Wakefield conjectures that Pope altered the line from having learnt the erroneousness of the vulgar belief that the sting of the serpent is in its tail. The expression he substituted in the text is borrowed from Dryden's Palamon and Arcite, quoted by Wakefield:
And troops of lions innocently play.
[52] Salem is used for Jerusalem in Psalm lxxvi. 2.
[53] Isaiah lx. 1.—Pope. "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee."
[54] The thoughts of Isaiah, which compose the latter part of the poem, are wonderfully elevated, and much above those general exclamations of Virgil, which make the loftiest parts of his Pollio:
Magnus ab integro sæclorum nascitur ordo
—toto surget gens aurea mundo!
—incipient magni procedere menses!
Aspice, venture lætentur ut omnia sæclo! &c.
The reader needs only to turn to the passages of Isaiah, here cited.—Pope.
[55] The open vowel thy eyes is particularly offensive.—Wakefield.
[56] Isaiah lx. 4.—Pope. "Lift up thine eyes round about, and see: all they gather themselves together, they come to thee: thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters shall be nursed at thy side."
[57] Isaiah lx. 3.—Pope. "And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising."