NOT E S

O N THE

TWO BOOKS OF ODE S.

B. 1. Ode XVIII. Stanza II. 2.] Lycurgus the Lacedæmonian law-giver brought into Greece from Afia Minor the first complete copy of Homer's works. -At Platea was fought the decifive battle between the Perfian army and the united militia of Greece under Paufanias and Ariftides.-Cimon the Athenian erected a trophy in Cyprus for two great victories gained on the fame day over the Perfians by fea and land: Diodorus Siculus has preferved the infcription which the Athenians affixed to the confecrated spoils, after this great fuccefs; in which it is very remarkable, that the greatnefs of the occafion has railed the manner of expression above the ufual fimplicity and modefty of all other ancient infcriptions. It is this:

ΕΞ. ΟΥ. Γ ́. ΕΥΡΩΠΗΝ, ΑΣΙΑΣ, ΔΙΧΑ. ΠΟΝΤΟΣ. ENEIME.

ΚΑΙ. ΠΟΛΕΑΣ. ΘΝΗΤΩΝ, ΘΟΥΡΟΣ ΑΡΗΣ.

EITEXEI.

ΟΥΔΕΝ, ΠΩ, ΤΟΙΟΥΤΟΝ, ΕΠΙΧΘΟΝΙΩΝ.. LENET.

ΑΝΔΡΩΝ.

ΕΡΓΟΝ. ΕΝ. ΗΠΕΙΡΩΙ. ΚΑΙ. ΚΑΤΑ. ΠΟΝΤΟΝ.

AMA.

U 3

ΟΙΔΕ..

ΟΙΔΕ. ΓΑΡ. ΕΝ. ΚΥΠΡΩΙ. ΜΗΔΟΥΣ. ΠΟΛΛΟΥΣ.

ΟΛΕΣΑΝΤΕΣ.

· ΦΟΙΝΙΚΩΝ. ΕΚΑΤΟΝ. ΝΑΥΣ. ΕΛΟΝ. ΕΝ. ΠΕΛΑ

TEI.

ΑΝΔΡΩΝ. ΠΛΗΘΟΥΣΑΣ. ΜΕΓΑ. Δ. ΕΣΤΕΝΕΝ. ΑΣΙΣ. ΥΠ'. ΑΥΤΩΝ.

ΠΛΗΓΕΙΣ. ΑΜΦΟΤΕΡΑΙΣ. ΧΕΡΣΙ. ΚΡΑΤΕΙ. ΠΟΛΕΜΟΥ.

The following translation is almost literal:

Since first the fea from Afia's hoftile coaft
Divided Europe, and the god of war
Affail'd imperious cities; never yet,

At once among the waves and on the fhore,
Hath fuch a labour been atchiev'd by men
Who earth inhabit. They, whofe arms the Medes
In Cyprus felt pernicious, they, the fame,
Have won from skilful Tyre an hundred ships
Crouded with warriors. Afia groans, in both
Her hands fore fmitten, by the might of war.

Stanza II. 3.] Pindar was contemporary with Ariftides and Cymon, in whom the glory of ancient Greece was at its height. When Xerxes invaded Greece, Pindar was true to the common intereft of his country; though his fellow citizens, the Thebans, had fold themselves to the Perfian king. In one of his odes he expreffes the great diftrefs and anxiety of his mind, occafioned by the vaft preparations of Xerxes against

Greece.

Greece. (Ifthm. 8.) In another he celebrates the victories of Salamis, Platea, and Himera. (Pyth. 1.) It will be neceffary to add two or three other particulars of his life, real or fabulous, in order to explain what follows in the text concerning him. First then, he was thought to be so great a favourite of Apollo, that the priests of that deity allotted him a conftant share of their offerings. It was faid of him, as of fome other illuftrious men, that at his birtli a fwarm of bees lighted on his lips, and fed him with their honey. It was also a tradition concerning him, that Pan was heard to recite his poetry, and feen dancing to one of his hymns on the mountains near Thebes. But a real historical fact in his life is, that the Thebans impofed a large fine upon him on account of the veneration which he expreffed in his poems for that heroic fpirit, fhewn by the people of Athens in defence of the common liberty, which his own fellow-citizens had fhamefully betrayed. And, as the argument of this ode implies, that great poetical talents, and bigb fentiments of liberty, do reciprocally produce and affift each other, fo Pindar is perhaps the most exemplary proof of this connection, which occurs in hiftory. The Thebans were remarkable, in general, for a flavish difpofition through all the fortunes of their common-wealth; at the time of its ruin by Philip; and even in its best state, under the adminiftratión of Pelopidas and Epaminondas and every one knows, they were no lefs remarkable for great dulnefs, and want of all genius. That

:

Pindar fhould have equally distinguished himself from the rest of his fellow-citizens in both these respects, feems fomewhat extraordinary, and is fcarce to be accounted for but by the preceding observation.

Stanza III. 3.] Alluding to his "Defence of the people of England" against Salmafius. See particularly the manner in which he himself speaks of that undertaking, in the introduction to his reply to Morus.

Stanza IV. 3.] Edward the Third; from whom defcended Henry Haftings, third Earl of Huntingdon, by the daughter of the Duke of Clarence, brother to Edward the Fourth.

Stanza V. 3.] At Whittington, a village on the edge of Scarfdale in Derbyshire, the Earls of Devonfhire and Danby, with the Lord Delamere, privately concerted the plan of the Revolution, The house in which they met is at prefent a farm-houfe; and the country people diftinguish the room where they fat, by the name of the plotting parlour."

B. II. Ode VII. Stanza II. 1.] Mr. Locke died in 1704, when Mr. Hoadly was beginning to distinguish himself in the cause of civil and religious liberty: Lord Godolphin in 1712, when the doctrines of the Jacobite faction were chiefly favoured by those in power: Lord Somers in 1716, amid the practices of the nonjuring clergy against the proteftant eftablishment; and Lord Stanhope in 1721, during the controverfy with the lower houfe of convocation.

B. II. Ode X. Stanza V.] During Mr. Pope's war with Theobald, Concanen, and the reft of their tribe, Mr. Warburton, the prefent Lord Bishop of Gloucefter, did with great zeal cultivate their friendship; having been introduced, forfooth, at the meetings of that refpectable confederacy: a favour which he afterwards spoke of in very high terms of complacency and thankfulness. At the fame time in his intercourse with them he treated Mr. Pope in a moft contemptuous, manner, and as a writer without genius. Of the truth of these affertions his Lordship can have no doubt, if he recollects his own correspondence with Concanen; a part of which is ftill in being, and will probably be remembered as long as any of this prelate's writings.

B. II. Ode XIII.] In the year 1751 appeared a very splendid edition, in quarto, of " Memoires pour "fervir à l'Hiftoire de la Maifon de Brandebourg, à "Berlin & à la Haye;" with a privilege figned FEDERIC; the fame being engraved in imitation of handwriting. In this edition, among other extraordinary paffages, are the two following, to which the third stanza of this ode more particularly refers:

Page 163.] "Il fe fit une migration" (the author is fpeaking of what happened of the revocation of the edict of Nantes) "dont on n'avoit guere vu d'exemples ‹‹ dans l'histoire: un peuple entier fortit du royaume par l'efprit de parti en haine du pape, & I pour rece"voir fous un autre ciel la communion fous les deux "efpeces quatre cens mille ames s'expatrierent ainfi

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& aban