Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 1.pdf/98

 too far the Transformation of the Sisters of Phaeton into Trees'', when perhaps they sat at that very time under the hospitable shade of those Alders or Poplars? Or the Metamorphoses of Philomela into that ravishing Bird, which makes the sweetest musick of the Groves? If he had look'd into the Ancient Greek Writers, or so much as Consulted honest Servius, he would have discover'd that under the Allegory of this drunkenness of Silenus, the refinement and exaltation of Mens Minds by Philosophy was intended. But if the Author of these Reflections can take such flights in his Wine, it is almost pity that drunkenness shou'd be a Sin, or that he shou'd ever want good store of Burgundy, and Champaign. But indeed he seems not to have ever drank out of Silenus his Tankard, when he made either his Critique, or'' Pastorals.

His Censure on the Fourth seems worse grounded than the other; it is Entituled in some ancient Manuscripts, The History of the Renovation of the World; he complains that he cannot understand what is meant by those many Figurative Expressions: But if he had consulted the younger Vossius his Dissertation on this Pastoral, or read the Excellent Oration of the Emperor Constantine, made French by a good Pen of their own, he would have found there the plain interpretation of all those Figurative Expressions; and withall, very strong proofs of the truth of the Christian Religion; such as