- "Think ye the joys that follow early day The Sacrament-“O! sacred gift of God to men POEMS. Ipse per Ausonias Æneia carmina gentes LUCAN. Paneg. ad Pisones. VOL. II. B TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE HENRY-RICHARD FOX, LORD HOLLAND, OF HOLLAND, IN LINCOLNSHIRE; LORD HOLLAND, OF FOXLEY; AND FELLOW OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES. MY LORD, THAT the longest poem in this collection (1) was honoured by the notice of your Lordship's right honourable and ever-valued relation, Mr. Fox; that it should be the last which engaged his attention; and that some parts of it were marked with his approbation; are circumstances productive of better hopes of ultimate success than I had dared to entertain before I was gratified with a knowledge of them: and the hope thus raised leads me to ask permission that I may dedicate this book to your Lordship, to whom that truly great and greatly lamented personage was so nearly allied in family, so closely bound in affection, and in whose mind presides the same critical taste which he exerted to the delight of all who heard him. He doubtless united with his unequalled abilities a fund of good-nature; (1) [The Parish Register was the longest poem in the volume, published in 1807, to which this dedication was prefixed.] and this possibly led him to speak favourably of, and give satisfaction to, writers with whose productions he might not be entirely satisfied: nor must I allow myself to suppose his desire of obliging was withholden, when he honoured any effort of mine with his approbation: but, my Lord, as there was discrimination in the opinion he gave; as he did not veil indifference for insipid mediocrity of composition under any general expression of cool approval; I allow myself to draw a favourable conclusion from the verdict of one who had the superiority of intellect few would dispute, which he made manifest by a force of eloquence peculiar to himself; whose excellent judgment no one of his friends found cause to distrust, and whose acknowledged candour no enemy had the temerity to deny. (1) With such encouragement, I present my book to your Lordship: the "Account of the Life and Writings of Lope de Vega" (2) has taught me what (1) ["Mr. Fox's memory seems never to have been oppressed by the number, or distracted by the variety, of the materials which he had gradually accumulated. Never, indeed, will his companions forget the readiness, correctness, and glowing enthusiasm, with which he repeated the noblest passages in the best English, French, and Italian poets, and in the best epic and dramatic writers of antiquity. He read the most celebrated authors of Greece and Rome, not only with exquisite taste, but with philological precision; and the mind which had been employed in balancing the fate of kingdoms, seemed occasionally, like that of Cæsar, when he wrote upon grammatical analogy, to put forth its whole might upon the structure of sentences, the etymology of words, the import of particles, the quantity of syllables, and all the nicer distinctions of those metrical canons, which some of our ingenious countrymen have laid down for the different kinds of verse in the learned languages. Even in these subordinate accomplishments, he was wholly exempt from pedantry. He could amuse without ostentation, while he instructed without arrogance.” — PARR.] (2) [First published in 1806. A new edition appeared in 1817, to which |