When first young Maro, in his boundless mind,
A work t’outlast immortal Rome design’d.
Essay on Criticism, l. 130.
The following examples are of downright inconsistencies.
Alii pulsis e tormento catenis discerpti sectique, dimidiato corpore pugnabant sibi superstites, ac peremptæ partis ultores.
Strada, Dec. 2. L. 2.
Il povér huomo, che non sen’ era accorto,
Andava combattendo, ed era morto. Berni.
He fled, but flying, left his life behind. Iliad xi. 443.
Full through his neck the weighty falchion sped;
Along the pavement roll’d the mutt’ring head.
Odyssey xxii. 365.
The last article is of raving like one mad. Cleopatra speaking to the aspick:
—— Welcome, thou kind deceiver,
Thou best of thieves; who, with an easy key,
Do’st open life, and unperceiv’d by us
Ev’n steal us from ourselves; discharging so
Death’s dreadful office, better than himself,
Touching our limbs so gently into slumber,
That Death stands by, deceiv’d by his own image,
And thinks himself but Sleep.
Dryden, All for Love, act 5.
Reasons that are common and known to every person, ought to be taken for granted: to express them is childish and interrupts the narration. Quintus Curtius, relating the battle of Issus: