Can there be a doubt that he borrowed this beautiful _farewell_ from an obscure poet, quoted by Poole, in his "English Parnassus," 1657? The date of Milton's great work, I find since, admits the conjecture: the first edition being that of 1669. The homely lines in Poole are these, To Thetis' watery bowers the _sun_ doth hie, BIDDING FAREWELL unto the gloomy sky. Young, in his "Love of Fame," very adroitly improves on a witty conceit of Butler. It is curious to observe that while Butler had made a remote allusion of a _window_ to a _pillory_, a conceit is grafted on this conceit, with even more exquisite wit. Each WINDOW like the PILLORY appears, With HEADS thrust through: NAILED BY THE EARS! _Hudibras_, Part ii. c. 3, v. 301. An opera, like a PILLORY, may be said To NAIL OUR EARS down, and EXPOSE OUR HEAD. YOUNG'S _Satires_. In the Duenna we find this thought differently illustrated; by no means imitative, though the satire is congenial. Don Jerome alluding to the _serenaders_ says, "These amorous orgies that steal the senses in the _hearing_; as they say Egyptian embalmers serve mummies, _extracting the brain through the ears_." The wit is original, but the subject is the same in the three passages; the whole turning on the allusion to the _head_ and to the _ears_. When Pope composed the following lines on Fame, How vain that second life in others' breath, The ESTATE which wits INHERIT after death; Ease, health, and life, for this they must resign, (Unsure the _tenure_, but how vast the _fine!_) _Temple of Fame_. he seems to have had present in his mind a single idea of Butler, by which he has very richly amplified the entire imagery. Butler says, Honour's a LEASE for LIVES TO COME, And cannot be extended from The LEGAL TENANT. _Hudibras_, Part i. c. 3, v. 1043. The same thought may be found in Sir George Mackenzie's "Essay on preferring Solitude to public Employment," first published in 1665: Hudibras preceded it by two years. The thought is strongly expressed by the eloquent Mackenzie: "_Fame is a revenue payable only to our ghosts_; and to deny ourselves all present satisfaction, or to expose ourselves to so much hazard for this, were as great madness as to starve ourselves, or fight desperately for food, to be laid on our tombs after our death." Dryden, in his "Absalom and Achitophel," says of the Earl of Shaftesbury, David for him his tuneful harp had strung, _And Heaven had wanted one immortal song_. This verse was ringing in the ear of Pope, when with equal modesty and felicity he adopted it in addressing his friend Dr. Arbuthnot. Friend of my life; which did not you prolong, _The world had wanted many an idle song!_