ere is a passage resembling this in Walsh's third
eclogue:

Adieu, ye flocks, no more shall I pursue;
Adieu, ye groves; a long, a long adieu.--WAKEFIELD.]

[Footnote 47: These four last lines allude to the several subjects of
the four Pastorals, and to the several scenes of them particularized
before in each--POPE.

They should have been added by the poet in his own person, instead of
being put into the mouth of a shepherd who is not presumed to have any
knowledge of the previous pieces. The specific character which Pope
ascribes to each of his Pastorals is not borne out by the poems
themselves. There is as much about "flocks" in the first Pastoral as in
the second; and there is as much about "rural lays and loves" in the
second Pastoral as in the first. The third Pastoral contains no mention
of a "sylvan crew," but a couple of shepherds are absorbed by the same
"rural lays and loves" which occupied their predecessors.]

MESSIAH,

A SACRED ECLOGUE:

IN IMITATION OF

VIRGIL'S POLLIO.

ADVERTISEMENT.

In reading several passages of the Prophet Isaiah, which foretell the
coming of Christ and the felicities attending it, I could not but
observe a remarkable parity between many of the thoughts, and those in
the Pollio of Virgil. This will not seem surprising, when we reflect,
that the Eclogue was taken from a Sibylline prophecy on the same
subject. One may judge that Virgil did not copy it line by line, but
selected such ideas as best agreed with the nature of pastoral poetry,
and disposed them in that manner which served most to beautify his
piece. I have endeavoured the same in this imitation of him, though
without admitting anything of my own; since it was written with this
particular view, that the reader, by comparing the several thoughts,
might see how far the images and descriptions of the prophet are
superior to those of the poet. But as I fear I have prejudiced them by
my management, I shall subjoin the passages of Isaiah, and those of
Virgil, under the same disadvantage of a literal translation.[1]

This is certainly the most animated and sublime of all our author's
compositions, and it is manifestly owing to the great original which he
copied. Perhaps the dignity, the energy, and the simplicity of the
original, are in a few passages weakened and diminished by florid
epithets, and useless circumlocutions.--WARTON.

All things considered, the Messiah is as fine and masterly a piece of