SIR,
I
Am now to consider Milton's Versification under the same Heads as I have considered Virgil's, so far as there is Opportunity of doing it.
I. To begin with The Varying of the Pause, which is the Soul of all Versification in all Languages. Verse is Musick, and Musick is more or less pleasing as the Notes are more or less varied, that is, raised or sunk, prolonged or shortned.
In order to judge of the varying of English Versification, I first endeavour'd (as I have already said, with respect to the Latin) to find out the common Pause in English Verse, that is, where the Voice naturally makes some sort of Stop when a Verse is read. To this purpose I look'd into Mr. Cowley's Davideis (for it would be of no use to quote such Authors as Quarles and Ogilby, who never had any Reputation for Poetry; but this Gentleman has been stil'd, and is at present recorded in Westminster-Abbey, as Anglorum Pindarus, Maro, Flaccus) and there I soon found the common Pause to be upon the last Syllable of the second Foot. For Example:
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"I sing the Man | who Judah's Sceptre bore
In that Right-hand, | which held the Crook before;
Who from best Poet, | best of Kings did grow: