There first the wren thy myrtles fhed
On gentleft Otway's infant-head,
To him thy cell was fhewn;

And while he fung the female heart,

With youth's foft notes unfpoil'd by art,
Thy turtles mix'd their own.

The Ode to Fear is fo nervous, fo expreffive, and so picturefque throughout, that we have feen no lyric performance fuperior to it in the English language. Thus it begins:

Thou, to whom the world unknown
With all its fhadowy fhapes is fhewn ;
Who feelt appall'd th' unreal fcene,
While Fancy lifts the veil between :
Ah Fear! ah frantic Fear!

1 fee, I fee thee near.

I know thy hurried ftep, thy haggard eye!
Like thee I ftart, like thee difordered fly,
For, lo! what monsters in thy train appear !

The abbreviation of the measure in the fifth and fixth verfes is most nervously expreffive, and moft happily adapted to the fuddennefs. of the motion excited. Danger, which is properly introduced as a perfonage in the train of Fear, is fo characteristically defcribed, that there is no looking upon the picture without horrour :

Danger, whofe limbs of giant-mold,
What mortal eye can fix'd behold?
Who talks his round, an hideous form,
Howling amidst the midnight ftorm,
Or throws him on the ridgy fleep
Of fome loofe hanging rock to fleep.

Certainly it is not in the power of human invention to produce an image of greater force and propriety than that which is exhibited in the two laft quoted verfes, where Danger is reprefented as fleeping on the loofely-hanging rock of a precipice. The dreadful Beings that attend him are defcribed with equal trength of imagination :

And with him thoufand phantoms join'd,
Who prompt to deeds accurs'd the mind:
And thole, the fiends, who ncar allied,
O'er Nature's wounds and wrecks prefide:
While Vengeance in the lurid air,
Lifts her red arm, expos'd and bare;
On whom that ravening brood of Fate,
Who lap the blood of Sorrow, wait;
Who, Fear, this ghaftly train can fee,
And lock not madly wild, like thee?

The effential part which Fear bears in the drama, could not be overlooked by an Imagination like that of Mr. Collins, and he very properly refers to its effects on the Crecian theatre:

In earliest Greece to thee, with partial choice,
The grief-full Muse addrefs'd her infant tongue :
The maids and matrons, on her awful voice,

Silent and pale in wild amazement hung.
O Fear, I know thee by my throbbing heart,
Thy withering power infpir'd each mournful line;
Tho' gentle Pity claim'd her mingled part,

Yet all the thunders of the fcene are thine.

In the Antiftrophe, which concludes this inimitable Ode, Fear is thus addreffed:

Say, wilt thou fhroud in haunted cell,
Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell?
Or in fome hallow'd feat,

'Gainst which the big waves beat,

Hear drowning feamen's cries in tempefts brought.

After this he alludes to a scenery and a fuperftition common in
fome parts of England, which has great poetical propriety in an
Ode to Fear: we mean the fuperftition of St. Mark's eve:
Ne'er be I found, by thee o'eraw'd,
On that thrice hallow'd eve abroad,
When ghofts, as cottage maids believe,
Their pebbled beds, permitted, leave,
And goblins haunt, from fire or fen,

Or mine, or flood, the works of men!

The allufions to fcenes of ancient Enthufiafm and Poetry, in the Ode to Simplicity, are happily defigned, and delightfully expreffed :

By all the honey'd store

On Hybla's thymy fhore;

By all her blooms, and mingled murmurs dear,

By her whofe love-lorn woe,

In evening mufings flow,

Sooth'd fweetly-fad Electra's Poet's ear:

By old Cephifus deep,

Who fpread his wavy fweep.

In warbled wanderings round thy green retreat,
On whofe enamel'd fide,

When holy Freedom died,

No equal haunt allur'd thy future feet.

O fifter meek of Truth,

To my admiring youth,

Thy fober aid, and native charms infufe!

The flowers that sweetest breathe,

Tho' Beauty cull'd the wreath,

Still afk thy hand to range their order'd hues.

Simplicity is effentially neceffary to the perfection of every poetical work; and Mr. Collins has borne witnefs, by all his per

C 4

formances,

mances, but particularly by his Oriental Eclogues, to the truth of the following ftanza:

Tho' Tafte, tho' Genius blefs,

To fome divine excess,

Faint's the cold work, 'till thou infpire the whole;
What each, what all fupply,

May court, may charm the eye,

Thou, only thou canst raise the meeting foul.

After this, how much in character is the next stanza, with which the Ode concludes?

Of thefe let others afk,

To aid fome mighty task,

I only feek to find thy temperate vale:
Where oft my reed might found

To maids, and fhepherds round,

And all thy fous. O Nature, learn my tale.

The Ode on the poetical Character is fo extremely wild and exorbitant, that it seems to have been written wholly during the tvany of imagination. Some, however, there are whofe conznal ipirits may keep pace with the Poet in his most excentric

ts, and from fome of his cafual ftrokes may catch those fabil de ideas which, like him, they have experienced, but have rever been able to exprefs-Some, to whom Fancy

the few.

The ceft of amplest power has given ;

To whom the godlike gift aligns,

To gaze her vifions wild, and feel unmix'd her flame.

But poetry fo entirely abftracted, can only be entertaining to
The little Ode which follows this, and which is faid
to have been written in the beginning of the year 1746, will be
more generally pleafing, as it is equally beautiful and fimplę;
How fleep the brave, who fink to rest,
With all their country's wishes blest !
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow'd mold,
She there (hall drefs a fweeter fod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.

By fairy-hands their knell is rung,
By forms unfeen their dirge is fung;
There Honour comes, a Pilgrim grey,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay.
And Freedom fhall a while repair,

To dwell a weeping Hermit there.

The Strophe in the Ode to Mercy affords the finest subject for a picture that imagination can form :

O thou, who fit'it a fmiling bride,
By Valour's arm'd and awful tide,

Gentle

Gentleft of fky-born forms, and beft-ador'd:
Who oft with fongs, divine to hear,
Win'ft from his fatal grafp the fpear,

And hid'ft in wreaths of flowers his bloodlefs fword!

There is fomething perfectly claffical in Mr. Collins's manner, both with respect to his imagery and his compofition; and Horace's rule of ut Pictura Poefis, was never better observed than in the above-quoted verfes.

The fame ftyle of painting, though somewhat bolder, characterises the Ode to Liberty :

Who fhall awake the Spartan fife,

And call in folemn founds to life,
The youths whofe locks divinely spreading,
Like vernal hyacinths in fullen hue,

At once the breath of fear and virtue fhedding,
Applauding Freedom lov'd of old to view ?

The Poet, after thefe lines, refers to that beautiful fragment of Alcoeus:

εν μυρίε κλαδί, &c.

which, together with a tranflation, the Reader will find in the firft article of our Review for October, 1762.

The ruin of the Liberties and of the State of Rome are defcribed in a moft picturefque and pathetic manner :

No, Freedom, no: I will not tell,
How Rome, before thy weeping face,
With heaviest found, a giant ftatue fell.
Push'd by a wild, and artless race,
From off its wide, ambitious base,
When Time his northern fons of spoil awoke,
And all the blended work of ftrength and grace,
With many a rude, repeated stroke,

And many a barbarous yell to thoufand fragments broke.

The ancient tradition that there was formerly a temple of Liberty in Britain, awakes, at once, the enthufiafm, and the patriotism of our liberal Bard. Hear with what rapture he dwells upon the thought:

Then too, 'tis faid, an hoary pile,
'Midit the green navel of our isle, `
Thy fhrine in fome religious wood,
O foul-enforcing Goddefs, flood!
There, oft the painted natives feet
Were wont thy form celeftial meet:
Tho' now with hopeless toil we trace
Time's backward rolls, to find its place;
Whether the fiery-treffed Dane,
Or Roman's felf o'erturn'd the Fane,
Or in what heaven left age it fell,
'I'were hard for modern fong to tell,

Yet

Yet ftill, if Truth those beams infufe,
Which guide at once, and charm the Muse,
Beyond yon braided clouds that lie
Paving the light-embroider'd sky :
Amidit the bright pavilion'd plains
The beauteous model ftill remains.
There happier than in islands blest,
Or bowers by Spring or Hebe drest,
The Chiefs who fill our Albion's story,
With warlike deeds, retir'd in glory,
Hear their conforted Druids fing

Their triumphs to th' immortal string.

In the Paffions, an Ode for Mufic, (which, if we are not miftaken, was fometime ago fet by Dr. Hayes) the emotions of the foul are defcribed, and the movements of the verse adapted to them with equal happiness:

But thou, O Hope, with eyes fo fair,
What was thy delighted measure?
Still it whifper'd promis'd pleasure,

And bad the lovely fcenes at diftance hail!
Still would her touch the ftrain prolong,

And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She call'd on Echo ftill thro' all her fong;

And where her fweetest theme the chofe,
A foft refponfive voice was heard at every close,
And Hope enchanted smil'd and wav'd her golden hair.
The force of the following stanza must be universally felt :
First Fear his hand, its fkill to try,

Amid the chords, bewilder'd, laid,
And back recoil'd he knew not why,

Even at the found himself had made.

It is with peculiar pleasure that we do this juftice to a Poet who was too great to be popular, and whofe genius was neglected, because it was above the common taste.

The Author. A Poem. By C. Churchill. 4to. 2s. 6d.

Flexney.

HIS is, in our opinion, the moft agreeable, and the most unexceptionable of all Mr. Churchill's Poems, whether we confider the tendency of the fubject, or the execution. The interefts of Genius and Learning are cordially efpoufed, and powerfully fupported, while the contempt of profeffed Ignorance, and the fhallowness of Pretenders to Science, are juftly expofed, and lafh'd by the blameless rod of general Satire.Sometimes,