Thy hand unfeen the secret death fhall bear,
Blunt the weak fword, and break the oppreflive
Where'er we turn, by fancy charm'd, we find Some fweet illufion of the cheated mind.
Oft, wild of wing, the calls the foul to rove
With humbler nature, in the rural grove;
Where fwains contented own the quiet fcene,
And twilight fairies tread the circled green:
Drefs'd by her hand, the woods and vallies fmile,
And Spring diffusive decks the inchanted ifle.
O more than all in powerful genius bleft,
Come, take thine empire o'er the willing breaft!
Whate'er the wounds this youthful heart shall feel,
Thy fongs fupport me, and thy morals heal.
There every thought the poet's warmth may raise,
There native mufick dwells in all the lays.
O might fome verfe with happiest skill perfuade Expreffive Picture to adopt thine aid!
What wondrous draughts might rife from every page!
What other Raphaels charm a distant age!
Methinks even now I view fome free defign,
Where breathing Nature lives in every line:
Chafte and fubdued the modeft lights decay,
Steal into fhades, and mildly melt away.
-And fee, where Antony," in tears approv'd,
Guards the pale relicks of the chief he lov'd:
O'er the cold corfe the warrior feems to bend,
Deep funk in grief, and mourns his murder'd friend!
Still as they prefs, he calls on all around,
Lifts the torn robe, and points the bleeding wound.
See the tragedy of Julius Cæfar.
But who is he, whose brows exalted bear
A wrath impatient, and a fiercer air?
Awake to all that injur'd worth can feel,
On his own Rome he turns the avenging fteel.
Yet fhall not war's infatiate fury fall
(So heaven ordains it) on the deftin'd wall.
See the fond mother, 'midft the plaintive train,
Hung on his knees, and proftrate on the plain!
Touch'd to the foul, in vain he ftrives to hide
The fon's affection in the Roman's pride:
O'er all the man conflicting paffions rife,
Rage grafps the fword, while Pity melts the eyes.
Methinks I fee with Fancy's magick eye,
The fhade of Shakspeare, in yon azure sky.
On yon high cloud behold the bard advance,
Piercing all Nature with a fingle glance:
In various attitudes around him ftand
The Paffions, waiting for his dread command.
Firft kneeling Love before his feet appears,
And mufically fighing melts in tears.
Near him fell Jealoufy with fury burns,
And into ftorms the amorous breathings turns;
Then Hope with heavenward look, and Joy draws
While palfied Terror trembles in the rear.
Such Shakspeare's train of horror and delight, &c.
Chriftopher Smart's Prologue to Othello, 1751.
What are the lays of artful Addison,
Coldly correct, to Shakspeare's warblings wild?
Whom on the winding Avon's willow'd banks
Fair Fancy found, and bore the smiling babe
Coriolanus. See Mr. Spence's dialogue on the Odyssey.
To a close cavern: (still the fhepherds shew
The facred place, whence with religious awe
They hear, returning from the field at eve,
Strange whifp'ring of sweet mufick through the air :)
Here, as with honey gather'd from the rock,
She fed the little prattler, and with fongs
Oft footh'd his wond'ring ears; with deep delight
On her soft lap he fat, and caught the founds.
The Enthusiast, or the Lover of Nature, a Poem,
by the Rev. Jofeph Warton.
From the Rev. Thomas Warton's Addrefs to the Queen on her Marriage.
Here, boldly mark'd with every living hue, Nature's unbounded portrait Shakspeare drew: But chief, the dreadful group of human woes The daring artift's tragick pencil chofe; Explor'd the pangs that rend the royal breast, Those wounds that lurk beneath the tiffued veft.
Monody, written near Stratford-upon-Avon.
Avon, thy rural views, thy paftures wild,
The willows that o'erhang thy twilight edge,
Their boughs entangling with the embattled fedge;
Thy brink with watery foliage quaintly fring'd,
Thy furface with reflected verdure ting'd;
Sooth me with many a penfive pleasure mild.
But while I mufe, that here the Bard Divine
Whofe facred duft yon high-arch'd ifles inclofe,
Where the tall windows rife in ftately rows,
Above th' embowering shade,
Here first, at Fancy's fairy-circled fhrine,
Of daifies pied his infant offering made;
VOL. II.
M m
Here playful yet, in ftripling years unripe,
Fram'd of thy reeds a fhrill and artlefs pipe:
Sudden thy beauties, Avon, all are fled,
As at the waving of fome magick wand;
An holy trance my charmed fpirit wings,
And aweful fhapes of leaders and of kings,
People the bufy mead,
Like fpectres fwarming to the wifard's hall;
And flowly pace, and point with trembling hand
The wounds ill-cover'd by the purple pall.
Before me Pity feems to ftand,
A weeping mourner, fmote with anguish fore,
To fee Misfortune rend in frantick mood
His robe, with regal woes embroider'd o'er.
Pale Terror leads the vifionary band,
And sternly shakes his fceptre, dropping blood.
Far from the fun and fummer gale,
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon ftray'd,
To him the mighty mother did unveil
Her awful face: The dauntlefs child
Stretch'd forth his little arms, and fmil'd.
This pencil take (fhe faid) whofe colours clear
Richly paint the vernal year:
Thine too thefe golden keys, immortal boy!
This can unlock the gates of joy;
Of horror that, and thrilling fears,
the facred fource of fympathetick tears.'
Gray's Ode on the Progrefs of Poefy.
An ingenious perfon, who fent Mr. Gray his remarks anonymoufly on this and the following Ode foon after they were publifhed, gives this ftanza and the following a very juft and wellexpreffed eulogy: "A poet is perhaps never more conciliating than
Next Shakspeare fat, irregularly great,
And in his hand a magick rod did hold,
Which vifionary beings did create,
And turn the fouleft drofs to purest gold:
Whatever spirits rove in earth or air,
Or bad, or good, obey his dread command;
To his behefts thefe willingly repair,
Those aw'd by terrors of his magick wand, The which not all their powers united might withftand.
Lloyd's Progress of Envy, 1751.
Oh, where's the bard, who at one view
Could look the whole creation through,
Who travers'd all the human heart,
Without recourfe to Grecian art?
He fcorn'd the rules of imitation,
Of altering, pilfering, and translation,
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 Shakspeare.—
Lloyd's Shakespeare, a Poem.
when he praises favourite predeceffors in his art. Milton is not more the pride than Shakspeare the love of their country: It is therefore equally judicious to diffuse a tenderness and a grace through the praife of Shakspeare, as to extol in a strain more elevated and fonorous the boundlefs foarings of Milton's imagination." The critick has here well noted the beauty of contrast which results from the two defcriptions; yet it is further to be obferved, to the honour of our poet's judgement, that the tenderness and grace in the former, does not prevent it from strongly characterifing the three capital perfections of Shakspeare's genius; and when he defcribes his power of exciting terror (a fpecies of the fublime) he ceases to be diffufe, and becomes, as he ought to be, concise and energetical. MASON.
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