was it made to be enflaved to any precife model of elder or later times. After all, I must petition my reader to lay aside the four and fullen air of criticism, and to affume the friend. Let him chufe fuch copies to read at particular hours, when the temper of his mind is fuited to the fong. Let him come with a defire to be entertained and pleased, rather than to feek his own disgust and averfion, which will not be hard to find. I am not fo vain as to think there are no faults, nor fo blind as to espy none : though I hope the multitude of alterations in this fecond edition are not without amendment. There is fo large a difference between this and the former, in the change of titles, lines, and whole poems, as well as in the various tranfpofitions, that it would be useless and endless, and all confufion, for any reader to compare them throughout. The additions alfo make up half the book, and some of these have need of as many alterations as the former. Many a line needs the file to polish the roughness of it, and many a thought wants richer language to adorn and make it fhine. Wide defects and equal fuperfluities may be found, especially in the larger pieces; but I have at present neither inclination nor leisure to correct, and I hope I never shall. It is one of the biggest fatisfactions I take in giving this volume to the world, that I expect to be for ever free froin the temptation of making or mending poems again. So that my friends may be perfectly fecure *Naturam expellas furcâ licet, ufque recurret." Hor. Will this fhort note of Horace excufe a man who has refifted nature many years, but has been fometimes overcome? 1736. Edition the 7th. against ! against this impreffion's growing wafte upon their hands, and useless as the former has done. Let minds that are better furnished for fuch performances pursue thefe ftudies, if they are convinced that poefy can be made ferviceable to religion and virtue. As for myfelf, I almost blush to think that I have read fo little, and written fo much. The following years of my life fhall be more entirely devoted to the immediate and direct labours of my station, excepting thofe hours that may be employed in finishing my imitation of the Pfalms of David, in christian language, which I have now promifed the world *. I cannot court the world to purchase this book for their pleasure or entertainment, by telling them that any one copy entirely pleafes me. The best of them finks below the idea which I form of a divine or moral ode. He that deals in the myfteries of Heaven, or of the Mufes, fhould be a genius of no vulgar mould : And as the name Vates belongs to both; fo the furniture of both is comprised in that line of Horace, Cui mens divinior, atque os Magna fonaturum But what Juvenal fpake in his age, abides true in ours: A compleat Poet or a Prophet is fuch a one; "—Qualem nequeo monftrare, & fentio tantùm." Perhaps neither of these characters in perfection fhall ever be seen on earth, till the feventh angel has founded his awful trumpet; till the victory be compleat over * In the year 1719 thefe were finished and printed. dying God; the awful glories of the laft tribunal; the grand decifive fentence, from which there is no appeal ; and the confequent tranfports or horrors of the two eternal worlds; these things may be variously disposed, and form many poems. How might fuch performances, under a divine blefing, call back the dying piety of the nation to life and beauty? This would make religion appear like itself, and confound the blafphemies of a profligate world, ignorant of pious pleasures. But we have reason to fear, that the tuneful men of our day have not raifed their ambition to fo divine a pitch; I should rejoice to see more of this celeftial fire kindling within them; for the flashes that break out in fome present and past writings betray an infernal fource. This the incomparable Mr. Cowley, in the latter end of his preface, and the ingenious Sir Richard Blackmore, in the beginning of his, have so pathetically defcribed and lamented, that I rather refer the reader to mourn with them, than detain and tire him here. These gentlemen, in their large and laboured works of poefy, have given the world happy examples of what they wish and encourage in profe; the one in a rich variety of thought and fancy, the other in all the fhining colours of profuse and florid diction. If fhorter fonnets were compofed on fublime fubjects, fuch as the Pfalms of David, and the holy transports interspersed in the other facred writings, or fuch as the moral odes of Horace, and the ancient Lyricks; I perfade myself, that the Chriftian preacher would find lant aid from the poet, in his defign to diffuse vir◄ tue, tue, and allure fouls to God. If the heart were first inflamed from Heaven, and the Mufe were not left alone to form the devotion, and purfue a cold fcent, but only called-in as an affiftant to the worship, then the fong would end where the infpiration ceafes; the whole compofure would be of a piece, all meridian light and meridian fervour; and the fame pious flame would be propagated, and kept glowing in the heart of him that reads. Some of the fhorter odes of the two poets now mentioned, and a few of the Rev. Mr. Norris's Effays in verfe, are convincing inftances of the fuccefs of this propofal. It is my opinion alfo, that the free and unconfined numbers of Pindar, or the noble meafures of Milton without rhyme, would beft maintain the dignity of the theme, as well as give a loose to the devout foul, nor check the raptures of her faith and love. Though, in my feeble attempts of this kind, I have too often fettered my thoughts in the narrow metre of our Pfalmtranflators; I have contracted and cramped the fense, or rendered it obfcure and feeble, by the too fpeedy and regular returns of rhyme. If my friends expect any reafon of the following compofures, and of the first or second publication, I entreat them to accept of this account. The title affures them that poefy is not the business of my life; and if I feized thofe hours of leifure, wherein my foul was in a more sprightly frame, to entertain them or myself with a divine or moral fong, I hope I fhall find an eafy pardon. In the First Book are many odes which were written to affift the meditations and worship of vulgar Chriftians, and with a design to be published in the volume of hymns, which have now passed a second impreffion; but upon the review, I found fome expreffions that were not suited to the plainest capacity, and the metaphors are too bold to please the weaker Christian : therefore I have allotted them a place here. Amongst the songs that are dedicated to Divine Love, I think I may be bold to affert, that I never compofed one line of them with any other defign than what they are applied to here; and I have endeavoured to secure them all from being perverted and debased to wanton paffions, by feveral lines in them that can never be applied to a meaner love. Are not the nobleft instances of the grace of Chrift represented under the figure of a conjugal state, and defcribed in one of the sweetest odes, and the softest pastoral that ever was written? I appeal to Solomon*, in his Song, and his father David, in Pfal. xlv. if David was the author: and I am well affured, that I have never indulged an equal licence: it was dangerous to imitate the sacred writers too nearly, in fo nice an affair. The "Poems facred to Virtue," &c. were formed when the frame and humour of my foul was just suited to the subject of my verfe: the image of my heart is painted in them; and if they meet with a reader whose Solomon's Song was much more in ufe among reachers and writers of divinity when these poems ere written than it is now. 1736. foul |