The Project Gutenberg EBook of Discourse on Criticism and of Poetry (1707)
by Samuel Cobb

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Title: Discourse on Criticism and of Poetry (1707)
From Poems On Several Occasions (1707)

Author: Samuel Cobb

Release Date: December 30, 2004 [EBook #14528]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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_Series Two:_

_Essays on Poetry and Language_

No. 1

Samuel Cobb's

Discourse on Criticism and of Poetry

from

Poems on Several Occasions (1707)

With an Introduction by

Louis I. Bredvold

The Augustan Reprint Society July, 1946

Membership in the Augustan Reprint Society entitles the subscriber to
six publications issued each year. The annual membership fee is $2.50.
Address subscriptions and communications to The Augustan Reprint Society
in care of the General Editors: Richard C. Boys, University of Michigan,
Ann Arbor, Michigan; or Edward N. Hooker or H.T. Swedenberg, Jr.,
University of California, Los Angeles 24, California. Editorial
Advisors: Louis I. Bredvold, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor,
Michigan, and James L. Clifford, Columbia University, New York.

Introduction

What little is known of the life of Samuel Cobb (1675-1713) may be found
in the brief article in the _Dictionary of National Biography_ by W.P.
Courtney. He was born in London, and educated at Christ's Hospital and
at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained the degrees of B.A.,
1698, and M.A., 1702. He was appointed "under grammar master" at
Christ's Hospital in 1702 and continued his connection with this school
until his early death. He had a reputation for wit and learning, and
also for imbibing somewhat too freely. In his poetry he especially
cultivated the style of the free Pindaric ode, a predilection which won
him a mention without honor in Johnson's life of Pope (_Lives of the
Poets_, ed. Birkbeck Hill, III, 227). Even the heroic couplets of his
poem on "Poetry" aim rather at pseudo-Pindaric diffuseness than at
epigrammatic concentration of statement. As a