Humanos animos."
Sat. viii. 19. lib. i.
Human passions is not, however, a creation of Gray's; for, if not anywhere else, he might have found the words very often in the writings of William Law, as vigorous a prose writer as England can boast of since the days of Dr. South. See his answer to Dr. Trapp's Not Righteous overmuch, p. 62., Lond. 1741; and his Serious Call, cap. xii. p. 137., and cap. xxi. p. 293., Lond. 1816.
To mention its use by modern writers would be endless. I selected these few passages on reading Mr. Wakefield's laudations, for otherwise I should not perhaps have remarked the words as unusual. Wakefield adduces from Pope's Eloisa to Abelard:
"One human tear shall drop, and be forgiven."
"Noble rage," Gray's Elegy. "Noble rage," Cowley's Davideidos, lib. iv. p. 137. Again, in the Elegy:
"Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower
The mopeing owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wand'ring near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign."