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Whofe chearful Tenants blefs their yearly toil, Yet to their Lord owe more than to the foil;

COMMENTARY.

a true Tafte, the great end and aim of both be the fame, viz. the general good, in ufe or ornament; yet that their progrefs to this end is carried on in direct contrary courfes; that, in Plating, the private advantage of the neighbourhood is firft promoted, till, by time, it rifes up to a public benefit:

Whose ample Lawns are not asham'd to feed
The milky heifer and deferving fteed;

Whofe ruling Forefts, not for pride or show,
But future Buildings, future Navies grow.

On the contrary, the wonders of Architecture ought first to te bettowed on the public:

Bid Harbors open, public Ways extend,

Bid Temples, worthier of the God, afcend;

Bid the broad Arch the dang'rous flood contain;
The Mole projected break the roaring main.

And when the public has been properly accommodated and adorned, then, and not till then, the works of private Magnificence may take place. This was the order obferv'd by thofe two great I mpires, from whom we received all we have of this polite ait: We do not read of any Magnificence in the private buildings of Greece or Rome, till the generofity of their public fpirit ad adorned the State with Temples, Emporiums, Councilhoufes, Common-Porticos, Baths, and Theatres.

NOTES.

make the examples of good Taste the better understood, introduces them with a fummary of his Precepts in thefe two fublime lines: for, the confulting Ufe is beginning with Senfe; and the making Splendor or Taste borrow all its rays from thence, is going on with Senfe, after the has led us up to Tafte. The art of this can never be fufficiently admired. But the Expreffion is equal to the Thought. This functifying of expence gives us the idea of fomething confecrated and fet apart for facred ules; and indeed, it is the idea under which it may be properly confidered: For wealth employed according to the intention of Providence, is its true confecration; and the real ufes of humanity were certainly firft in its intention.

Whose ample Lawns are not asham'd to feed 185
The milky heifer and deferving fteed;
Whofe rifing Forefts, not for pride or show,
But future Buildings, future Navies, grow:
Let his plantations ftretch from down to down,
First shade a Country, and then raise a Town. 190
You too proceed! make falling Arts your care,
Erect new wonders, and the old repair;
Jones and Palladio to themselves restore,
And be whate'er Vitruvius was before:

Till Kings call forth th' Ideas of your mind, 195 (Proud to accomplish what such hands defign'd,) Bid Harbors open, public Ways extend,

Bid Temples, worthier of the God, afcend;

NOTES.

VER. 195, 197, &c.] 'Till Kings -Bid Harbors open, &c.] The poet after having touched upon the proper objects of Magnificence and Expence, in the private works of great men, comes to those great and public works which become a prince. This Poem was published in the year 1732, when fome of the new-built churches, by the act of Queen Anne, were ready to fall, being founded in boggy land (which is fatirically alluded to in our author's imitation of Horace, Lib. ii. Sat. 2.

Shall half the new-built Churches round thee fall) others were vilely executed, thro' fraudulent cabals between undertakers, officers, &c. Dagenham-breach had done very great mifchiefs; many of the Highways throughout England were hardly paffable; and moft of thofe which were repaired by Turnpikes were made jobs for private lucre, and infamoufly executed, even to the entrance of London itfclf: The pro

Bid the broad Arch the dang'rous Flood contain,
The Mole projected break the roaring Main; 200
Back to his bounds their subject fea command,
And roll obedient Rivers thro' the Land:
These Honours, Peace to happy Britain brings,
These are Imperial Works, and worthy Kings.

NOTES.

pofal of building a Bridge at Weftminster had been petition'd againft and rejected; but in two years after the publication of this poem, an Act for building a Bridge pafs'd thro' both houses. After many debates in the committee, the execution was left to the carpenter above-mentioned, who would have made it a wooden one; to which our auther alludes in these lines,

Who builds a Bridge that never drove a pile?

Should Ripley venture, all the world would smile.

See the notes on that place. P.

MORAL ESSAYS.

EPISTLE V.

To Mr. ADDISON.

Occafion'd by his Dialogues on MEDALS.

EE the wild Waste of all-devouring years! How Rome her own appears, How Rome her own fad Sepulchre appears, With nodding arches, broken temples spread!

The

very Tombs now vanish'd like their dead!

NOTES.

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THIS was originally written in the year 1715, when Mr. Addifon intended to publish his book of Medals; it was sometime before he was Secretary of State; but not published till Mr. Tickell's Edition of his works; at which time the verfes on Mr. Craggs, which conclude the poem, were added, viz. in 1720. P.

EPIST. V.] As the third Epiftle treated of the extremes of Avarice and Profufion; and the fourth took up one particular branch of the latter, namely, the vanity of expence in people of wealth and quality, and was therefore a corollary to the third; fo this treats of one circumstance of that Vanity, as it appears in the common collectors of old coins; and is, therefore, a corollary to the fourth.

5

Imperial wonders rais'd on Nations fpoil'd,
Where mix'd with Slaves the groaningMartyr toil'd:
Huge Theatres, that now unpeopled Woods,
Now drain'd a distant country of her Floods:
Fanes, which admiring Gods with pride furvey, .
Statues of Men, scarce less alive than they!
Some felt the filent ftroke of mould'ring age,
Some hoftile fury, fome religious rage.
Barbarian blindness, Chriftian zeal confpire,
And Papal piety, and Gothic fire.

NOTES.

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VER. 6. Where mix'd with flaves the groaning Martyr toild:] The inattentive reader might wonder how this circumstance came to find a place here. But let him compare it with ✯ 13, 14, and he will fee the Reafon,

Barbarian blindnefs, Chriflian zeal confpire,

And Papal piety, and Gothic fire.

For the Slaves mentioned in the 6th line were of the fame nation with the Barbarians in the 13th: and the Chriftians in the 13th, the Succeffors of the Martyrs in the 6th: Providence ordaining, that thefe fhould ruin what thofe were fo injuriously employed in rearing: for the poet never lofeth fight of his great principle.

VER. 9. Fanes, which admiring Gods with pride furvey,] Thefe Gods were the then Tyrants of Rome, to whom the Empire raifed Temples. The epithet, admiring, conveys a ftrong ridicule; that paffion, in the opinion of Philofophy, always conveying the ideas of ignorance and mifery.

Nil admirari prope res eft una, Numici, Solaque quæ poflit facere et fervare beatum. Admiration implying our ignorance of other things; pride, our ignorance of ourselves.

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