This ode of Jonson's is apparently the earliest, and remained for a long time the only, notable English ode based on the strict structure of the Greek original. The Greek ode was commonly divided into the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode; the strophe and antistrophe being identical in structure, though varying in different odes, and the epode being of different structure. Jonson therefore followed the classical form carefully, and introduced English terms to express the original three divisions.
Professor Bronson observes, in his Introduction to the Odes of Collins: "It is a commonplace that the Pindaric Ode in English is an artificial exotic, of slight native force, and unable to reproduce the effects of the Greek original. The reason is obvious. The Greek odes were accompanied by music and dancing, the singers moving to one side during the strophe, retracing their steps during the antistrophe, ... and standing still during the epode. The ear was thus helped by the eye, and the divisions of the ode were distinct and significant. But in an English Pindaric the elaborate correspondences and differences between strophe, antistrophe, and epode are lost upon most readers, and even the critical reader derives from them a pleasure intellectual rather than sensuous." (Edition of Collins, Athenæum Press Series, Introduction, pp. lxxiv, lxxv.)
I1
Daughter of Memory, immortal Muse,
Calliope, what poet wilt thou choose,
Of Anna's name to sing?
To whom wilt thou thy fire impart,
Thy lyre, thy voice, and tuneful art,
Whom raise sublime on thy ethereal wing,
And consecrate with dews of thy Castalian spring?
I2
Without thy aid, the most aspiring mind
Must flag beneath, to narrow flights confin'd,
Striving to rise in vain;
Nor e'er can hope with equal lays
To celebrate bright Virtue's praise.
Thine aid obtain'd, even I, the humblest swain,
May climb Pierian heights, and quit the lowly plain.
I3
High in the starry orb is hung,
And next Alcides' guardian arm,
That harp to which thy Orpheus sung,
Who woods and rocks and winds could charm;
That harp which on Cyllene's shady hill,
When first the vocal shell was found,
With more than mortal skill
Inventor Hermes taught to sound:
Hermes on bright Latona's son,
By sweet persuasion won,
The wondrous work bestow'd;
Latona's son, to thine
Indulgent, gave the gift divine:
A god the gift, a god th' invention show'd.
(Congreve: A Pindaric Ode on the victorious progress of her Majesty's Arms. 1706.)
To Congreve is due the credit for the revival of the regular ode in the eighteenth century, after it had been long forgotten by English poets. Meantime the irregular form, devised by Cowley, had become popular; and against the license of this Congreve protested in his Discourse on the Pindaric Ode, prefixed to his Ode of 1706. (See Mr. Gosse's Introduction to English Odes, p. xvii., and his Life of Congreve, p. 158.)