fully be inferted. But in the higher kinds of poetry, they appear as unnatural and out of place, as one of the burlefque fcenes of Hemfkirke would do in a folemn landscape of Pouffin.

"On the revival of literature, the first writers feemed not to have obferved any SELECTION in their thoughts and images. Dante, Petrarch, Boccacio, Ariofto, make very fudden tranfitions. from the fublime to the ridiculous. Chaucer, in his Temple of Mars, among many pictures, has brought in a strange line:

The coke is fcalded for all his long ladell.

Again,

As Efop's dogs contending for the bone *.

"No writer has more religiously observed the decorum here recommended than Virgil †."

If we examine the poems of Boyardo and Ariofto, we fhall find that the second, with refpect to the epic part, the wars of Charlemain

* Dryden has turned the first line thus:

And the cook caught within the raging fire he made.

But he has retained the fecond line.

Effay on the Genius and Writings of Pope, vol. i

Page 410.

and Agramant, is not defective in point of unity, as it fets forth one great action, the Invasion of France by the Saracens, and concludes with the victory of the Chriftians, by the death or defeat of all the Pagan leaders, although this great action is broken and interrupted, from time to time, by an infinity of epifodes and romantic adventures, artfully connected with each other, and interwoven with the general fable. But Boyardo has no pretence to unity in any part of his vaft and heterogeneous compofition, which, befide the leffer incidents, confifts of three diftinct great actions: the invafion of France by Gradaffo, for the conquest of Durindana and Boyardo the fiege of Albracca by Agrican king of Tartary, and the other enemies of Galaphron, and his daughter Angelica: and the Invafion of France by Agramant to revenge the death of Troyano.

But, notwithstanding Ariosto has undoubtedly a better claim to unity of action, and regularity of defign, than his predeceffor; yet it is very plain that he never intended to write a regular Epic poem, but that he adopted the fashionable mode of that time. As an inftance of the taste. then prevalent for the wild and defultory narratives of romance, it is faid, that when Bernardo b 2 Taffo

Taffo conceived the defign of compofing a poem from the Amadis de Gaul, he had at firft reduced it to the plan of a regular Epic, and in that state read part of it to his friends, who gave it fo cool a reception, that he thought it advifeable to change his purpofe, and treat his fubject in the fame manner as the other popular writers, or Romanzatori *,

Thus Ariofto, having undertaken to continue a well-known story, begun and left unfinished by Boyardo, was neceffarily led to vary his narative and diction, as the different fubjects required and therefore in him is to be found a greater variety of stile and manner, than perhaps in any other author.

From the romantic turn of his fable, and the motley character of his writing, many of the French critics, and fome others, have been induced, in the cool phlegm of criticism, to pafs the feverest censures on Ariofto; but it will be feen that fuch cenfures are in general futile, being founded on the mistaken opinion, that the Orlando is to be tried by the rules of Ariftotle, and the examples of Homer and Virgil: but as no

*Romance-writers in verfe. See preface to the AMADIGI of Bernardo Taffo.

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writers

writers of real tafte, however strongly prejudiced with the idea of claffic excellence, could peruse the Italian poem without fenfibly feeling its beauties, it follows that their obfervations often appear a contradictory mixture of praife and cenfure, of which the reader will have fome idea from the following paffages of Baillet, in his Jugemens des favans*. 6

X "It is a general received opinion in Italy, that the Orlando Furiofo has entirely furpaffed every performance that appeared before it, particularly the Orlando of Boyardo, and the Morgante of Pulci: the laft by dignity of incidents and majesty of verfification, and the former by completing and bringing to perfection the inventions of the count . M. Rofteau gives it as his opinion, that the Orlando Furiofo had no fuperior, or rival, till the Godfrey of Tafso, which appeared afterwards in the world,

"Never was any other piece filled with fo many and various events as the poem of Ariofto: the whole is a mixture of combats, enchantments, and grotefque adventures; and it is faid, that the wits of Italy are ftill divided concerning the merits of this work, and the Jerufalem Delivered.

Poetes modernes.

+ Paul. Jovius.

b

3

"The

"The Orlando seems to be a trophy raised from the spoils of every other Italian production, in which the author has neglected nothing that his genius or industry could supply him with, in order to enrich his poem, and give it the utmost perfection.

"Father Rapin has discovered many blemishes in the Orlando Furiofo*. In one part he finds that the poet has too much fire; in another, that he is crowded with fupernatural events, which are like the crude imaginations of a distempered brain, and which can never be admired by men of fenfe, as bearing no refemblance of truth.

He fays, befides, that his defign is too vast, without proportion or justness; that his episodes are affected, improbable, injudiciously introduced, and often out of nature; that his heroes are only Paladins, and that his poem breathes more an air of romantic chivalry, than a fpirit of heroifm.

"In other places, he confeffes that Ariofto is pure, elevated, sublime, and admirable in expreffion; that his defcriptions are mafter-pieces, but that he is altogether deficient in judgment; that the beauty of his expreffion, joined to the other *Reflect, critiq. fur la poefi.

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