"Nessun maggior dolore Che ricordarsi del tempo felice Ne la miseria." --_Collier._ [5] Two romances of the time, very well known, often reprinted, and frequently mentioned in old authors.--_Collier._ [6] _i.e._, _Shrive_ her, hear her at confession. So in Shakespeare's "King Richard III."-- "What, talking with a priest, Lord Chamberlain? Your lordship hath no _shriving_-work in hand." --_Steevens._ [7] These lines seem a parody on the following one in "Bonduca," by Beaumont and Fletcher, act iv. sc. 3-- "_Lie lightly on my ashes, gentle earth._" The time when Prior wrote his beautiful Ode to the Memory of Colonel George Villiers, drowned in the river Piave, in Friuli, 1703, is so near the period in which Mr Pope composed his elegy to the memory of an unfortunate lady, that it is difficult to say which of these great men borrowed from the other. It appears certain, however, that one of them, in the following lines, was indebted to his friend, unless it can be supposed that both of them were obliged to the above line of Beaumont and Fletcher. Prior says-- "Lay the dead hero graceful in a grave (The only honour he can now receive), And fragrant mould upon his body throw. And plant the warrior laurel o'er his brow; _Light lie the earth_, and flourish green the bough." Mr Pope writes thus-- "What though no sacred earth allow thee room, Nor hallow'd dirge be mutter'd o'er thy tomb; Yet shall thy grave with rising flowers be drest, And thy green turf _lie lightly on thy breast_." I know not why we should suppose that Pope borrowed from Prior, or that either of them was indebted to Beaumont and Fletcher on this occasion. _Sit tibi terra levis!_ is a wish expressed in many of the ancient Roman inscriptions. So in that on Pylades-- "Dicite qui legitis, _solito de more_, sepulto, Pro meritis, Pylade, _sit tibi terra levis_!" Again, in the sepulchral dialogue supposed to pass between Atimetus and Homonoea-- "_Sit tibi terra levis_, mulier dignissima vita!" Again, in Propertius, El. xvii. lib. 1-- "Et mihi _non ullo pondere terra_ foret." Again, in Ovid-- "Et sit _humus cineri non onerosa_ tuo!" Thus also Juvenal, Sat. vii.-- "Di majorum umbris _tenuem et sine pondere terram_, Spirantesque crocos, et in urna perpetuum ver!" Again, in Persius, Sat. i.-- "Non _levior cippus nunc imprimit ossa_? ... nunc non e manibus illis, Nunc non e tumulo fortunataque favilla Nascentur violæ?" On the contrary, _Sit tibi terra gravis_ and _Urgeat ossa lapis_ were usual maledictions, the ancients supposing that the soul remained for some time after death with the body, and was partner in its confinement. The latter of these wishes is ludicrously adopted by Dr Evans, in his epitaph on Sir J. Vanbrugh-- "_Lie heavy on him, earth!_ for he Laid many a heavy weight on thee."