} who makes so much ado about the
polite manners of the _Arcadian_ Shepherds, would say to _Polybius_
who tells us that _Arcadians_ by reason of the Mountainousness of the
Country and hardness of the weather, are very unsociable and austere.

Now as too much neatness in _Pastoral_ is not to be allow'd, so
rusticity (I do not mean that which _Plato_, in his Third Book of a
Commonwealth, mentions which is but a part of a down right honesty)
but Clownish stupidity, such as _Theophrastus_, in his Character of a
_Rustick_, describes; or that disagreeable unfashionable roughness
which _Horace_ mentions in his Epistle to _Lollius_, must not in my
opinion be endur'd: On this side _Mantuan_ errs extreamly, and is
intolerably absur'd, who makes Shepherds blockishly sottish, and
insufferably rude: And a certain Interpreter blames _Theocritus_ for
the same thing, who in some mens opinion sometimes keeps too close to
the _Clown_, and is rustick and uncouth; But this may be very well
excus'd because the Age in which he sang was not as polite as now.

But that every Part may be suitable to a Shepherd, we must consult
unstain'd, uncorrupted Nature; so that the manners might not be too
Clownish nor too Caurtly: And this mean may be easily observed if the
manners of our Shepherds be represented according to the _Genius_ of
the _golden Age_, in which, if _Guarinus_ may be believ'd {34}, every
man follow'd that employment: And _Nannius_ in the Preface to his
Comments on _Virgil's_ _Bucolicks_ is of the same opinion, for he
requires that the manners might represent the Golden Age: and this was
the reason that _Virgil_ himself in his _Pollio_ describes that Age,
which he knew very well was proper to _Bucolicks_: For in the whole
course of a Shepherds life there can be no form more excellent than
that which was the practise of the Golden Age; And this may serve to
moderate and temper the affections that must be exprest in this sort
of Poetry, and sufficiently declare the whole Essence of it, which in
short must be taken from the nature of a Shepherds life to which a
Courtly dress is not agreeable.

That the Thought may be commendable, it must be suitable to the
_manners_; as those must be plain and pure that must be so too: nor
must contain any, deep, exquisite, or elaborate fancies: And against
this the _Italians_ offend, who continually hunt after smart witty
sayings, very foolishly in my opinion; for in the Country, where all
things sho