Molliter ossa quiescent
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is works are not common, and, therefore, I shall subjoin his verses. In examining this performance, Nothing must be considered as having notonly a negative, but a kind of positive signification; as I need not fearthieves, I have _nothing_, and _nothing_ is a very powerful protector. Inthe first part of the sentence it is taken negatively; in the second itis taken positively, as an agent. In one of Boileau's lines it was aquestion, whether he should use "à rien faire," or "à ne rien faire;"and the first was preferred, because it gave "rien" a sense in some sortpositive. _Nothing_ can be a subject only in its positive sense, and sucha sense is given it in the first line: _Nothing_, thou elder brother ev'n to shade. In this line, I know not whether he does not allude to a curious book, DeUmbra, by Wowerus, which, having told the qualities of _shade_, concludeswith a poem, in which are these lines: Jam primum terram validis circumspice claustrisSuspensam totam, decus admirabile mundi,Terrasque, tractusque maris, camposque liquentesAeris, et vasti laqueata palatia coeli----Omnibus UMBRA prior. The positive sense is generally preserved, with great skill, throughthe whole poem; though, sometimes, in a subordinate sense, the negative_nothing_ is injudiciously mingled. Passerat confounds the two senses. Another of his most vigorous pieces is his lampoon on sir Car Scroop,who, in a poem called the Praise of Satire, had some lines likethese[68]: He who can push into a midnight frayHis brave companion, and then run away,Leaving him to be murder'd in the street,Then put it off with some buffoon conceit;Him, thus dishonour'd, for a wit you own,And court him as top fiddler of the town. This was meant of Rochester, whose "buffoon conceit" was, I suppose, asaying often mentioned, that "every man would be a coward, if he durst;"and drew from him those furious verses; to which Scroop made, in reply,an epigram, ending with these lines: Thou canst hurt no man's fame with thy ill word;Thy pen is full as harmless as thy sword. Of the Satire against Man, Rochester can only claim what remains, whenall Boileau's part is taken away. In all his works there is sprightliness and vigour, and every where maybe found tokens of a mind, which study might have carried to excellence.What more can be expected from a life spent in ostentatious contempt ofregularity, and ended, before the abilities of many other men began to bedisplayed[69]? Poema Cl. V. JOANNIS PASSERATII,
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