opinion, as mine, can be of no weight. But I am ingenuous; and I am strongly impressed with a feeling of what I am going to advance: therefore my boldness will be forgiven by all readers whom I would wish to please.
Tasso is a greater poet than Virgil. Pope will be admired as long as the English language is understood; and as long as the human breast glows, while it imbibes the sacred flame of poetry. An Englishman, who is sensible to the charms of the Muses, and free from prejudice, not [1]bristled with Greek, however profound a Grecian he may be, would not so much regret the loss of the original Iliad, as of Pope's translation of that poem.
It may be objected to the Amyntas, especially in this free translation, that it hath sentiments by no means characteristick of rural life. But let me be permitted to observe, that if Tasso's Doric Muse appears sometimes in the buskin, she wears it not absurdly: his shep-
- ↑ Un pédant enyvré de sa vaine science,
Tout hérisé de Grec, tout bouffi d'arrogance;
Et qui, de mille auteurs, retenus mot pour mot,
Dans sa tête entassés, n'a souvent fait qu'un sot,
Croit qu'un livre fait tout, et que sans Aristote,
La raison ne voit goute, et le bon sens radote.
Boileau, Satire iv.
herds
