interea raucae, tua cura, palumbes,
Nec gemere aeria cessabit turtur ab ulmo._ Ec. i. 47

Happy old man! then still thy farms restored,
Enough for thee, shall bless thy frugal board.
What tho' rough stones the naked soil o'erspread,
Or marshy bulrush rear its wat'ry head,
No foreign food thy teeming ewes shall fear,
No touch contagious spread its influence here.
Happy old man! here 'mid th' accustom'd streams
And sacred springs, you'll shun the scorching beams;
While from yon willow-fence, thy picture's bound,
The bees that suck their flow'ry stores around,
Shall sweetly mingle with the whispering boughs
Their lulling murmurs, and invite repose:
While from steep rocks the pruner's song is heard;
Nor the soft-cooing dove, thy fav'rite bird,
Meanwhile shall cease to breathe her melting strain,
Nor turtles from th' aerial elm to 'plain. WARTON.

It may be observed, that these two poems were produced by events that
really happened; and may, therefore, be of use to prove, that we can
always feel more than we can imagine, and that the most artful fiction
must give way to truth.

I am, Sir,
Your humble servant,

DUBIUS.

No. 95. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1753.

--_Dulcique animos novitate tenebo_. OVID. Met. iv. 284.

And with sweet novelty your soul detain.

It is often charged upon writers, that with all their pretensions to
genius and discoveries, they do little more than copy one another; and
that compositions obtruded upon the world with the pomp of novelty,
contain only tedious repetitions of common sentiments, or at best
exhibit a transposition of known images, and give a new appearance to
truth only by some slight difference of dress and decoration.

The allegation of resemblance between authors is indisputably true; but
the charge of plagiarism, which is raised upon it, is not to be allowed
with equal readiness. A coincidence of sentiment may easily happen
without any communication, since there are many occasions in which all
reasonable men will nearly think alike. Writers of all ages have had the
same sentiments, because they have in all ages had the same objects of
speculation; the interests and passions, the virtues and vices of
mankind, have been diversified in different times, only by unessential
and casual varieties: and we must, therefore, expect in the works of all
those who attempt to describe them, such a likeness as we find in the