mists and mountains, his grey dogs and feeble fons of the wind, ftrung in couplets!]-But befides this want of conformity and affimilation between language and fentiment, there are, we apprehend, other reafons, why the verfification of the facred writings fhould not be attended with fuccefs; reasons which were obvious enough to Shaftesbury, when he observed that no poem founded upon them would profper.

With respect to the Book of Pfalms in particular, various attempts have been made to verfify it in our own language; but they have been unsuccessful from the first to the laft. It has not, indeed, been attempted by men of diftinguished genius; yet fome, whose poetical abilities were not altogether contemptible, have applied themselves to the tafk. Sandys tells us, that finding the little advantage he made of his other poems, he had refumed his old scheme of tranflating the Pfalms.-Were Sandys now living, we prefume it would be the laft fcheme he would think of with any view to advantage. His tranflation, or rather paraphrafe, we have never looked into. It was, however, publifhed; and it has funk into oblivion, with many others, on the merits of which we do not think it worth our while to enter; satisfied of the truth of what we have already obferved, that the fongs of Sion will no more bend to the genius of a strange language, than their fingers would of old to the commands of their conquerors, when called upon to fing them in a strange land.

With regard to the merit of the tranflation before us, the Reader muft form his judgment from the following fpecimens: Pfalm cxxxvii. is one of the most beautiful elegiac poems in all antiquity. The fubject is the happieft that could be suggested. The captivity of Sion was a proper object for the mournful harmony of her own fongs.-The fcene upon the Euphrates; the harps fufpended on the willows; the pathos and patriotic affection described in it are truly beautiful; but we have nothing to say in favour of the barbarous conclufion, which, in our opinion, the Tranflator would have done better to have softened.

PSALM CXXXVII.

Where Babylon's proud water flows,
We fate and wept, while in us rose
The dear remembrance of thy name,
O fair, O loft, Jerufalem!

Our filent harps the willows bore,
Whose boughs along the extended fhore

Their fhades outspread: when thus the Foc

Infulting aggravates our woe:

"Come, tune to mirth your fullen tongue;
"Rife, Hebrew flaves, and give the long;
"Such trains as wont your fane to fill,
"On captive Sion's boafted Hill."”.

How

How shall we yield to the demand?
How, exiles in a heathen Land,
Prefume the Heav'n-taught fong to raise,
And defecrate the hallow'd lays?
If Sion from my breast depart,
Forget my hand its tuneful art:
Faft to my palate cleave my tongue,
If, when I form my fprightlieft fong,
Aught to my mirth fupply a theme,
But Thou, O lov'd Jerufalem.
Think, Lord, O think, when Sion lay
Abandon'd to the dreadful day,
How, as thy heaviest wrath fhe tried,
Down, down, exulting Edom cried,
"Down let the hated City fall,
"And level to the duft her wall."
Daughter of Babylon, that woe,

Deprefs'd, confum'd, thyfelf fhalt know,
Which we, dire Murth'refs, found from Thee;
And Bleft, who fhall by God's Decree
Warn from thy fate each diftant Land
To dread the Juftice of his hand;
Commiffion'd lead the flaughter on,

And dafh thine infants on the stone.

This is, in general, the meafure in which the Pfalms are here tranflated; and we are forry that either this, or fome ftronger ftanza than that of the old tranflations was not used in Pfalm cvii. which contains fuch a beautiful, natural and moral defcription of the immediate agency of Providence, and is one of the finest compofitions in the whole book. Next in merit to this is Pfalm civ. which we fhall felect as a farther fpecimen.

Awake, my Soul, to hymns of praise ;
To God the fong of triumph raife.
O cloth'd with majefty divine,

What pomp, what glory, Lord, are thine!
Light forms thy robe, and round thy Head
The Heav'ns their ample curtain spread.
Thou know'ft amid the fluid fpace
The strong-compacted beams to place,
That proof to waiting Ages lie,
And prop the chambers of the fky.

Behold, aloft, the King of Kings,
Borne on the wind's expanded wings,
(His Chariot by the Clouds fupplied,)
Through Heav'n's wide realms triumphant ride.
Around him rang'd in awful flate

Th' affembled ftorms miniftrant wait;

And

And Flames, attentive to fulfill
The dictates of his mighty Will.
On firmest base uprear'd, the Earth
To him afcribes her wondrous birth.
He fpake; and o'er each mountain's head
The deep its watry mantle spread :
He fpake; and from the whelming flood
Again their tops emergent ftood;
And fast adown their bending fide
With refluent ftream the Currents glide:
Aw'd by his ftern rebuke they fly.
While peals of thunder rend the sky,
In mingled tumult upward borne
Now to the mountain's height return,
Now lodg'd within their peaceful bed
Along the winding vale are led,

