Page:The Amyntas of Tasso (1770) - Percival Stockdale.djvu/19

Rh opinion, as mine, can be of no weight. But I am ingenuous; and I am strongly impressed with a feeling of what I am going to advance: therefore my boldness will be forgiven by all readers whom I would wish to please.

Tasso is a greater poet than Virgil. Pope will be admired as long as the English language is understood; and as long as the human breast glows, while it imbibes the sacred flame of poetry. An Englishman, who is sensible to the charms of the Muses, and free from prejudice, not bristled with Greek, however profound a Grecian he may be, would not so much regret the loss of the original Iliad, as of Pope's translation of that poem.

It may be objected to the Amyntas, especially in this free translation, that it hath sentiments by no means characteristick of rural life. But let me be permitted to observe, that if Tasso's Doric Muse appears sometimes in the buskin, she wears it not absurdly: his shep-