oetry, which gives life and lustre to all it
touches, are here described; its quiet majestic progress enriching
every subject (otherwise dry and barren) with a pomp of diction and
luxuriant harmony of numbers; and its more rapid and irresistible
course, when swollen and hurried away by the conflict of tumultuous
passions."

2. _And give to rapture_. The first reading of the MS. was "give to
transport."

3. _Helicon's harmonious springs_. In the mountain range of Helicon,
in Boeotia, there were two fountains sacred to the Muses, Aganippe
and Hippocrene, of which the former was the more famous.

7. Cf. Pope, _Hor. Epist._ ii. 2, 171:

"Pour the full tide of eloquence along,
Serenely pure, and yet divinely strong;"

and _Ode on St. Cecilia's Day_, 11:

"The deep, majestic, solemn organs blow;"

also Thomson, _Liberty_, ii. 257:

"In thy full language speaking mighty things,
Like a clear torrent close, or else diffus'd
A broad majestic stream, and rolling on
Through all the winding harmony of sound."

9. Cf. Shenstone, _Inscr._: "Verdant vales and fountains bright;"
also Virgil, _Geo._ i. 96: "Flava Ceres;" and Homer, _Il._ v. 499:
[Greek: xanthe Demeter].

10. _Rolling_. Spelled "rowling" in the 1st and other early editions.

_Amain_. Cf. _Lycidas_, 111: "The golden opes, the iron shuts amain;"
_P. L._ ii. 165: "when we fled amain," etc. Also Shakes. _Temp._ iv.
1: "Her peacocks fly amain," etc. The word means literally _with
main_ (which we still use in "might and main"), that is, with force
or strength. Cf. Horace, _Od._ iv. 2, 8: "Immensusque ruit profundo
Pindarus ore."

11. The first MS. reading was, "With torrent rapture see it pour."

12. Cf. Dryden, _Virgil's Geo._ i.: "And rocks the bellowing voice of
boiling seas resound;" Pope, _Iliad_: "Rocks rebellow to the roar."

13. "Power of harmony to calm the turbulent sallies of the soul. The
thoughts are borrowed from the first Pythian of Pindar" (Gray).

14. _Solemn-breathing airs_. Cf. _Comus_, 555: "a soft and
solemn-breathing sound."

15. _Enchanting shell_. That is, lyre; alluding to the myth of the
origin of the instrument, which Mercury was said to have made from
the shell of a tortoise. Cf. Collins, _Passions_, 3: "The Passions
oft, to hear her shell," etc.

17. _On Thracia's hills_. Thrace was one of the chief seats of the
worship of Mars. Cf. Ovid, _Ars Am._ ii. 588: "Mars Thracen occupat."
See also Virgil, _Aen._ iii