ing every day what my heart condemns."

No one will deny the felicity of the poet thus situated, for his cherished recess is far from the tumults and strife of the world, and yet if inclination prompt, he may taste in full luxuriance the various blessings of society. Virgil sometimes left his retreat and honoured the capital of the world with his presence; he was welcomed at the banquets of Augustus, and at the theatre he received the applauses of the Roman people, Testes Augusti epistolæ, testes ipse populus, qui auditis in theatro versibus Virgilii, surrexit universus, et fortè præsentem spectantemque Virgilium veneratus es, sic quasi Augustum, "Ta prove this, the letters of Augustus are still extant; and the people, we know, hearing in the theatre some verses of Virgil, when he himself was present, rose in a body and paid him every mark of hom, age, with a degree of veneration, nothing short of what they usually offered to the emperour." such scenes were not congenial to the purity and elevation of his mind, He rather loved his green shades and sequestered walks; he admired loneliness and cool tranquillity, where the heart may find utterance for devotion, and poetry may soften the passions to mellowness.

tradictory statements and testimony, are indeed far removed from the tranquillity and cheerful devotion of the worshipper of nature; but the avaricious merchant, the wily speculator, and the idle gen. tleman are also the fit subjects for the experiments of spleen and the tortures of disappointment, The miserable beings, who haunt the publick and private places of dissipation, like thin ghosts of depart ed reality, are far from the sweet complacency of rural scenery and the endless delights of varying na ture. Look at the sad counte, nances of some, and remark the malignant joyfulness of others, who are occupied in schemes, in folly, in riot, in nonsense, and wickedness,...and then wonder at their wishes and pursuits. With such beings the poet has no sympathy. He hates their melancholy and their turbulence. He flies from their contact, as the traveller from a storm, and is glad that he knows their folly only by instinctive aver sion; and he rejoices that the silent contagion of their complaints neve er affects the salubrity of his groves, and that he hears their triumphs and huzzas only by the gentle undulations of distant noise, which softly flow to his retreat. If from necessity he is sometimes obliged to be present at scenes, which his poetry and purity reject, he sighs for his clear sky or shady wood walk, and exclaims in the language of Maternus, Me verò dulces, ut Virgilius ait, Musa, remotum a sollicitudinibus, et curis, et necessitate quotidie aliquid contra O qui me gelidis in vallibus Hæmi Sistat, et ingenti ramorum protegat umbrâ! GEOR. 2. 485

Yet

In his villa near Naples, Virgil the purity and innocence of nature enjoyed all the quiet and silence were fitted necessarily to excite de loved. He was tired of the feelings of goodness and senti. brawis and civil contentions, which ments of piety. Virgil, from his had so long agitated the Roman single objects or his landscapes, commonwealth. Poetry he ador, loves to glide gently into morals ; ed, and with the fullest inspiration the tale is told, and the application of the Muses he composed his is known ; the picture is completo Georgics and part of the Æneid ed, and its virtue is irresistible , in the pleasantness of retirement. the poet has instructed like a He there loved to muse on the preacher, and the preacher has mellowness of the landscape, to charmed like a poet. study the curious economy of his Such sublime effects were parts bees, and to revel in the ransack ly owing to his retirement from of Troy, and luxuriate in the fu. the nonsense and business of the ture splendour of Iulus, Such world. He fled from the stupid was the lovely mind of the poet, admiration of the crowd, and the that, though he was equal to the incessant din of parasites and fools, most dignified elevation in heroick to the tranquillity of his villa and poetry, he continually adverts to the pure musick of nature. Here nature and her analogies. We he passed his hours as his verses accompany Æneas.to hell with sie have celebrated, and enjoyed such blime feelings, and with great in- felicity as Maternus has eulogized, terest are we present at his com- Ac ne fortunam quidem vatum, et bat with Turnus, yet how do we illud felix contubernium,comparare love to linger on the tranquil inlet, timuerim cum inquietâ et anxia retreating from the boisterous o- oratorum ritâ : licet illos certamina céan on the African shore ; and is et pericula sua ad consulatus evex it not most pleasant, like Meli- erint, malo securum et secretum bæus, to talk of liberty and rural Virgilii secessum, in quo tamen life with fortunate old Tityros, re. neque apud divum Angustum gracubans sub tegmine fagi. Study the tiâ caruit, neque apud populum biography of Virgil, read his Ec- Romanum notitiâ. “ If we now fogues and Georgics, and you will consider the happy condition of find how much his mind was de: the true poet, and that easy comvoted to the poetry of nature and merce in which he passes his time, its consequent felicity. He is con- need we fear to compare his situaținually delighted with the fruits tion with that of the boasted ora, of his own farm, the shady beech, tor, who leads a life of anxiety, the curling vines, the hour of even, oppressed by business and overing, the high rock, the young whelmed with care? But it is said, sheep, and the wood-pigeon. With his contention, his toil, and danger, stichi scenes and objects before are steps to the consulship. How him, his fancy was fertile and his much more eligible was the soft pictures were true. His refleca retreat in which Virgil passed his tions and remarks are perfectly days, beloved by the prince, and correspondent. They have all the honoured by the people !" " beauty of truth and all the loveli

