On the couplet, cf. Dekker, If this be not a good play, etc.:
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"Thinkest thou, base lord, Because the glorious Sun behind black clouds Has awhile hid his beams, he's darken'd forever, Eclips'd never more to shine?" |
[137.] Cf. Lycidas, 169: "And yet anon repairs his drooping head;" and Fletcher, Purple Island, vi. 64: "So soon repairs her light, trebling her new-born raies."
[141.] Mitford remarks that there is a passage (which he misquotes, as usual) in the Thebaid of Statius (iii. 81) similar to this, describing a bard who had survived his companions:
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"Sed jam nudaverat ensem Magnanimus vates, et nunc trucis ora tyranni, Nunc ferrum adspectans: 'Nunquam tibi sanguinis hujus Jus erit, aut magno feries imperdita Tydeo Pectora; vado equidem exsultans et ereptaque fata Insequor, et comites feror expectatus ad umbras; Te Superis, fratrique.' Et jam media orsa loquentis Abstulerat plenum capulo latus." |
Cf. also a passage in Pindar (Olymp. i. 184), which Gray seems to have had in mind:
[143.] Cf. Virgil, Ecl. viii. 59:
| "Praeceps aërii specula de montis in undas Deferar; extremum hoc munus morientis habeto." |