The friend shall view yon whit’ning spire†, VI. But thou, who own'st that earthly bed, VII. Yet lives there one, whose heedless eye VIII. But thou, lorn Stream! whose sullen tide IX. And see! the Fairy vallies fade, Dun Night has veil'd the solemn view! Meek Nature's Child! again adieu ! † Richmond church, in which Mr. Thomson was buried. X. The genial meads assign'd to bless XI. Long, long, thy stone and pointed clay Mr. Thomson resided in the neighbourhood of Richmond some time before his death. !" ON THE ORIENTAL ECLOGUES. THE genius of the Pastoral, as well as of every other respectable species of poetry, had its origin in the East, and from thence was transplanted by the Muses of Greece; but whether from the continent of the Lesser Asia, or from Egypt, which about the era of the Grecian Pastoral was the hospitable nurse of letters, it is not easy to determine. From the subjects and manner of Theocritus one would incline to the latter opin ion, while the history of Bion is in favour of the former. However, though it should still remain a doubt through what channel the Pastoral travelled westward, there is not the least shadow of uncertainty concerning its oriental origin. In those ages which, guided by sacred chronology, from a comparative view of time we call the Early Ages, it appears from the most authentic historians that the chiefs of the people employed themselves in rural exercises, and that astronomers and legislators were at the same time shepherds. Thus Strabo informs us that the history of the creation was communicated to the Egyptians by a Chaldean shepherd. From these circumstances it is evident not only that such shepherds were capable of all the dignity and elegance peculiar to poetry, but that whatever poetry they attempted would be of the Pastoral kind; would take its subjects from those scenes of rural simplicity in which they were conversant, and, as it was the offspring of Harmony and Nature, would employ the powers it derived from the former to celebrate the beauty and benevolence of the latter. Accordingly we find that the most ancient poems treat of agriculture, astronomy, and other subjects within the rural and natural systems. What constitutes the difference between the Georgic and the Pastoral is love, and the colloquial or dramatic form of composition is sometimes dispensed with, and love and rural imagery alone are thought sufficient to distinguish the Pastoral. The tender passion, however, seems to be essential to this species of poetry, and is hardly ever excluded from those pieces that were intended to come under this denomination: even in those Eclogues of the Amabean kind, whose only purport is a trial of skill between contending shepherds, love has its usual share, and the praises of their respective mistresses are the general subjects of the competitors. It is to be lamented that scarce any oriental compositions of this kind have survived the ravages of Ignorance, Tyranny, and Time: we cannot doubt that many such have been extant, possibly as far down as that fatal period, never to be mentioned in the world of letters without horror, when the glorious monuments of human ingenuity perished in the Alexandrian library. Those ingenious Greeks, whom we call the Parents of Pastoral poetry, were probably no more than imitators, that derived their harmony from higher and remoter sources, and kindled their poetical fires at those then unextinguished lamps which burned within the tombs of oriental genius. It is evident that Homer has availed himself of those magnificent images and descriptions so frequently to be met with in the books of the Old Testament. And as the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament was performed at the request, and under the patronage, of Ptolemy Philadelphus, it were not to be wondered if Theocritus, who was entertained at that prince's court, had borrowed some part of his pastoral imagery from the poetical passages of those books. In consequence of the peculiarities of the eastern style so ill adapted to the frigid genius of the north, Mr. Collins could make but little use of it as a precedent for his Oriental Ec. logues; and even in his third Eclogue, where the subject is of a similar nature, he has chosen rather to follow the mode of the Doric and the Latin Pastoral. The scenery and subjects, then, of the following Eclogues alone are oriental; the style and colouring are purely European; and for this reason the author's preface, in which he intimates that he had the originals from a merchant who traded to the east, is omitted, as being now altogether superfluous. With regard to the merit of these Eclogues, it may justly be asserted, that in simplicity of description and expression, in delicacy and softness of numbers, and in natural and unaffected tenderness, they are not to be equalled by any thing of the Pastoral kind in the English language. ECLOGUE I. THIS Eclogue, which is entitled Selim; or the Shepherd's Moral, as there is nothing dramatic in the subject, may be thought the least entertaining of the four; but it is by no means the least valuable. The moral precepts which the intelligent shepherd delivers to his fellow swains, and the vir. gins their companions, are such as would infallibly promote the happiness of the Pastoral life. In impersonating the private virtues, the poet has observed great propriety, and has formed their genealogy with the most perfect judgment, when he represents them as the daughters of truth and wisdom. The characteristics of modesty and chastity are extremely happy and pienturesque ; Come thou, whose thoughts as limpid springs are clear; With thee be Chastity, of all afraid, Distrusting all, a wise, suspicious maid; Cold is her breast, like flow'rs that drink the dew, A silken veil conceals her from the view. The two similes borrowed from rural objects are not only much in character, but perfectly natural and expressive. There is, notwithstanding, this defect in the former, that it wants a peculiar propriety; for purity of thought may as well be applied to chastity as to modesty; and from this instance, as well as from a thousand more, we may see the necessity of distinguish. ing, in characteristic poetry, every object by marks and attri. butes peculiarly its own. It cannot be objected to this eclogue that it wants both those essential criteria of the pastoral, love and the drama; for though it partakes not of the latter, the former still retains an interest in it, and that too very material, as it professedly consults the virtue and happiness of the lover, while it informs what are the qualities that must lead to love. ECLOGUE II. ALL the advantages that any species of poetry can derive from the novelty of the subject and scenery this eclogue posThe route of a camel-driver is a scene that scarce could sesses. |