The Pindarique Odes have so long enjoyed the highest degree of poetical reputation, that I am not willing to difmifs them with unabated cenfure; and furely though the mode of their compofition be erroneous, yet many parts deferve at least that admiration which is due to great comprehenfion of knowledge, and great fertility of fancy. The thoughts are often new, and often striking; but the greatness of one part is disgraced by the littleness of another; and total negligence of language gives the noblest conceptions the appearance of a fabric auguft in the plan, but mean in the materials. Yet surely those verses are not without a just claim to praise; of which it may be faid with truth, that no man but Cowley could have written them.

The Davideis now remains to be confidered; a poem which the author defigned to have extended to twelve books, merely, as he makes no scruple of declaring, because the Eneid had that number; but he had leisure or perfeverance only to write the third part. Epick poems have been left unfinished by Virgil, Statius, Spenfer, and Cowley. That

we

we have not the whole Davideis is, however, not much to be regretted; for in this undertaking Cowley is, tacitly at least, confefled to have miscarried. There are not many examples of fo great a work, produced by an author generally read, and generally praised, that has crept through a century with so little regard. Whatever is faid of Cowley, is meant of his other works. Of the Davideis no mention is made; it never appears books, nor emerges in converfation. By the Spectator it has once been quoted, by Rymer it has once been praised, and by Dryden, in Mac Flecknoe, it has once been imitated; nor do I recollect much other notice from its publication till now, in the whole fucceffion of English literature.

in

Of this filence and neglect, if the reason be inquired, it will be found partly in the choice of the fubject, and partly in the formance of the work.

per

Sacred History has been always read with fubmiffive reverence, and an imagination

over-awed and controlled.

We have been

accustomed to acquiefce in the nakedness and

fimplicity

fimplicity of the authentick narrative, and to repofe on its veracity with fuch humble confidence, as fuppreffes curiofity. We go with the hiftorian as he goes, and ftop with him when he ftops. All amplification is frivolous and vain; all addition to that which is already fufficient for the purposes of religion, feems not only useless, but in fome degree profane.

Such events as were produced by the visible interpofition of Divine Power are above the power of human genius to dignify. The miracle of Creation, however it may teem with images, is beft defcribed with little diffufion of language: He pake the word, and they were made.

We are told that Saul was troubled with an evil spirit; from this Cowley takes an opportunity of defcribing hell, and telling the hiftory of Lucifer, who was, he says,

Once general of a gilded hoft of fprites,
Like Hefper leading forth the spangled nights;
But down like lightning, which him ftruck, he

came,

And roar'd at his firft plunge into the flame.

Lucifer

Lucifer makes a fpeech to the inferior agents of mifchief, in which there is fomething of heathenism, and therefore of impropriety; and, to give efficacy to his words, concludes by lashing his breaft with his long tail. Envy, after a pause, steps out, and among other declarations of her zeal utters thefe lines:

Do thou but threat, loud ftorms fhall make reply,

And thunder echo to the trembling sky.

Whilft raging feas fwell to fo bold an height,
As fhall the fire's proud element affright.
Th' old drudging Sun, from his long-beaten
way,

Shall at thy voice start, and misguide the day.
The jocund orbs fhall break their measur'd

pace,

And stubborn Poles change their allotted place. Heaven's gilded troops fhall flutter here and

there,

Leaving their boasting songs tun'd to a sphere.

Every reader feels himself

weary with this

useless talk of an allegorical Being.

It is not only when the events are confeffedly miraculous, that fancy and fiction lose their effect: the whole fyftem of life, while the Theocracy was yet visible, has an appearance fo different from all other scenes of human action, that the reader of the Sacred Volume habitually confiders it as the peculiar mode of existence of a distinct species of mankind, that lived and acted with manners uncommunicable; fo that it is difficult even for imagination to place us in the state of them whose story is related, and by confequence their joys and griefs are not easily adopted, nor can the attention be often interested in any thing that befals them.

To the fubject, thus originally indifpofed to the reception of poetical embellishments, the writer brought little that could reconcile impatience, or attract curiofity. Nothing can be more difgufting than a narrative fpangled with conceits, and conceits are all that the Davideis fupplies.

One of the great fources of poetical delight is defcription, or the power of prefent