All this, it must be confessed, is sufficiently wild ; yet the author, we see, thinks of his proprieties in the midst of it; and the critic, who is about to cry out against the dancing statues, will probably check himself, on the sudden, by recollecting the walking images and peripatetic footstools in Homer. In fact, it is of these very images that the poet has made use. The conclusion of the piece is very quiet and pleasing Peace and silence be the guide To the man, and to the bride. If there be a joy yet new In marriage, let it fall on you. &c. In the Cœlum Britannicum, which represents the Pagan heaven as having resolved, out of pure emulation of the British court, to lead a better life and rid the constellations of their unworthy occupants, a variety of allegorical persons come before Mercury and Momus to shew the extensiveness of their sovereignty and lay claim to the vacant places. Among others, Poverty . and Pleasure appear, the former of whom is described as a woman of a pale colour, large brims of a hat upon her head, through which her hair started up like a Fury; her robe was of a dark colour full of patches; about one of her hands was tyed a chaine of iron, to which was fastned a weighty stone, which she bore up under her arm." Mercury after hearing her pretensions, which are of the Stoical cast, dismisses her with an invective, which begins thus :— Thou dost presume too much, poor needy wretch, To claim a station in the firmament, Because thy humble cottage, or thy tub, In the cheap sunshine, or by shady springs, And Gorgon-like, turns active men to stone. The picture of Pleasure is that of " a young woman with a smiling face, in a light lascivious habit, adorned with silver and gold, her temples crowned with a garland of roses, and over that a rainbow circling her head down to her shoulders." Poverty's speech is followed with a dance of Gypsies, Pleasure's with that of the Five Senses: but Mercury dismisses her in like manner, commencing, among other images of a less original complexion, with some that are very lively and forcible : Bewitching Syren, gilded rottenness, Which, as thy joyes 'gin tow'rds their West decline, Thy dwarfish stature. For the third, or lyrical part of the Mask, nothing can equal in point of richness and harmonious variety the songs in Comus,-that, for instance, beginning Sabrina fair, Listen where thou art sitting Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave, In twisted braids of lilies knitting The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair the lyrics in the Faithful Shepherdess are also models of this kind in point of grace and a light touching; nor could Ben Jonson have more completely proved his fitness for writing Masks than by the single production of that most accomplished invocation to Diana in Cynthia's Revels; Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, Now the sun is laid to sleep, Seated in thy silver chair, State in wonted manner keep*; &c. but to conclude the specimens from the more decided Mask, the following passage may be taken from the Circe of Browne. The Charme, though falling off towards the conclusion, has been quoted by Warton * Act 5. Sc. 6. in his History of Poetry with a just feeling of admiration. THE SONGE OF NYMPHES IN THE WOOD. What sing the sweet birds in each grove? Nought but love. What sound our echoes, day and night? All delighte. What doth each wynd breathe us, that fleetes? Endlesse sweetes. CHORUS. Is there a place on earth this isle excels, Or any nymphes more happy live than we, When all our songes, our soundes, and breathinges be, CIRCE. Yet holdes soft sleepe his course. Now, Ithacus, Ajax would offer hecatombes to us, And Ilium's ravish'd wifes, and childlesse sires, With incense dym the bright ætherial fires, Vol. 2. Sect. 16. |