It would be easy to adduce similar instances from the ancient sources, but I will only mention from Milton an illustration of the συστρεψας of Demosthenes, and of the passionate abruptness with which Gray commences "The Bard:" "As when of old some orator renown'd In Athens or free Rome, where eloquence Flourish'd, since mute, to some great cause addressed _Stood in himself collected_, while each part, Motion, each act won audience ere the tongue, _Sometimes in height began, as no delay Of preface brooking through his zeal of right_." _Par. Lost_, lib. ix. 670. Wakefield's hypercritical fastidiousness would have completely defeated the intentions of Gray. His "Bard" had a mission to fulfil which could not have been fulfilled by one suspended like king Solomon, in the ancient Jewish traditions, or like Mahomet's coffin, mid-way between heaven and earth. His cry was δος που στω, and the poet heard him. And thus, from his majestic position, was not-- "Every burning word he spoke Full of rage and full of grief?" In the full blaze of poetic phrensy, he flashes out at once with the awfully grand and terrible exordium: "Ruin seize thee, ruthless king! Confusion on thy banners wait! Tho' fann'd by conquest's crimson wing, They mock the air with idle state. Helm, nor hauberk's twisted mail, Nor e'en thy virtues, Tyrant, shall avail To save thy secret soul from nightly fears, From Cambria's curse, from Cambria's tears." Collins thus describes the passion of _anger_: "Next Anger rush'd;--his eyes on fire, In lightnings own'd his secret stings: In one rude clash he struck the lyre, And swept with flurried hand the strings." Word-painting can go no farther. When, however, he comes to _melancholy_, in lines which contain more suggestive beauty, as well as more poetic _inspiration_, than perhaps any others of the same length in the English language, how does he sing? "With eyes upraised, as one inspired, Pale Melancholy _sate_ retired; And, from her wild sequester'd seat, In notes, by distance made more sweet, Pour'd thro' the mellow horn her pensive soul: And, dashing soft from rocks around, Bubbling runnels join'd the sound; Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole, Or o'er some haunted stream with fond delay, Round a holy calm diffusing, Love of peace, and lonely musing, In hollow murmurs died away." _Ode on the Passions._ This is the concentrated essence of poetry. Surely Gray had _forgotten_ Collins when he penned the beautiful lines: