purity for the standard of their language; and a masculine vigour is that of ours. Like their tongue is the genius of their poets, light and trifling in comparison of the English—more proper for sonnets, madrigals, and elegies than heroic poetry. The turn on thoughts and words is their chief talent: but the epic poem is too stately to receive those little ornaments. The painters draw their nymphs in thin and airy habits, but the weight of gold and of embroideries is reserved for queens and goddesses. Virgil is never frequent in those turns, like Ovid, but much more sparing of them in his “Æneis” than in his Pastorals and Georgics. “_Ignoscenda quidem_, _scirent si ignoscere manes_.” That turn is beautiful indeed; but he employs it in the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, not in his great poem. I have used that licence in his “Æneis” sometimes, but I own it as my fault; it was given to those who understand no better. It is like Ovid’s “_Semivirumque bovem_, _semibovemque virum_.” The poet found it before his critics, but it was a darling sin which he would not be persuaded to reform. The want of genius, of which I have accused the French, is laid to their charge by one of their own great authors, though I have forgotten his name, and where I read it. If rewards could make good poets, their great master has not been wanting on his part in his bountiful encouragements; for he is wise enough to imitate Augustus if he had a Maro. The Triumvir and Proscriber had descended to us in a more hideous form than they now appear, if the emperor had not taken care to make friends of him and Horace. I confess the banishment of Ovid was a blot in his escutcheon; yet he was only banished, and who knows but his crime was capital? And then his exile was a favour. Ariosto, who, with all his faults, must be acknowledged a great poet, has put these words into the mouth of an Evangelist; but whether they will pass for gospel now I cannot tell:— “Non fu si santo ni benigno Augusto, Come la tuba di Virgilio suona; L’haver havuto in poesia buon gusto, La proscrittione iniqua gli pardona.”