t for an author of sixteen, not only to be able to
copy the poems of antiquity with judicious selection, but to have
obtained sufficient power of language and skill in metre to exhibit a
series of versification which had in English poetry no precedent, nor
has since had an imitation.--JOHNSON.

It is somewhat strange that in the pastorals of a young poet there
should not be found a single rural image that is new; but this, I am
afraid, is the case in the Pastorals before us. The ideas of Theocritus,
Virgil, and Spenser are, indeed, here exhibited in language equally
mellifluous and pure; but the descriptions and sentiments are trite and
common. To this assertion, formerly made, Dr. Johnson answered, "that no
invention was intended." He, therefore, allows the fact and the charge.
It is a confession of the very fault imputed to them. There _ought_ to
have been invention. It has been my fortune from my way of life,[4] to
have seen many compositions of youths of sixteen years old, far beyond
these Pastorals in point of genius and imagination, though not perhaps
of correctness. Their excellence, indeed, might be owing to having had
such a predecessor as Pope.[5] A mixture of British and Grecian ideas
may justly be deemed a blemish in these Pastorals, and propriety is
certainly violated when he couples Pactolus with Thames, and Windsor
with Hybla.[6] Complaints of immoderate heat, and wishes to be conveyed
to cooling caverns, when uttered by the inhabitants of Greece, have a
decorum and consistency, which they totally lose in the character of a
British Shepherd,[7] and, Theocrites, during the ardors of Sirius, must
have heard the murmurings of a brook, and the whispers of a pine, with
more home-felt pleasure than Pope could possibly experience upon the
same occasion. Pope himself informs us, in a note, that he judiciously
omitted the following verse:

And list'ning wolves grow milder as they hear

on account of the absurdity, which Spenser overlooked, of introducing
wolves into England. But on this principle, which is certainly a just
one, may it not be asked, why he should speak, the scene lying in
Windsor Forest, of the "sultry Sirius," of the "grateful clusters of
grapes," of "a pipe of reeds," the antique fistula, of "thanking Ceres
for a plentiful harvest," of "the sacrifice of lambs," with many other
instances that might be adduced to this purpose? That Pope, however, was
sensible of the importance of adapting ima