The longest tyranny that ever swayed
Was that wherein our ancestors betrayed
Their free-born reason to the Stagyrite,
And made his torch their universal light.
Had we still paid that homage to a name,
Which only God and nature justly claim,
The western seas had been our utmost bound,
Where poets still might dream the sun was drowned,
And all the stars that shine in southern skies
Had been admired by none but savage eyes.
[261] Oldham—
Each strain a graceful negligence does wear.—Wakefield.
[262] "Before he goes ten lines further," said Dennis, "he forgets himself, and commends Longinus for the very contrary quality for which he commended Horace. He commends Horace for judging coolly in verse, and extols Longinus for criticising with fire in prose." With very little faith in the traits he had ascribed to Horace, Pope was tempted in the manuscript to reverse the characteristic, and write
He judged with spirit as he sung with fire.
He subsequently affixed to the original reading the note, "Not to be altered. Horace judged with coolness as Longinus with fire."
[263] Dennis notices that this couplet is borrowed from Roscommon's Essay on Translated Verse:
Thus make the proper use of each extreme,
And write with fury, but correct with phlegm.
[264] In all Pope's works there cannot be found a couplet so paltry and impertinent as this.—Wakefield.
The construction of the last line is deplorably faulty. "Horace does not suffer more by wits than he suffers by critics" is Pope's meaning, but interpreted by his language, he would be read as asserting that Horace did not suffer more by wrong translations than critics suffered by wrong quotations.