While they ring round the same unvary'd chimes,
With sure returns of still expected rhymes;

Where'er you find "the cooling western breeze," 350
In the next line, it "whispers thro' the trees:"

If chrystal streams" with pleasing murmurs creep," The reader's threaten'd (not in vain) with "sleep;" Then at the last and only couplet fraught

With some unmeaning thing they call a thought, 355

A needless Alexandrine ends the song,

That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along.

Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and know

What's roundly smooth, or languishingly slow;

And praise the easy vigour of a line,

360

Where Denham's strength, and Waller's sweetness join.

True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,

As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.

'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence,

The sound must seem an echo to the sense. 365

A trepar nelle, déz palavras baxas.

Em quanto o carrilhaõ sabido toca

Vem sem falencia a rima ja sabida.

Onde acharmos que o Zephiro sóspira,

No

que segue, entre as folhas se retira.

Se vai sereno o rio, que

abandono

Arrisco o meu leitor a ganhar sono
Mas enfim huma strophe he necessaria,
Suprem com certo insulso ditto a idea

Que hum escusado Alexandrino acaba

E qual ferida cobra ali s'estira.

Deichalos entoar insulsas rimas

E saibamos o que he suave ou frouxo

O vigôr facil de hum bom verso amemos,

Que á doçura de Waller, junta a força

que

Com Denham faz resoar a lyra

Vem d'arte o escrever bem naõ vem do acáso.

Quem aprende a dançar, melhor se move,

Nao basta a o verso, ser brando, innocente

O som déve ser éco do sentido

420

425

430

435

Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,

And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;

But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,

The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar. When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, The line too labours, and the words move slow: 371 Not so, when swift Camilla-scours the plain,

Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the

main.

Hear how Timotheus' vary'd lays surprise,

And bid alternate passions fall and rise!

375

While at each change, the son of Lybian Jove

Now burns with glory, and then melts with love:

Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,

Now sighs steal out, and tears begin to flow:

He doce o verso, em que o favonio sópra

440

Placido corre, o numero cadente,

Que o murmurio imita da corrente.

Mas quando a vaga altiva a praia bate,
Affoito, impetuoso s'incapelle,

Como a torrente rouca o verso atroe.

445

Se com pezadas rochas Ajax tenta
Com violencia atirár, forceje o verso,
Os termos com trabalho vao nascendo.
Nao assim, se as espigas se nao vergao
Se as espumas do már se naõ desfazem
Quando Camilla rapida passeia.

A Thimoteo escutai nos sons variados
Como acende as paxões, como as acalma !

Cada modulaçaõ cria hum prodigio.
Do Libio Jove o filho, n'alma sente
Ora hum ardôr de gloria, que o devora
Ora de amor hum fogo que o derrete.
Sae' de seus olhos dardos furiosos

Rompem seu peito, os ais, seu pranto corre;

450

455

Persians and Greeks like turns of Nature found, 380

And the world's victor stood subdu'd by sound!

The pow'r of music all our hearts allow,

And what Timotheus was, is Dryden now.

Avoid extremes; and shun the fault of such,

Who still are pleas'd too little or too much;

385

At ev'ry trifle scorn to take offence,

That always shows great pride, or little sense:

Those heads, as stomachs, are not sure the best,

Which nauseate all, and nothing can digest.

Yet let not each gay turn thy rapture move;

390

For fools admire, but men of sense approve:

As things seem large which we through mists descry,

Dulness is ever apt to magnify.

Some foreign writers, some our own despise;

The Ancients only, or the Moderns prize.

395