Before, she had thus express'd her Rage:
[168] —Neque te teneo, neque dicta refello. I, sequere Italiam ventis; pete regna per undas; Spero equidem mediis (si quid pia numina possunt) Supplicia hausurum scopulis, &c.
I nor detain thee, nor refel thy Words. Away for Latium by the Winds; go, seek Thy Kingdom o'er the Waves. For me, I hope, If the just Gods have Pow'r, thou wilt receive Thy due Reward among the Rocks.
Behold, now, another Strain!
[169] Quo ruit? extremum hoc miseræ det munus amanti; Expectet facilemque fugam, ventosque ferentes. Non jam conjugium antiquum, quod prodidit, oro; Nec pulchro ut Latio careat, regnumque relinquat; Tempus inane peto, requiem, spatiumque furori, Dum mea me victam doceat fortuna dolere.
Whither does he fly So hasty? This last Favour let him grant To his unhappy Lover; let him wait An easy Voyage, and permitting Winds. I now no more petition him to yield The Rites of Nuptials, which he has betray'd; Nor urge him to relinquish his gay Hopes Of Italy, and Empire: All I beg, Is but a soothing Interval, some Rest, And Respite to my Passion; till my Fate Shall to Misfortune reconcile my Soul, Subdu'd by Grief, and teach me how to mourn.
That Man must be as void of Sense, as of Humanity, that does not feel in himself the strongest Emotions of Pity and Admiration, of Grief and Pleasure, when he reads so moving a Complaint; than which, I may venture to pronounce, there is not a greater Master-piece, either in Art or Nature.
I might justly fear lying under the Imputation of Prolixity in citing these Passages, if the Beauty of them did not compensate for their Number. As no one ever touch'd the Passions like Virgil, you'll forgive the Liberty I have taken in recalling to your Mind so many pleasing Instances of his Power.
What Longinus calls[170] φαντασιαι, and others, as he tells us, ειδωλοποιιαι the Roman Writers style Visions, or Imaginations, and the modern Images. These, then, operate, "when (as Longinus[171] speaks) a Man has so strong an Imagination of the Things he describes, that he seems to be in Transport, as it were, to behold them with his own Eyes, and places them before those of his Hearers." What Longinus adds immediately afterwards, in relation to these Images, I must confess I don't rightly comprehend, or (with all Deference to so great Authority) I cannot assent to. Ὁϛ δ' ἑτερου τι ἡ ῥητορικη φαντασια βουλεται, και ἑτερον ἡ παρα ποιηταιϛ, ουκ αν λαθοι σε. Ουδ' ὁτι τηϛ μεν εν ποιησει τελοϛ εστιν εκπληξιϛ, τηϛ δ' εν λογοιϛ εναργεια Which Tollius thus paraphrastically translates: "You cannot be ignorant, I suppose, that Oratorical Visions intend one Thing, and Poetical another; that the Aim of the latter is to affect the Hearers with Terror; of the former to express every Thing so strongly, that it may be rather seen, than heard by the Audience. The one we may properly call Evidence, or Illustration; the other Consternation, or Amazement." I own, I say, this is what I cannot well digest; for neither is it true that the Images, which Poetry impresses, affect us with Terror only, for all Sorts of Images are impress'd by Poetry; nor is it the peculiar Property of Oratory to express every Thing so strongly, that it may be rather seen, than heard by the Audience; since Poetry has a much larger Share in this Province than Oratory. The only Difference between them in this Particular is, that all Images are impress'd more strongly by the one; but all are truly impress'd by both. This is a Difficulty in Longinus, which not one of his numerous Commentators has touch'd upon. If, therefore, I am fallen into any Mistake, I hope I shall be the easier pardoned, as I have none of the Helps of the Learned to conduct me out of it. But however that be, all are agreed that the Images excited, both by Oratory and Poetry, strike the Mind with a sudden Force. To prove this, Longinus recites the Speech of Orestes[172], where he cries out, that he sees his Mother and the Furies stand before him; which Virgil has wonderfully imitated, in the following Passage:
[173] Eumenidum veluti demens videt agmina Pentheus, Et solem geminum, & duplices se ostendere Thebas: Aut Agamemnonius, scenis agitatus, Orestes, Armatam facibus matrem, & serpentibus atris, Cum fugit, ultricesque sedent in limine Diræ.