"Dura pan, cursuque pedum praevertere ventos.
Illa vel intactae segetis per summa volaret
Gramina nec teneras cursu laesisset aristas;
Vel mare per medium fluctu suspensa tumenti,
Ferret iter, celeres nec tingeret aequore plantas."
Aen. vii 807-811.
Thus rendered by Dryden.
"Outstripped the winds in speed upon the plain,
Flew o'er the fields, nor hurt the bearded grain;
She swept the seas, and as she skimmed along,
Her flying feet unbathed on billows hung">[
[!--Line Note 374-381--] [ [!--Line Note 374-381--] [Lines 374-381: This passage refers to Dryden's ode, Alexander's Feast, or The Power of Music. Timotheus, mentioned in it, was a musician of Boeotia, a favorite of Alexander's, not the great musician Timotheus, who died before Alexander was born, unless, indeed, Dryden have confused the two.]
[!--Line Note 376--] [Line 376: The son of Libyan Jove.—A title arrogated to himself by Alexander.]
[!--Line Note 393--] [Line 393: Dullness here 'seems to be incorrectly used. Ignorance is apt to magnify, but dullness reposes in stolid indifference.']
[!--Line Note 441--] [Line 441: Sentences—Passages from the Fathers of the Church who were regarded as decisive authorities on all disputed points of doctrine.]
[!--Line Note 444--] [Line 444: Scotists—The disciples of Duns Scotus, one of the most famous and influential of the scholastics of the fourteenth century, who was opposed to Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274), another famous scholastic, regarding the doctrines of grace and the freedom of the will, but especially the immaculate conception of the Virgin. The followers of the latter were called Thomists, between whom and the Scotists bitter controversies were carried on.]
[!--Line Note 445--] [Line 445: Duck Lane.—A place near Smithfield where old books were sold. The cobwebs were kindred to the works of these controversialists, because their arguments were intricate and obscure. Scotus is said to have demolished two hundred objections to the doctrine of the immaculate conception, and established it by a cloud of proofs.]
[!--Line Note 459--] [Line 459: Parsons.—This is an allusion to Jeremy Collier, the author of A Short View etc, of the English Stage. Critics, beaux.—This to the Duke of Buckingham, the author of The Rehearsal.]