rse_. Mr. _PHILIPS_ comes the nearest to a Pastoral
Language of any English Swain but _Spencer_. And he has truly enervated
his Language in four several Lines. One of which is the last of these
two.

_Ye Swains, I beg ye pass in silence by;
My Love in yonder Vale asleep doth lye_.

The Word Doth, is what enervates the last Line. But 'twould be still
better enervated if Mr. _Philips_ had used only such Words as have very
few Consonants in them. For by Consonants, joyn'd with the Vowel O, a
Writer may render his Language, in Epick Poetry, just as Sonorous as he
will; and by the want of Consonants and by delighting in the other soft
Vowels he may render it weak. I cannot see that Mr. _PHILIPS_ has any
Line where the Language is wholly enervated. But see how _Spencer_ has
done this. Especially in the second of these Lines.

_The gentle Shepherd sate beside a Spring.
All in the Shadow of a Bushy Breer. &c_.

In this last Line, there is but one Word end's with a Consonant, where
the following Word begin's with one. But a Writer, who is perfectly
Master of his Language, will be able to have every Line like this; and
no Word more strong than Evening, Rivulet, and the like, will he be
forc'd to use.

_Secondly_, The Language is by nothing more weaken'd, than by the use of
Monisyllables. This no one ever had the least Notion of but _Spencer_.
Which I wonder has not been observed, 'tis so very palpable in him. What
makes the finess of these Lines else?

_All as the Sheep such was the Shepherd's look,
For pale and wan he was (alas the while!)
May seem he lov'd, or also some Care he took,
Well could he tune his Pipe and form his Stile_.

Past. 1.

Here is but two Words for four Lines, except Monosyllables.

The best Lines in _PHILIPS_, for the Language, are these, where
Monosyllables reign.

..._Fine gain at length, I trow,
To hoard up to my self such deal of Woe!_

And the last of these; for the first is rough thro' too many Consonants.

_A lewd Desire strange Lands and Swains to know:
Ah Gad! that ever I should covet Woe!_ Past. 2.

There are other Methods, I see, Cubbin, you have taken to enervate your
Language; too minute and too numerous to recite, but they are easily, I
think, observ'd, if a Person peruses the Pastoral Writers with Care.

When our Dialect is thus render'd weak and low, we must then add to
it, (in order to render it as pleasant as a Dialect that is not low and