which is leaft natural. A Citizen is no fooner proprietor of a couple of Yews, but he entertains thoughts of erecting them into Giants, like those of Guildhall. I know an eminent Cook, who beautified his country feat with a Coronation-dinner in greens, where you fee the Champion flourifhing on horseback at one end of the table, and the Queen in perpetual youth at the other. For the benefit of all my loving countrymen of this curious taste, I fhall here publish a catalogue of Greens to be difpofed of by an eminent TownGardiner, who has lately applied to me upon this head. He reprefents, that for the advancement of a politer fort of ornament in the Villa's and Gardens adjacent to this great city, and in order to diftinguish thofe places from the meer barbarous countries of grofs nature, the world stands much in need of a virtuofo Gardiner, who has a turn to fculpture, and is thereby capable of improving upon the ancients, in the imagery of Ever-greens. I proceed to his catalogue. Adam and Eve in Yew; Adam a little shattered by the fall of the Tree of Knowledge in the great ftorm; Eve and the Serpent very flourishing. Noah's ark in Holly, the ribs a little damaged for want of water. The Tower of Babel, not yet finished. St. George in Box; his arm scarce long enough, but will be in a condition to stick the Dragon by next April. A green Dragon of the fame, with a tail of GroundIvy for the present. N. B. These two not to be fold feparately. Edward the Black Prince in Cypress. A Lauruftine Bear in Bloffom, with a Juniper Hunter in Berries. A pair of Giants, ftunted, to be fold cheap. A A Queen Elizabeth in Phyllirea, a little inclining to the green fickness, but of full growth. Another Queen Elizabeth in Myrtle, which was very forward, but mifcarried by being too near a Savine. An old Maid of honour in Wormwood. Divers eminent modern Poets in Bays, fomewhat blighted, to be difpofed of a pennyworth. A quick-fet Hog fhot up into a Porcupine, by being forgot a week in rainy weather. A Lavender Pigg, with Sage growing in his belly. A pair of Maidenheads in Firr, in great forward nefs. He alfo cutteth family pieces of men, women, and children, fo that any gentleman may have his lady's effigies in Myrtle, or his own in Horn-beam. Thy Wife fhall be as the fruitful Vine, and thy Children as Olive-branches round thy table. PREFACE PREFACE то HOMER'S ILIAD. H OMER is univerfally allowed to have had the greatest Invention of any writer whatever. The praife of Judgment Virgil has juftly contested with him, and others may have their pretenfions as to particular excellencies; but his Invention remains yet unrival'd. Nor is it a wonder if he has ever been acknowledged the greateft of poets, who most excelled in that which is the very foundation of poetry. It is the invention that in different degrees diftinguishes all great Genius's: The utmoft ftretch of human ftudy, learning, and. induftry, which mafter every thing befides, can never attain to this. It furnishes Art with all her materials, and without it, Judgment itself can at beft but steal wifely: For Art is only like a prudent fteward that lives on managing the riches of Nature. Whatever praises may be given to works of Judgment, there is not even a fingle beauty in them, to which the Invention must not contribute. As in the moft regular gardens, Art can only reduce the beauties of Nature to more regufarity, and fuch a figure, which the common eye may better take in, and is therefore more entertained with. And perhaps the reafon why common Criticks are inclined to prefer a judicious and methodical genius to a great and fruitful one, is, because because they find it easier for themselves to pursue their obfervations through an uniform and bounded walk of Art, than to comprehend the vaft and various extent of Nature. Our author's work is a wild paradife, where if we cannot fee all the beauties fo diftinctly as in an ordered garden, it is only because the number of them is infinitely greater. 'Tis like a copious nurfery which contains the feeds and first productions of every kind, out of which thofe who followed him have but felected fome particular plants, each according to his fancy, to cultivate and beautify. If fome things are too luxuriant, it is owing to the richness of the foil; and if others are not arrived to perfection or maturity, it is only because they are over-run and oppreft by those of a stronger na ture. It is to the ftrength of this amazing invention we are to attribute that unequall'd fire and rapture, which is fo forcible in Homer, that no man of a true poetical fpirit is mafter of himself while be reads him. What he writes, is of the moft animated nature imaginable; every thing moves, every thing lives, and is put in action. If a council be called, or a battle fought, you are not coldly informed of what was faid or done as from a third perfon; the reader is hurried out of himself by the force of the Poet's imagination, and turns in one place to a hearer, in another to a spectator. The courfe of his verfes refembles that of the army he defcribes, Οἱ δ' ὡς ἴσων ὡσεί τε πυρὶ χθῶν πᾶσα νέμοιο They pour along like a fire that fweeps the whole earth before it. 'Tis however remarkable, that his fancy, which is every where vigorous, is not discovered immediately at the beginning of his poem in its fulleft fplendor: It grows in the progress both up on |