Select Poems Of Thomas Gray Part 10

36. Hayley, in the Life of Crashaw, _Biographia Britannica_, says that this line is "literally translated from the Latin prose of Bartholinus in his Danish Antiquities."

39. _Fretted_. The _fret_ is, strictly, an ornament used in cla.s.sical architecture, formed by small fillets intersecting each other at right angles. Parker (_Glossary of Architecture_) derives the word from the Latin _fretum_, a strait; and Hales from _ferrum_, iron, through the Italian _ferrata_, an iron grating. It is more likely (see Stratmann and Wb.) from the A. S. _fraetu_, an ornament.

Cf. _Hamlet_, ii. 2:

"This majestical roof fretted with golden fire;"

and _Cymbeline_, ii. 4:

"The roof o' the chamber With golden cherubins is fretted."

40. _The pealing anthem_. Cf. _Il Penseroso_, 161:

"There let the pealing organ blow To the full-voiced quire below, In service high, and anthem clear," etc.

41. _Storied urn_. Cf. _Il Pens._ 159: "storied windows richly dight." On _animated bust_, cf. Pope, _Temple of Fame_, 73: "Heroes in animated marble frown;" and Virgil, _aen._ vi. 847: "spirantia aera."

43. _Provoke_. Mitford considers this use of the word "unusually bold, to say the least." It is simply the etymological meaning, _to call forth_ (Latin, _provocare_). See Wb. Cf. Pope, _Ode_:

"But when our country's cause provokes to arms."

44. _Dull cold ear_. Cf. Shakes. _Hen. VIII._ iii. 2: "And sleep in dull, cold marble."

46. _Pregnant with celestial fire_. This phrase has been copied by Cowper in his _Boadicea_, which is said (see notes of "Globe" ed.) to have been written after reading Hume's History, in 1780:

"Such the bard's prophetic words, Pregnant with celestial fire, Bending as he swept the chords Of his sweet but awful lyre."

47. Mitford quotes Ovid, _Ep._ v. 86:

"Sunt mihi quas possint sceptra decere ma.n.u.s."

48. _Living lyre_. Cf. Cowley:

"Begin the song, and strike the living lyre;"

and Pope, _Windsor Forest_, 281:

"Who now shall charm the shades where Cowley strung His living harp, and lofty Denham sung?"

50. Cf. Browne, _Religio Medici_: "Rich with the spoils of nature."

51. "_Rage_ is often used in the post-Elizabethan writers of the 17th century, and in the 18th century writers, for inspiration, enthusiasm" (Hales). Cf. Cowley:

"Who brought green poesy to her perfect age, And made that art which was a rage?"

and Tickell, _Prol._:

"How hard the task! How rare the G.o.dlike rage!"

Cf. also the use of the Latin _rabies_ for the "divine afflatus," as in _aeneid_, vi. 49.

53. _Full many a gem_, etc. Cf. Bishop Hall, _Contemplations_: "There is many a rich stone laid up in the bowells of the earth, many a fair pearle in the bosome of the sea, that never was seene, nor never shall bee."

_Purest ray serene_. As Hales remarks, this is a favourite arrangement of epithets with Milton. Cf. _Hymn on Nativity_: "flower-inwoven tresses torn;" _Comus_: "beckoning shadows dire;"

"every alley green," etc.; _L'Allegro_: "native wood-notes wild;"

_Lycidas_: "sad occasion dear;" "blest kingdoms meek," etc.

55. _Full many a flower_, etc. Cf. Pope, _Rape of the Lock_, iv. 158:

"Like roses that in deserts bloom and die."

Mitford cites Chamberlayne, _Pharonida_, ii. 4:

"Like beauteous flowers which vainly waste their scent Of odours in unhaunted deserts;"

and Young, _Univ. Pa.s.s._ sat. v.:

"In distant wilds, by human eyes unseen, She rears her flowers, and spreads her velvet green; Pure gurgling rills the lonely desert trace, And waste their music on the savage race;"

and Philip, _Thule_:

"Like woodland flowers, which paint the desert glades, And waste their sweets in unfrequented shades."

Hales quotes Waller's

"Go, lovely rose, Tell her that's young And shuns to have her graces spied, That hadst thou sprung In deserts where no men abide Thou must have uncommended died."

On _desert air_, cf. _Macbeth_, iv. 3: "That would be howl'd out in the desert air."

57. It was in 1636 that John Hampden, of Buckinghamshire (a cousin of Oliver Cromwell), refused to pay the ship-money tax which Charles I.

was levying without the authority of Parliament.

58. _Little tyrant_. Cf. Thomson, _Winter_:

"With open freedom little tyrants raged."

The artists who have ill.u.s.trated this pa.s.sage (see, for instance, _Favourite English Poems_, p. 305, and _Harper's Monthly_, vol. vii.

p. 3) appear to understand "little" as equivalent to _juvenile_. If that had been the meaning, the poet would have used some other phrase than "of his fields," or "his lands," as he first wrote it.

59. _Some mute inglorious Milton_. Cf. Phillips, preface to _Theatrum Poetarum_: "Even the very names of some who having perhaps been comparable to Homer for heroic poesy, or to Euripides for tragedy, yet nevertheless sleep inglorious in the crowd of the forgotten vulgar."

60. _Some Cromwell_, etc. Hales remarks: "The prejudice against Cromwell was extremely strong throughout the 18th century, even amongst the more liberal-minded. That cloud of 'detractions rude,' of which Milton speaks in his n.o.ble sonnet to our 'chief of men' as in his own day enveloping the great republican leader, still lay thick and heavy over him. His wise statesmanship, his unceasing earnestness, his high-minded purpose, were not yet seen."

After this stanza Thomas Edwards, the author of the _Canons of Criticism_, would add the following, to supply what he deemed a defect in the poem:

"Some lovely fair, whose unaffected charms Shone with attraction to herself alone; Whose beauty might have bless'd a monarch's arms, Whose virtue cast a l.u.s.tre on a throne.

"That humble beauty warm'd an honest heart, And cheer'd the labours of a faithful spouse; That virtue form'd for every decent part The healthful offspring that adorn'd their house."