*The first line of the 31st pleads the poetic privilege of being allowed to leave something to the imagination, by using a mode of expression not unfrequent with our best writers. In prose, I should have said, "Whether he be a beast of prey, or a man devoted to guilt." Permit me to give you instances of similar ellipsis. In the Fifth Book of Paradise Lost, Satan, addressing the forbidden fruit, "Fair plant, with fruit surcharg’d, Forbid who will, none shall from me with-hold "Whether it be envy or reserve that forbids others to taste of thee," is the implied meaning; and, to people used to poetry, surely sufficiently implied; while the ellipsis, by curtailing the words, gives rapid force to the meaning. Again, in the same poem, Book Tenth, line 245, "Whatever draws me, * Or beast of prey or man, to guilt devote, With fangs terrific, and with burning eyes, Thy brave protector rushes on his throat, And low, in blood, the dark destroyer lies. Milton would have said in prose, by whatever I am drawn, whether by sympathy or by some connatural force."-Also, "Or true, or false, to me it matters not."-Jephson's Nurbon. That is, whether it be true or false; and thus the ever accurate Pope, “ Alike or when, or where, they shone, or shine, This is the most luxuriant use of the ellipsis I recollect in so short a limit-the sense could not have been contained in one couplet, but for the lavish use of that privilege. Johnson tells us, in his Dictionary, that "the particle or, sometimes, but rather inelegantly, stands for either, and sometimes for before, but the latter usage is obsolete." He mentions not that it more frequently supplies the place of four syllables, whether it be. The use of the particle or might have been defined with more justness, thus: "It is one of the privileges of verse to condense expression, by making the little particle or supply the place, first, of four syllables, whether it be; second, of the double syllable, either; and third, of the word before, though this last usage is not common with modern writers, but it is employed with fine effect by the ancient ones. The first usage might be illustrated by the above, or by similar quotations; and the second, where or is substituted for either, as follows: "O Rossanno ! Or give me way, or thou art no more my friend." Rowe's Fair Penitent. "Or grant me this, or with a monarch's claim, Pope's Homer. In the third and last instance, where this particle is used for before, "Or ever your pots be made hot with thorns."-Psalms. "Learn before thou speakest, and use physic, Or ever thou be sick." Ecclesiastes, chap. xviii. verse 19. "The dead man's knell Is there scarce ask'd for whom; and good men's lives Dying, or ere they sicken.”—Shakespeare, I did not expect you would like the * 37th stanza, * Ah wretch ingrate! to liberal hope unknown, Sinks, when thou soarest to the light of Heaven? B because of the second line, which has too much of the bold simplicity of the elder writers in its metaphor to please a taste of so much modern refinement-and yet you do not like the specimens I inclosed from Darwin's refined and splendidly ornamented poem, in which there is nothing of that simplicity which you will not endure in poetry of this day—in truth it is hard to please you. In the 39th I have changed, at your suggestion, the word Omnific for Almighty;-but not because I can agree with you that omnific is quaint, since to me it appears the reverse, but because, on strict examination, it does not suit the sense so well as almighty, since the precise meaning of omnific is all-creating-but how fine is the word in Milton! 66 Silence, ye troubled waves, and thou deep, peace! You will be glad to apply that command to this review of your criticisms; nor shall I be sorry to enforce its obedience ;-but suffer me to assure you that I am extremely obliged by your attention to my poem. It has been to its advantage in several instances. Lichfield, Jan. 24, 1788. If life was not so short, if time did not fly so fast, if connections did not increase so rapidly, I might not have been forced, two years ago, to make a resolution of avoiding to enter into any new correspondences. That resolution has, in the interim, withstood many powerful temptations, and upon its future firmness my ease, and I have reason to think my health, depends. In the apparent quietness of Lichfield, my hours of leisure are few. Filial cares and attentions ;—the transacting all my father's business, social claims, and long-established correspondence with a number of friends;—what, alas, of time so swiftly whirled away, remains to me for needful exercise, and for the beloved employment of reading? Pity therefore, I intreat, the regret I feel when talents, and dispositions, esteemed, and interesting to me as yours, offer me pleasures which I am obliged to decline. Your last letter, like your former, gratified me |