both poets, perhaps, chose their numbers properly; for they both meant
to express a kind of airy hilarity. The two passions of merriment and
exultation are, undoubtedly, different; they are as different as a
gambol and a triumph, but each is a species of joy; and poetical
measures have not, in any language, been so far refined, as to provide
for the subdivisions of passion. They can only be adapted to general
purposes; but the particular and minuter propriety must be sought only
in the sentiment and language. Thus the numbers are the same in Colin's
Complaint, and in the ballad of Darby and Joan, though, in one, sadness
is represented, and, in the other, tranquillity; so the measure is the
same of Pope's Unfortunate Lady, and the Praise of Voiture.

He observes, very justly, that the odes, both of Dryden and Pope,
conclude, unsuitably and unnaturally, with epigram.

He then spends a page upon Mr. Handel's musick to Dryden's ode, and
speaks of him with that regard which he has generally obtained among the
lovers of sound. He finds something amiss in the air "With ravished
ears," but has overlooked, or forgotten, the grossest fault in that
composition, which is that in this line:

"Revenge, revenge, Timotheus cries,"

He has laid much stress upon the two latter words, which are merely
words of connexion, and ought, in musick, to be considered as
parenthetical.

From this ode is struck out a digression on the nature of odes, and the
comparative excellence of the ancients and moderns. He mentions the
chorus which Pope wrote for the duke of Buckingham; and thence takes