Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 2.djvu/68

 view'd it, and found those Errours which he resolv'd to mend: But being prevented by Death, and not willing to leave an imperfect Work behind him, he ordain'd, by his last Testament, that his Æneis should be burn'd. As for the death of Aruns, who was shot by a Goddess, the Machine was not altogether so outragious, as the wounding Mars and Venus by the Sword of Diomede. Two Divinities, one wou'd have thought, might have pleaded their Prerogative of Impassibility, or at least not to have been wounded by any mortal Hand. Beside that the which they shed, was so very like our common Blood, that it was not to be distinguish'd from it, but only by the name and colour. As for what Horace says in his Art of Poetry; that no Machines are to be us'd, unless on some ex­traordinary occasion,

That Rule is to be apply'd to the Theatre, of which he is then speak­ing; and means no more than this, that when the Knot of the Play is to be unty'd, and no other way is left, for making the discovery; then and not otherwise, let a God descend upon a Rope, and clear the Bu­siness to the Audience: But this has no relation to the Machines which are us'd in an Epick Poem. In the last place, for the Dira, or Flying-Pest, which flapping on the Shield of Turnus, and fluttering about his Head, dishearten'd him in the Duel, and presag'd to him his approaching Death, I might have plac'd it more properly amongst the Objections. For the Criticks, who lay want of Courage to the Charge of Virgil's Heroe; quote this Passage as a main proof of their Assertion. They say our Author had not only secur'd him before the Duel, but also in the beginning of it, had given him the advantage in impenetrable Arms,