"So prayed they, innocent, and to their thoughts
Firm peace recover'd soon and wonted calm;
On to their morning's rural work they haste,
Among sweet dews and flowers, where any row
Of fruit-trees over-woody reach'd too far
Their pamper'd boughs, and needed hands to check
Fruitless embraces; or they led the vine
To wed the elm."
Milton's Paradise Lost, Book v., from line 209 to 216.
Here the tense changes three times.
Again:—
"Straight knew him all the bands
Of angels under watch, and to his state
And to his message high in honour rise,
For on some message high they guess'd him bound."
Ibid., Book v., from line 288 to 291.
"Thus while he spoke, the virgin from the ground
Upstarted fresh; already closed the wound;
And unconcern'd for all she felt before,
Precipitates her flight along the shore:
The hell-hounds as ungorged with flesh and blood
Pursue their prey and seek their wonted food;
The fiend remounts his courser, mends his pace,
And all the vision vanish'd from the place."
Dryden's Theod. and Honor.
Pope—not without reason esteemed for verbal correctness and precision—far exceeds all in his lavish use of this privilege, as one or two quotations will amply suffice to show.
"She said, and to the steeds approaching near
Drew from his seat the martial charioteer;
The vigorous Power[E] the trembling car ascends,
Fierce for revenge, and Diomed attends:
The groaning axle bent beneath the load," &c.