Judicium subtile videndis artibus illud.
When he could not possibly apply what concludes,
Bœtum in crasso jurares æere natum.
Ver. 95. Our most gracious Sovereign’s comparative estimate of Messrs. Whitehead and Warton, is here happily elucidated, from a circumstance highly honourable to his Majesty’s taste; that, whereas he thought the former worthy of two places, he has given the latter only the worst of the two. Mr. Fauquier is made Secretary and Register to the order of the Bath, in the room of the deceased Laureat.
Ver. 107. We suspect the whole of this passage in praise of his Majesty, has been retouched by Mr. Warton, as this line, or something very like it, occurs in his “Triumphs of Isis,” a spirited poem, which is omitted, we know not why, in his publication of his works.
Ver. 149. Our readers, we trust, have already admired the several additions which our poet has made to the ideas of his great original. He has here given an equal proof of his judgment in a slight omission. When he converted Amyntas into Lord Uxbridge, with what striking propriety did he sink upon us the epithet of stultus, or foolish; for surely we cannot suppose that to be conveyed above in the term of simple peer.
Ver. 156. In the manuscript we find two lines which were struck out; possibly because our poet supposed they touched on a topic of praise, not likely ta be very prevalent with Mr. PITT, notwithstanding what we have lately heard of his “Atlantean shoulders.” They are as follows:
Yet strong beyond the promise of their years,
Each in one night would drain two grenadiers.
Ver. 181. The orders of the Board of Controul, relative to the debts of the Nabob of Arcot, certainly appear diametrically opposite to Mr. Dundas’s Reports, and to an express clause of Mr. Pitt’s bill. Our author, however, like Mr. Pitt and Mr. Dundas, roundly asserts the consistency of the whole.
Ver. 189. This unfortunate slip of the Honourable Secretary’s constitutional logic happened in a debate on the Irish Propositions. Among the many wild chimeras of faction on that memorable occasion, one objection was, that the produce of the French West-Indian Islands might be legally smuggled through Ireland into this country. To which Mr. Rose replied, “That we might repeal all our acts in perfect security, because the French King had lately issued an arrêt which would prevent this smuggling.”