spritely and keen, has, however, not much of heroick poesy:
These are the chief; to number o'er the rest,
And stand like Adam naming every beast,
Were weary work; nor will the Muse describe
A slimy-born, and sun-begotten tribe;
Who far from steeples and their scatter'd sound,
In fields their sullen conventicles found.
These gross, half animated, lumps I leave;
Nor can I think what thoughts they can conceive;
But, if they think at all, 'tis sure no higher
Than matter, put in motion, may aspire;
Souls that can scarce ferment their mass of clay;
So drossy, so divisible are they,
As would but serve pure bodies for allay;
Such souls as shards produce, such beetle things
As only buz to Heaven with evening wings;
Strike in the dark, offending but by chance;
Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance.
They know not beings, and but hate a name;
To them the Hind and Panther are the same.
One more instance, and that taken from the narrative part, where style was more in his choice, will shew how steadily he kept his resolution of heroic dignity.
For when the herd, suffic'd, did late repair
To ferney heaths and to their forest laire,
