To thee he gave the heav'nly birth, And bade to form her infant mind. Stern rugged nurse! thy rigid lore With patience many a year she bore: What sorrow was, thou bad'st her know, 15 And from her own she learn'd to melt at others' woe. Scar'd at thy frown terrific, fly Self-pleasing Folly's idle brood, Wild Laughter, Noise, and thoughtless Joy, 20 V. 5. 'Αδαμαντίνων δεσμῶν ἐν ἀῤῥήκτοις πέδαις Esch. Prom. vi. W., from whom Milton. Par. L. i. 48 : "In adamantine chains, and penal fire." And the expression occurs also in the Works of Spenser, Drummond, Fletcher, and Drayton. See Todd's note on Milton. adamantine chains shall Death be bound," Pope. Messiah, ver. 47; and lastly, Manil. Astron. lib. i. 921. And Boisson. on Philost. Heroic, p. 405. "In V. 7. "Till some new tyrant lifts his purple hand," Pope. Two Choruses, ver. 23. Wakefield cites Horace, lib. i. od. xxxv. 12: "Purpurei metuunt tyranni." Add Tasso. Gier. Lib. c. vii. Luke. V. 8. "Strange horror seize thee, and pangs unfelt before." Par. L. ii. 703. V. 13. An expression similar to this occurs in Sidney. Arcadia, vol. iii. p. 100: “ Ill fortune, my awful gover ness." 66 V. 16. "Non ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco." Luke. V. 20. "If we for HAPPINESS COULD LEISURE find," Hurd's Cowley, vol. i. p. 136: and the note of the editor. And know I have not yet the leisure to be good," Oldham. Ode, st. v. vol. i. p. 83. V. 22. -For men, like butterflies, By vain Prosperity receiv'd, To her they vow their truth, and are again believ'd. Wisdom in sable garb array'd, Immers'd in rapt'rous thought profound, And Melancholy, silent maid, With leaden eye that loves the ground, Still on thy solemn steps attend : Warm Charity, the gen'ral friend, With Justice, to herself severe, And Pity, dropping soft the sadly-pleasing tear. Oh! gently on thy suppliant's head, Dread goddess, lay thy chast'ning hand! Not in thy Gorgon terrors clad, Also, 25 30 35 "The common people swarm like summer flies, And whither fly the gnats, but to the sun.' Henry VI. P. iii. act 2. sc. 9. "Such summer-birds are men!" Tim. of Ath. act iii. sc. 7. But the exact expression is George Herbert's: "fall and flow, like leaves, about me, or like summer-friends, flies of estates and sunshine," Temple, p. 296. And (The W. Devil) v. Dodsley's Old Plays, vol. vi. p. 292. "One summer she." Quarles. Sion's Elegies, xix. "Ah, summer friendship with the summer ends." Mr. Rogers quotes Massinger's Maid of Honor, "O summer friendship." Gray seems to have had Horace in his mind, lib. I. Od. xxxv. 25. V. 25. V. 28. "O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue.' Il Penser. 16. W. "With a sad leaden downward cast, Thou fix them on the earth as fast." Il Penser. 43. W. "So leaden eyes." Sidney. Astroph. and Stella, Song 7. "And stupid eyes that ever loved the ground," Dryden. Cim. and Iphig. v. 57. Melancholy lifts her head," Pope. Ode on St. Cec. v. 30. "The sad companion, dull-eyed Melancholy," Pericles, act i. sc. 2. And so we read "leaden Contemplation" in Love's Lab. Not circled with the vengeful band (As by the impious thou art seen) With thund'ring voice, and threat'ning mien, With screaming Horror's fun'ral cry, Despair, and fell Disease, and ghastly Poverty: 40 Thy form benign, oh goddess, wear, Thy milder influence impart, Thy philosophic train be there To soften, not to wound, my heart. The gen'rous spark extinct revive Teach me to love, and to forgive, Exact my own defects to scan, 45 What others are to feel, and know myself a Man. Lost, act iv. sc. 3. In Beaumont. Passionate Madman, act iii. sc. 1: V. 31. "A look that's fasten'd to the ground, "To Servants kind, to Friendship clear, Carew. Poems, p. 