t this:
It loves _Simplicity_ so much that it must be averse to that Pomp and
Ostentation which _Epick_ Poetry must show, for that must be copious
and flowing, in every part smooth, and equal to it self: But
_Pastoral_ must dissemble, and hide even that which it would {42}
show, like _Damon's_ _Galatea_, who flies then when she most desires
to be discovered.

And to the Bushes flys, yet would be seen.

And this doth not proceed from any malitious ill-natur'd Coyness, as
some imagine, but from an ingenuous modesty and bashfulness, which
usually accompanies, and is a proof of _Simplicity: Tis very rare_,
says Pliny, _to find a man so exquisitely skillful, as to be able to
show those Features in a Picture which he hides_, and I think it to be
so difficult a task, that none but the most excellent Wits can attempt
it with success: For small Wits usually abound with a multitude of
words.

The third Grace of _Bucolicks_ is _Neatness_, which contains all the
taking prettiness and sweetness of Expression, and whatsoever is
call'd the Delicacies of the more delightful and pleasing _Muses_:
This the Rural _Muses_ bestow'd on _Virgil_, as _Horace_ in the tenth
_Satyr_ of his first Book says,

And _Virgils_ happy Muse in Eclogues plays,
soft and facetious;

Which _Fabius_ takes to signify the most taking neatness and most
exquisite Elegance imaginable: For thus he explains this place, in
which he agrees with _Tully_, who in his _Third Book de Oratore_,
says, the _Atticks_ are Facetious _i.e._ elegant: Tho the common
Interpreters of these words are not of the same mind: But if by
_Facetious Horace_ had meant _jesting_, and such as is design'd to
make men laugh, and apply'd that to _Virgil_, nothing {43} could have
been more ridiculous; 'tis the design of _Comedy_ to raise laughter,
but _Eclogue_ should only delight, and charm by its takeing
_prettiness_: All ravishing _Delicacies_ of Thought, all sweetness of
Expression, all that Salt from which _Venus_, as the Poets Fable,
rose; are so essential to this kind of _Poetry_, that it cannot endure
any thing that is scurillous, malitiously biteing, or ridiculous:
There must be nothing in it but _Hony, Milk, Roses, Violets_, and the
like sweetness, so that when you read you might think that you are in
_Adonis's_ Gardens, as the _Greeks_ speak, _i.e._ in the most pleasant
place imaginable: For since the subject of _Eclogue_ must be mean and
unsurprizing, unless it maintains pu