been tolerably turned into our
language.[1]--POPE.

It was in his childhood only that Pope could make choice of so
injudicious a writer as Statius to translate. It were to be wished that
no youth of genius were suffered ever to look into Statius, Lucan,
Claudian, or Seneca the tragedian,--authors who, by their forced
conceits, by their violent metaphors, by their swelling epithets, by
their want of a just decorum, have a strong tendency to dazzle, and to
mislead inexperienced minds, and tastes unformed, from the true relish
of possibility, propriety, simplicity, and nature. Statius had
undoubtedly invention, ability, and spirit; but his images are gigantic
and outrageous, and his sentiments tortured and hyperbolical. One cannot
forbear reflecting on the short duration of a true taste in poetry among
the Romans. From the time of Lucretius to that of Statius was no more
than about one hundred and forty-seven years; and if I might venture to
pronounce so rigorous a sentence, I would say, that the Romans can boast
of but eight poets who are unexceptionably excellent,--namely, Terence,
Lucretius, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, Phaedrus.
These only can be called legitimate models of just thinking and writing.
Succeeding authors, as it happens in all countries, resolving to be
original and new, and to avoid the imputation of copying, become
distorted and unnatural. By endeavouring to open an unbeaten path, they
deserted simplicity and truth; weary of common and obvious beauties,
they must needs hunt for remote and artificial decorations.

It is plain that Pope was not blind to the faults of Statius, many of
which he points out with judgment and truth, in a letter to Mr.
Cromwell, written in 1708{9}. After this censure of Statius's manner, it
is but justice to add, that in the Thebais there are many strokes of a
strong imagination; and, indeed, the picture of Amphiaraus, swallowed up
suddenly by a chasm that opened in the ground, is truly
sublime.--WARTON.

Statius was a favourite writer with the poets of the middle ages. His
bloated magnificence of description, gigantic images, and pompous
diction suited their taste, and were somewhat of a piece with the
romances they so much admired. They neglected the gentler and genuine
graces of Virgil, which they could not relish. His pictures were too
correctly and chastely drawn to take their fancies; and truth of design,
elegance of expression, and the arts of comp