Gray himself noted the Miltonic anticipation of this line (see Gosse's edition, 1884). The lines Lamb quotes are from Paradise Lost, I., lines 536-537.
[Page 181,] line 6 of essay. Heywood's old play. "The Four 'Prentices of London," by Thomas Heywood. The speech is that of Turnus respecting the Persian Sophy. It is copied in one of Lamb's Commonplace Books.
[Page 182.] VIII.—[An American War for Helen.]
The Examiner, September 26, 1813. Signed ‡. Reprinted under the above title by Leigh Hunt in The Indicator, January 3, 1821.
[Page 182,] line 1 of essay. A curious volume. Hazlitt's Handbook to the Popular, Poetical and Dramatic Literature of Great Britain, 1867, gives the title as Alexandri Fultoni Scoti Epigrammatum Libri Quimque. Perth, 1679. 8vo.
[Page 182,] line 9. "The master of a seminary ... at Islington." This was the Rev. John Evans, a Baptist minister, whose school was in Pullin's Row, Islington. Gray's Elegy was published as Lamb indicates in 1806. The headline covering the first three stanzas is "Interesting Silence."
[Page 183.] IX.—[Dryden and Collier.]
The Examiner, September 26, 1813. Signed ‡.
[Page 183,] line 3. Jeremy Collier. Jeremy Collier (1650-1726), the nonjuror and controversialist. His Essays upon Several Moral Subjects, Part II., were published in 1697. The passage quoted is from that "On Musick," the second essay in Part II. I have restored his italics and capitals.
[Page 183,] at foot. "His genius...." Collier's words are: "His genius was jocular, but when disposed he could be very serious."