QUINTILIAN, ness of morals. It seems as if

a

FOR THE ANTHOLOGY.

SILVA.

• Si cui fortè nonnunquam tempus voluptasque erit lucubratiunculas istas cognoscere, petitum impetratumque volumus ; ut in legendo, que pridem scierint, non aspernentur quasi nota invulgataque: nam et quid tam remytam in litteris est, quin id tamen complusculi isiant ?" A. Gellius, Præf. in Noct. Att.

one

tional poetry aims at accomplish

DR. AIKIN. ing. Surely the morning hymn of It was said by Aikin of the late Adam and Eve in Milton, Thom- Dr. Erifield, that he was perfect son's hymn on the seasons, and the master of what may be called the devotional pieces of Mrs. Barbauld middle style. If any living author are sufficient to rescue English may claim the honour of succeedverse from the censure of Johnson, ing to this character it is Aikin when he says, “ that all attempts himself. His « letters to his to animate devotion by pious poe- son” should be in the hands of try have miscarried.” The true every young man, upon his enreason of these miscarriages I sus- trance into the world, in preference pect is this ; that the finest poets to Little's poems ; and his “ lethave not been the most devotional ters to a young lady upon a course christians, or the greatest saints of English poetry” are worth at have not been the best poets. least as much as any bonnet in

Cornhill. There is a chasteness

of sentiment, a susceptibility of LITERARY ANECDOTE.

poetical beauty, a coolness of deci. It is curious to observe what sion, and a liberality of mind disconfusion, uncertainty, and con

covered in every line of this entradiction involve of our gaging writer, which show the most noted literary anecdotes. influence of literature on a mind, Who has not heard the famous which perhaps bears no very oristory of the student at one of the ginal stamp, but is solid enough English universities, who was re- to take a polish, and pure enough quired to write a theme upon the

to reflect rays of genius, and of miracle at Cana, and having de- taste. layed his task till he was in danger of being punished for his negli

PORT FOLIO. gence, rescued himself by the fol

The editor of this work delowing impromptu.

serves the thanks of his countryThe modest water saw its God and blushed.

men for his perseverance in the

ungrateful task of disciplining the The truth is, that this is a literal taste of a money-getting age. . I version of the last line of a latin will venture to say that the literary epigram of Crashaw, the first col- history of modern times does not lection of whose poems was pub- furnish a more honourable instance lished in 1646. The line alluded of a miscellany devoted exclusiveto is the following.

ly to elegant literature, and relying

for support on the intellectual Lympha pudica Deum vidit & erubuit.

sympathy and lettered generosity This very epigram was after- of a people, whose literary exports wards translated by Aaron Hill, are so few, and so unprofitable, one of the heroes of the Dunciad, and who will long find, I fear, and passed for an original.

that the balance of trade is against

ACCOUNT OF THE PRESENT STATE OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS IN ITALY.

Collected in a tour through that country in 1803, by M. Fernow.