Page:Poetical Works of the Right Hon. Geo. Granville.djvu/78

The Roman wit,^[1] who impiouſly divides
His hero and his gods to different ſides,
I would condemn, but that, in ſpite of ſenſe,
Th’ admiring world ſtill ſtands in his defence.^{[Explanation 1]}
How oft, alas! the beſt of men in vain85
Contend for bleſſings which the worſt obtain?
The gods permitting traitors to ſucceed
Become not parties in an impious deed,
And by the tyrant’s murder we may find
That Cato and the gods were of a mind.90

Till all the purple current dry’d and ſpent,
He fell, and made the waves his monument.
Where ſhall the next fam’d Granville’s aſhes ſtand?
Thy grandſire’s fill the ſea, and thine the land.

I cannot ſay the two laſt lines in which conſiſts the ſting or point of the epigram, are ſtrictly conformable to the rule herein ſet down: the word aſhes, metaphorically, can ſignify nothing but fame, which is mere ſound, and can fill no ſpace either of land or ſea: the Welchman however muſt be allowed to have outdone the Gaſcon. The fallacy of the French epigram appears at firſt ſight; but the Engliſh ſtrikes the fancy, ſuſpends and dazzles the judgment, and may perhaps be allowed to paſs under the ſhelter of those daring hyperboles which, by preſenting an obvious meaning, make their way, according to Seneca, through the incredible to true.

Victrix cauſa Deis placuit, ſed victa Catoni.
The conſent of ſo many ages having eſtabliſhed the reputation of this line, it may perhaps be preſumption to attack it; but it is not to be ſuppoſed that Cato, who is deſcribed to have been a man of rigid morals and ſtrict devotion, more reſembling the gods than men, would have choſen any party in oppoſition to thoſe gods whom he profeſſed to adore. The poet

1. Lucan.