felicity, and notwithstanding the inevitable loss of some happy turns of expression, he has managed to retain both the passion and the poetry. Effusions of sentiment were better adapted to his genius than the heroic narrative of the Thebais; and his limpid measure, which neither resembled the numerous and robuster verse of Statius, nor was suited to an epic theme, accorded with the sweetness and uniformity of Ovid's verse, and with the outpourings of grief and tenderness which are the staple of these epistolary strains. There is no ground for the regret of Warton that Pope should have spent a little time in translating portions of Ovid and Statius. It would be as reasonable to lament that he stooped to the preliminary discipline which made him a poet. He has related that he did not take to translation till he found himself unequal to original composition, and, like all who excel in any department, he learnt, by copying his predecessors, to rival them. SAPPHO TO PHAON.[1] Say, lovely youth,[2] that dost my heart command, Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand? Must then her name the wretched writer prove, To thy remembrance lost, as to thy love? Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose, 5 The lute neglected, and the lyric muse;[3] Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow. And tuned my heart to elegies of woe. I burn, I burn, as when through ripened corn By driving winds the spreading flames are borne![4] 10 Phaon to Ætna's scorching fields retires, While I consume with more than Ætna's fires![5] No more my soul a charm in music finds; Music has charms alone for peaceful minds.[6] Soft scenes of solitude no more can please, 15 Love enters there, and I'm my own disease. No more the Lesbian dames my passion move, Once the dear objects of my guilty love; All other loves are lost in only thine, Ah youth ungrateful to a flame like mine! 20 Whom would not all those blooming charms surprise, Those heav'nly looks, and dear deluding eyes? The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear, A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear; Would you with ivy wreathe your flowing hair, 25 Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare: Yet Phoebus loved, and Bacchus felt the flame, One Daphne warmed, and one the Cretan dame;[7] Nymphs that in verse no more could rival me, Than ev'n those gods contend in charms with thee.[8] 30 The muses teach me all their softest lays, And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise. Though great Alcæus more sublimely sings, And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings, No less renown attends the moving lyre, 35 Which Venus tunes, and all her loves inspire; To me what nature has in charms denied,