87. And 'Judge of thyself alone, for none there were Oldham. Ode on Ben Jonson, p. 71. vol. ii. "Forgiving others, to himself severe," Dryden. Misc. vi 322. "The Muses' friend unto himself severe," Waller. Poems, p. 149. "Candid to all, but to himself severe," E. Smith. El. on J. Philips, v. Lintot. Misc. p. 161. V. 32. "Ours be the lenient, not unpleasing tear," Thomson. Mr. Rogers quotes Dryden. Virg. Æn. x. a sadlypleasing thought." V. 35. "Gorgoneum turpes crinem mutavit in hydros. Nunc quoque, ut attonitos formidine terreat hostes." Ovid. Met. iv. 801. " Horrentem colubris, vultuque tremendam Milt. Par. L. ii. 611. 66 Val. Flac. vi. 175. 'Medusa with Gorgonian terrors." THE PROGRESS OF POESY. A PINDARIC ODE.* [Finished in 1754. Printed together with the Bard, an Ode. Aug. 8, 1757. MS.] Φωνᾶντα συνετοῖσιν· ἐς Χατίζει. I. 1. PINDAR. OL. II. v. 152. AWAKE, Æolian lyre, awake, And give to rapture all thy trembling strings. Var. V. 1. "Awake, my lyre: my glory, wake." Ms. V. 2. Rapture] Transport. ms. * When the author first published this and the following Ode, he was advised, even by his friends, to subjoin some few explanatory notes; but had too much respect for the understanding of his readers to take that liberty. Gray. V. 1. "Awake, my glory: awake, lute and harp." David's Psalms. Gray. "Awake, awake, my lyre, And tell thy silent master's humble tale." Cowley. Ode of David, vol. ii. p. 423. Pindar styles his own poetry, with its musical accompaniments, Αἰολὶς μολπή, Αἰολίδες χορδαὶ, Αἰολίδων πνοαὶ avλ@v, Æolian song, Æolian strings, the breath of the Eolian flute. Gray.1 The subject and simile, as usual with Pindar, are united. The various sources of poetry, which gives life and lustre to all it touches, are here described; its quiet majestic progress enriching every subject (otherwise dry and barren) with a pomp of diction and luxuriant harmony of numbers; 1 This note was occasioned by a strange mistake of the Critical Reviewers, who supposed the Ode addressed to the "Harp of. Æolus." See Mason. Memoirs, let. 26. sec. 4.; and Crit. Rev. vol. iv. p. 167. And the Literary Magaz. 1757, p. 422; at p. 466 of the same work, is an Ode to Gray on his Pindaric Odes. From Helicon's harmonious springs A thousand rills their mazy progress take : and its more rapid and irresistible course when swoln and hurried away by the conflict of tumultuous passions. Gray. V. 3. Thomson has joined the subject and simile in a passage strongly resembling this: "In thy full language speaking mighty things, Liberty, ii. 257. And see Quinctil. Inst. xii. 10. 61. "At ille qui saxa devolvat," &c. In Huntingford, Apology for his Monostrophics, p. 80, referred to by Wakefield, several passages of Pindar are pointed out, to which he supposes that Gray alluded, viz. Ol. ii. 62. 229. vii. 12. xii. 6. Luke. 5 V. 4 "The melting voice through mazes running." Milt. L'Allegro, 142. V. 5. "Albaque de viridi riserunt lilia prato," Petron. cap. 127. "Ridenti colocasia fundet acantho," Virg. Ecl. iv. 20; and Achilles Tatius has the expression, Tò TέTaλov TŸ Sepúρw yeλã. See Burm. ad Ovid. v. ii. p. 1023. V. 6. "Bibant violaria fontem," Virg. Georg. iv. ver. 32. W. "And mounting in loose robes the skies Shed light and fragrance as she flies." Green. Spleen, v. 79. V. 7. This couplet seems to have been suggested by some lines of Pope. Hor. Epist. II. ii. 171 : "Pour the full tide of eloquence along, Wakefield refers to Pope. Cecilia, 10: "While in more lengthen'd notes, and slow, The deep majestic solemn organs blow." Dr. Berdmore of the Charter-House, in his pamphlet on Literary Resemblance, p. 16, supposes that Gray had Horace in his mind. Od. III. xxix. 32. |