from the
Value of their Judgment, by dashing it with some splenetick Reflections.
Like a certain Nobleman mention'd by my Lord_ Verulam, _who when he
invited any Friends to Dinner, always gave a disrelish to the
Entertaiment by some cutting malicious Jest._

_The_ French _then seem to me to have a truer Taste of the ancient
Authors than ever_ Scaliger _or_ Heinsius _could pretend to_. Rapin,
_and above all_, Bossu, _have done more Justice to_ Homer _and to_
Virgil, _to_ Livy _and_ Thucydides, _to_ Demosthenes _and to_ Cicero,
_&c. and have bin more beneficial to the Republick of Learning, by their
nice Comparisons and Observations, than all the honest Labours of those
well-meaning Men, who rummage_ musty Manuscripts _for_ various Lections.
_They did not_ Insistere in ipso cortice, verbisq; interpretandis
intenti nihil ultra petere, (_As_ Dacier _has it_) _but search'd the
inmost Recesses, open'd their Mysteries, and (as it were) call'd the
Spirit of the Author from the Dead. It is for this_ Le Clerc _(in his_
Bibliotheque Choisie, _Tom._ 9. _p._ 328.) _commends St._ Evremont's
_Discourses on_ Salust _and_ Tacitus, _as also his Judgment on the
Ancients, and blames the Grammarians, because they give us not a Taste
of Antiquity after his Method, which would invite our Polite Gentlemen
to study it with a greater Appetite. Whereas their Manner of Writing,
which takes Notice only of Words, Customs, and chiefly Chronology, with
a blind Admiration of all they read, is unpleasant to a fine Genius, and
deters it from the pursuit of the_ Belles Lettres.

_I shall say no more at present on this Head, but proceed to give you an
Account of the following Sheets. What I have attempted in them is mostly
of the Pindaric and the Lyric Way. I have not follow'd the_ Strophe
_and_ Antistrophe; _neither do I think it necessary; besides I had
rather err with Mr._ Cowley, _who shew'd us the Way, than be flat and in
the right with others._

_Mr._ Congreve, _an ingenious Gentleman, has affirm'd, I think too
hastily, that in each particular Ode the Stanza's are alike, whereas the
last Olympic has two_ Monostrophicks _of different Measure, and Number
of Lines._

_The Pacquet-boat is just going off, I am afraid of missing Tide. You
may expect the rest on the_ Pindaric Style. _In the mean time I beg
leave to subscribe myself,_

_Sir, Your ever Obedient and
Obliged Servant,_

Samuel Cobb.

_Of POETRY._

1. Its Antiquity. 2. Its