And, taught their deftin'd bounds to know,
No more th' affrighted earth o'erflow,
But obvious to her use (their course
By Nature's ever copious fource
Supplied,) refresh the hilly plain,
And life in all its forms fuftain.
Here ftooping o'er the river's brink
The herds and flocks promifcuous drink ;
There, 'mid the barren Defert nurs'd,
The Wild-Afs cools his burning thirst:
While faft befide the murm'ring fpring.
The feather'd minstrels fit and fing,
And shelter'd in the branches fhun
The fervors of the mid-day fun.
His show'rs with verdure crown the hills;
The earth with various fruits he fills:
Preventive of their wants, his aid
Yields to the Brute the fpringing blade;
For Man, chief object of his care,
His hands the foodful herb prepare,
The glad ning wine, refreshing oil,
And bread that ftrings his nerves for toil.
By Him with genial moisture fed
The Trees their fhades luxuriant spread;
The Cedars, nurtur'd by his hand,
On Lebanon's high fummit ftand,
And weave their focial boughs, defign'd
A refuge for th' aerial kind:
While on the Fir-tree's fpiry top
The vagrant Stork is feen to ftop,
Where, cradled in their waving neft,
Her infant brood in fafety rest.
See from the bills the Goats depend,
Or bounding from the cliff defcend:
The leffer tribes, in furry pride
Array'd, the rocks dark cavern's hide.
R
Rav. Sept. 1765.

Her

Her way by Him prefcrib'd, the Moon
Our seasons marks, and knows her own;
And taught by Him the Orb of day
Slopes in the Weft his parting ray.
Now Night from Ocean's bed afcends,
And o'er the earth her wings extends;
While favour'd by the friendly gloom
The fylvan race licentious roam :
The Lions chief with hideous roar
From God their needful food implore,
And eager for the wonted prey
Along the echoing Desert Aray;
Till now, as Morn approaches nigh,
Back to their cavern'd haunts they fly,
Where, fatiate with the bloody feast,
The lordly favage finks to rest.
His care fufficient to the day,
Man to his labour takes his way,
His task at earliest dawn begun,
And ended with the setting fun.
Eternal Ruler of the Skies,

How various are thy Works, how wife!
Nor Earth alone beholds her fhores
Inrich'd from thy exhaustless stores ;
Alike, throughout their liquid reign,
Th' extended Seas thy gifts contain:
Beneath, unnumber'd reptiles fwarm,
Of diff'rent fize, of diff'rent form;
Above, the ships enormous glide,
Incumbent on the burthen'd tide;
And oft, the rolling waves between,
The huge Leviathan is seen,
There privileg'd by Thee to flray,
And wanton o'er the watry way.
Thy care, great God, fultains them all;
As, urg'd by hunger's furious call,
Expectant of the known fupply,
To Thee they lift the asking eye,
And reap from thy extended hand
Whate'er their various wants demand.
If Thou thy face but turn away,
Their troubled looks their grief betray;
If Thou the vital air deny,
Behold them ficken, faint, and die;
Duft to its kindred duft returns,

And Earth her ruin'd offspring mourns:
But foon thy breath her lofs fupplies ;
She fees a new-born race arite,
And, o'er her regions scatter'd wide,
The blings of thy hand divide.
Thy glo y, fearless of decline,
Thy glory, Lord, thail ever fhine,

Thy

Thy Works in changeless order lie,
And glad their great Creator's eye.
Earth at thy look fhall trembling ftand,
"Confcious of fov'reign pow'r at hand,
And, touch'd by Thee, Almighty Site,
The cloud-topt Hills in fmoke afpire.
To God in ceafelefs ftrains my tongue
Shall meditate the grateful fong,
And, long as breath informs my frame,
The wonders of his Love proclaim,
Affur'd that his paternal ear

With full regard my voice will hear;
His Acts its unexhaufted theme,
His favour my Delight fupreme.
Behold his wrath on Sinners fhed;
Behold them number'd with the dead:
But Thou, my Soul, the hymn of praise
In loudest notes triumphant raife;
And let confenting Nations join

To blefs with Me the Name divine.

To whatever poetical reputation Mr. Merrick may be entitled by this translation, his whole claim to merit does not rest upon that. His tranflation, or rather paraphrafe, has frequently elucidated the text. Paffages that were dark and difficult he has rendered eafy and obvious; and where, in our common tranflation, there appeared inconsistencies and a want of connection, he has reconciled the former, and regulated the latter.

From PSALM IV.

What joy my confcious heart o'erflows!
Not fach th' exulting labourer knows,
When to his long expecting eyes

The Vintage and the harvests rife.

How much clearer and more natural is this interpretation, than "Thou haft put gladness in my heart, since the time that their corn and wine and oil increased!"

Mr. Merrick acknowledges his obligations to the learned Dr. Lowth for feveral interpretations and obfervations, through this work; and gives us reafon to hope that the world will be favoured with them in fome future publication.

Thus it ftands in the Common-prayer-book verfion; but in the Bible-tranflation we read, "Thou haft put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increased."