find not one in Homer, and I think not in any of the Greek Poets, or the Latin, excepting only Virgil; and there is no question but he thought, he had Virgil's Authority for that License. But I am confident, our Poet never meant to leave him or any other such a Precedent. And I ground my Opinion on these two Reasons. First, we find no Example of a Hemystick in any of his Pastorals or Georgicks. For he had given the last finishing Strokes to both these Poems: But his Æneis he left so uncorrect, at least so short of that perfection at which he aim'd, that we know how hard a Sentence He pass'd upon it: And in the second place, I reasonably presume, that he intended to have fill'd up all those Hemysticks, because in one of them we find the sense imperfect:
Quem tibi jam Trojâ———
Which some foolish Gramarian, has ended for him, with a half Line of Nonsense.
Peperit fumante Crëusa.
For Ascanius must have been born some Years before the burning of that City; which I need not prove. On the other side we find also, that he himself fill'd up one Line in the sixth Aeneid, the Enthusiasm seizing him, while he was reading to Augustus.
Misenum Æolidem, quo non præstantior alter
Ære, ciere viros. ———
To which he added in that transport. Martemque accendere cantu: and never was any Line more nobly finish'd; for the Reasons which I have given in the Book of Painting. On these Considerations I have
