These difficulties are not easily to be solved, without confessing that Virgil had not life enough to correct his work, though he had reviewed it, and found those errours which he resolved to mend ; but being prevented by death, and not willing to leave an imperfect work behind him, he ordained, by his last testament, that his NEIS should be burned. As for the death of Aruns, who was shot by a goddess, the machine was not altogether so outrageous, as the wounding Mars and Venus by the sword of Diomede. Two divinities, one would have thought, might have pleaded their prerogative of impassibility, or at least not have been wounded by any mortal hand. Beside that the xwe which they shed, was so very like our common blood, that it was not to be distinguished from it, but only by the name and colour. As for what Horace says in his ART OF POETRY, that no machines are to be used, unless on some extraordinary occasion,

Nec deus intersit, nisi dignus vindice nodus,— that rule is to be applied to the theatre, of which he is then speaking; and means no more than this, that when the knot of the play is to be untied, and no other way is left for making the dis covery, then, and not otherwise, let a god descend upon a rope, and clear the business to the audience. But this has no relation to the machines which are used in an epick poem.

In the last place, for the Dira, or flying pest, which flapping on the shield of Turnus, and flut

tering about his head, disheartened him in the duel, and presaged to him his approaching death, -I might have placed it more properly amongst the objections; for the criticks, who lay want of courage to the charge of Virgil's hero, quote this passage as a main proof of their assertion: they say, our author had not only secured him before the duel, but also, in the beginning of it, had given him the advantage in impenetrable arms, and in his sword; for that of Turnus was not his own, which was forged by Vulcan for his father, but a weapon which he had snatched in haste, and by mistake, belonging to his charioteer, Metiscus. That, after all this, Jupiter, who was partial to the Trojan, and distrustful of the event, though he had hung the balance, and given it a jog of his hand to weigh down Turnus, thought convenient to give the Fates a collateral security, by sending the screech-owl to discourage him. For which they quote these words of Virgil:

non me tua turbida virtus

Terret, ait; dii me terrent, et Jupiter hostis. *

In answer to which, I say, that this machine is one of those which the poet uses only for ornament, and not out of necessity. Nothing can be more beautiful, or more poetical, than his description of the three Dira, or the setting of the

* Our author here again quotes inaccurately. See EN. xii. 895.

— non me tua fervida terrent Dicta, ferox; dii me terrent, et Jupiter hostis.

balance, which our Milton has borrowed from him, but employed to a different end; for first he makes God Almighty set the scales for St. Gabriel and Satan, when he knew no combat was to follow; then he makes the good angel's scale descend, and the devil's mount; quite contrary to Virgil, if I have translated the three verses according to my author's sense:

Jupiter ipse duas æquato examine lances

Sustinet, et fata imponit diversa duorum;

Quem damnet labor, et quo vergat pondere letum. For I have taken these words, Quem damnet labor, in the sense which Virgil gives them in another place,-(Damnabis tu quoque votis,) to signify a prosperous event. Yet I dare not condemn so great a genius as Milton; for I am much mistaken, if he alludes not to the text in Daniel, where Belshazzar was put into the balance, and found too light. This is digression, and I return to my subject. I said above, that these two machines, of the balance, and the Dira, were only ornamental, and that the success of the duel had been the same without them. For when Æneas and Turnus stood fronting each other before the altar, Turnus looked dejected, and his colour faded in his face, as if he desponded of the victory before the fight; and not only he, but all his party, when the strength of the two champions was judged by the proportion of their limbs, concluded it was impar pugna, and that their chief was overmatched. Whereupon Juturna, who was of the same opinion,

took this opportunity to break the treaty, and renew the war. Juno herself had plainly told the nymph beforehand, that her brother was to fight

Imparibus fatis; nec diis, nec viribus æquis;

so that there was no need of an apparition to fright Turnus; he had the presage within himself of his impending destiny. The Dira only served to confirm him in his first opinion, that it was his destiny to die in the ensuing combat. And in this sense are those words of Virgil to be taken : non me tua turbida virtus

Terret, ait; dii me terrent, et Jupiter hostis.

I doubt not but the adverb, solum, is to be understood; "it is not your valour only that gives me this concernment, but I find also, by this portent, that Jupiter is my enemy:" for Turnus fled before, when his first sword was broken, till his sister supplied him with a better; which indeed he could not use, because Æneas kept him at a distance with his spear. I wonder Ruæus saw not this, where he charges his author so unjustly for giving Turnus a second sword to no purpose. How could he fasten a blow, or make a thrust, when he was not suffered to approach? Besides, the chief errand of the Dira was to warn Juturna from the field; for she could have brought the chariot again, when she saw her brother worsted in the duel. I might farther add, that Æneas was so eager of the fight, that he left the city, now almost in his possession, to decide his quarrel with

Turnus by the sword: whereas Turnus had manifestly declined the combat, and suffered his sister to convey him as far from the reach of his enemy as she could. I say, not only suffered her, but consented to it; for it is plain he knew her by these words:

O soror, et dudum agnovi, cum prima per artem
Fadera turbasti, teque hæc in bella dedisti ;

Et tunc necquicquam fallis dea; - -

I have dwelt so long on this subject, that I must contract what I have to say in reference to my translation; unless I would swell my Preface into a volume, and make it formidable to your Lordship, when you see so many pages yet behind. And indeed what I have already written, either in justification or praise of Virgil, is against myself, for presuming to copy, in my coarse English, the thoughts and beautiful expressions of this inimitable poet; who flourished in an age when his language was brought to its last perfection, for which it was particularly owing to him and Horace. I will give your Lordship my opinion, that those two friends had consulted each other's judgment, wherein they should endeavour to excel; and they seem to have pitched on propriety of thought, elegance of words, and harmony of numbers. According to this model, Horace writ his Odes and Epodes; for his Satires and Epistles, being intended wholly for instruction, required another style,

(Ornari res ipsa negat, contenta doceri ;)