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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
A REPLY TO AN IMITATION OF THE SECOND ODE OF HORACE, by RICHARD BENTLEY First Line: Who strives to mount parnassus hill Last Line: Great without patron, rich without south-sea. Variant Title(s): Verses | |||
Who strives to mount Parnassus hill And thence poetic laurels bring, Must first acquire due force and skill, Must fly with swan's or eagle's wing. Who Nature's treasures would explore, Her mysteries and arcana know, Must high as lofty Newton soar, Must stoop as searching Woodward low. Who studies ancient laws and rites, Tongues, arts, and arms, all history, Must drudge like Selden days and nights, And in the endless labour die. Who travels in religious jars, (Truth mixed with errors, shade with rays), Like Whiston, wanting Pyx and stars In ocean wide or sinks, or stays. But grant our hero's hopes long toil And comprehensive genius crown; All sciences, all arts, his spoil, Yet what reward or what renown? Envy, innate in vulgar souls, Envy steps in and stops his rise; Envy with poisoned tarnish fouls His lustre, and his worth decries. Inglorious, or by wants enthralled, To College and old books confined, A pedant for his learning called, Dunces advanced, he's left behind; Yet left content, a genuine Stoic he, Great without patron, rich without South-Sea. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ARIZONA POEMS: 2. MEXICAN QUARTER by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER PATROLING BARNEGAT by WALT WHITMAN STARRY NIGHT by KENNETH SLADE ALLING THESMOPHORIAZUSAE: EURIPIDES by ARISTOPHANES THESEUS AND ARIADNE by FRANCIS BEAUMONT GONERIL'S LULLABY, FR. KING LEAR'S WIFE by GORDON BOTTOMLEY EPIGRAM ON ONE BORN BLIND, AND SO DEAD by WILLIAM BROWNE (1591-1643) |
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