of this style, that Tacitus talks like a coffee-house politician, Josephus[1] like the British gazetteer, Tully is as short and smart as Seneca or Mr. Asgill, Marcus Aurelius is excellent at snip-snap, and honest Thomas-a-Kempis as prim and polite as any preacher at court.
3. The Alamode Style,
which is fine by being new, and has this happiness attending it, that it is as durable and extensive as the poem itself. Take some examples of it, in the description of the sun in a mourning coach upon the death of Queen Mary.
See Phœbus now, as once for Phaeton,
Has masked his face; and put deep mourning on;
Dark clouds his sable chariot do surround,
And the dull steeds stalk o'er the melancholy round[2].
Of Prince Arthur's soldiers drinking.
While rich burgundian wine, and bright champaign,
Chase from their minds the terrour of the main[3].
whence we also learn, that burgundy and champaign make a man on shore despise a storm at sea.
Of the Almighty encamping his regiments.
He sunk a vast capacious deep,
Where he his liquid regiments does keep.
Thither the waves file off, and make their way
To form the mighty body of the sea;
Where they encamp, and in their station stand,
Entrench'd in works of rock, and lines of sand[4].
- ↑ Josephus, translated by Sir Roger L'Estrange.
- ↑ Amb. Philips.
- ↑ Prince Arthur, p. 16.
- ↑ Blackm. Ps. civ. p. 261.
