And in his chariot fled—”
Page 262.
But we must bring a still heavier charge against the Dr., that of a total want of originality. The whole plan and conception of the Antediluvians is copied, but “longo intervallo,” after Paradise Lost. Had Milton never written poetry, Dr. McHenry would never have published bombast. Yet the one is only the shadow of the other’s shade. This imitation is perceptible, not only in various attempts to copy the versification, but oftentimes in more glaring and less defensible plagiarisms. Would it, for instance, be believed that the second book of the Antediluvians begins with a passage so nearly resembling the opening of the second book in Paradise Lost, as to make, as Dogberry has it, “flat burglary?” Thus:
“High on a throne of royal state, which far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous east, with richest hand,
Showers on her kings barbaric, pearls and gold,
Satan exalted sat.”
Paradise Lost, Book II.
“In royal robes, magnificently bright,