yore,

The fweetly-warbling Shakespeare bore

In m

The

But

;

Whofe filver Streams flow mufical along,

And dipt him in that facred Rill,

Whom every Mufe endow'd with every Skill,

Who

Cold

Where Phoebus' hallow'dMount refounds with raptur'd

Song.

II.

Grea

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Forfake not Thou the vocal Choir,

Their Breafts revifit with thy genial Fire,
Elfe vain the ftudied Sounds of mimic Art,
Tickle the Ear, but come not nigh the Heart.
Vain every Phrafe in curious Order fet,

On each Side leaning on the [ftop-gap] Epithet.
Vain the quick Rime ftill tinckling in the Close,
While pure Defcription fhines in measur'd Profe.
Thou bear'ft a-loof, and look'ft with high Difdain,
Upon the dull mechanic Train;

Whofe nerveless Strains flag on in languid Tone,
Lifeless and lumpifh as the Bag-pipe's drowzy Drone.

III. No

From

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