No. XLV. The same subject continued. Having in my last paper given Cowley's Latin versions of his odes on Solitude and Riches, I now proceed to insert his version of his beautiful Hymn to Light, whence Warton has extracted stanzas, which furnish him with instances of our poet's inferiority to Milton in classical purity. But perhaps the ingenious critic's zeal for Milton has made him a little too severe on his rival. If he has made a bold and perhaps rash endeavour to clothe his metaphysical conceits in the Latin language, and has sometimes failed accordingly, he has surely sometimes succeeded beyond all hope; there are passages, in which his happiness appears to me really astonishing; and though Johnson went a little too far on the occasion, there is certainly great acuteness in his remarks; and there is, I think, more originality in the Latin poems of Cowley than of Milton. There are many passages in the following ode which affect me with exquisite pleasure. Hymnus, in Lucem. "Pulchra de nigrâ sobole parente, Risus O terræ sacer et polorum! Quæque de cœlo fluis inquieto Gloria rivo! O salus O salus rerum, et decus omne, salve; Omnium mater bona cum calore Unde, momento, quibus e pharetris Carceres ipsos simul, atque metam Aureo lunæ bene læta curru Auream astrorum peragrare sylvam, et Vere nocturno reparata semper Visere prata, Regiam gaudens habitare solis More in æternum Scythico vagantem, et Divitem mundi redeunte gyro Ducere pompam: Inter et tantos humilis triumphos Lampede vepres. Discolorato glomerans racemo Quin et obscenas repetunt latebras Ad tuos quondam Dolor ipse vultus Cura subrisit, pepulitque rugas Ore maligno. Ad Ad tuos quondam Timor ipse vultus Inverecundi Dominator oris Tu, Dea, Eoi simul atque cœli Aula gaudentis reserata mundi; Monstra Deorum. Te bibens arcus Jovis ebriosus Lumine caudam. In Rosâ pallam indueris rubentem, Fertilis Floræ sobolem tenellam Igne concreto fabricata Gemmas Floreum immisces solidumque fucum; Invidet pictus; fragilesque damnat Hortus honores. Parcior fulvis utinam fuisses Diva largiri pretium metallis! Parcior, quantis hominum allevasses Pectora curis ! Mi quidem solis nitor, et diei Etheris gyros per inexplicatos, Flumine vivo. Lucidum trudis properanter agmen, Cuncta colore. At mare immensum, oceanusque lucis Hinc inexhausto per utrumque muudum It may be acceptable to some of my readers to transcribe the poet's epitaph in Westminster Abbey, as it is not inserted in the common accounts of his life. "Epitaphium In Ecclesia D. Petri apud Westmonasterienses Sepulti ABRAHAMUS COULEIUS. Anglorum Pindarus, Flaccus, Maro, Deliciæ, Decus, Desiderium Ævi sui, Hic juxta situs est. Aurea dum volitant late tua scripta per orbem, Intacti Intacti maneant; maneant per sæcula dulcis Votumque suum apud Posteros sacratum esse voluit, Excessit e vitâ Anno Ætatis suæ 49° et honorificâ pompâ elatus ex dibus Buckinghamianis, viris illustribus omnium ordinum exequias celebrantibus sepultus est die 3o M. Augusti, Anno Domini 1667." N° XLVI. Armorial Bearings on the Shields of the Grecian Chiefs, as described by Eschylus. SIR, TO THE RUMINATOR. A friend the other day pointed out to me several passages in Eschylus, which rather surprised me, and have much engaged my attention. Some articles in the late numbers of your Censura have induced me to make these passages the subject of a letter for your Ruminator, which professes to admit topics of criticism as well as moral essays. The origin of heraldry has been a point of long and tedious dispute among a particular class of antiquaries; into which I shall refrain from entering. I may, however, slightly hint, that it is now generally admitted, on the soundest authorities, that arms, considered as hereditary marks appropriate to the shields of particular families, and modified in their formation by rules of |