Book II.
The Dunciad.
115
"To cavil, censure, dictate, right or wrong,
"Full and eternal privilege of tongue."
Three College Sophs, and three pert Templars came,
The same their talents, and their tastes the same; 380
Each prompt to query, answer, and debate,[I 1]
And smit with love of Poesy and Prate.[I 2]
The pond'rous books two gentle readers bring;
The heroes fit, the vulgar form a ring.[I 3]
The clam'rous crowd is hush'd with mugs of Mum, 385
'Till all tun'd equal, send a gen'ral hum.
Then mount the Clerks, and in one lazy tone
Thro' the long, heavy, painful page drawl on;[R 1]
Soft creeping, words on words, the sense compose,
At ev'ry line they stretch, they yawn, they doze. 390
Remarks
- ↑ Ver. 388. Thro' the long, heavy, painful page, &c.] "All these lines very well imitate the slow drowziness with which they proceed. It is impossible to any one, who has a poetical ear, to read them without perceiving the heaviness that lags in the verse, to imitate the action it describes. The simile of the Pines is very just and well adapted to the subject;" says an Enemy, in his Essay on the Dunciad, p. 21.
Imitations
- ↑ Ver. 380, 381. The same their talents, —Each prompt, &c.]
Ambo fiorentes ætatibus, Arcades ambo,
Et certare pares, & respondere parati.Virg. Ecl. vi. - ↑ Ver. 382. And smit with love of Poetry and Prate.]
Smit with the love of sacred song———Milton. - ↑ Ver. 384. The heroes sit, the vulgar form a ring;]
Consedere duces, & vulgi stante corona.Ovid. Met. xiii.
