La bella eta dell' or unqua non venne,
Nacque da nostre menti
Entro il vago pensiero,
E nel nostro desio chiaro divenne.
_Guidi_.

The characters in Theocritus, are shewn to be distinguished into three
classes,--herdsmen, shepherds, and goatherds; the first of which was
superior to the next, as that in its turn was to the third; and this
distinction is proved to have been accurately observed, as to allusions
and images. The discrimination seems to have been overlooked by Virgil:
in which instance, no less than in all the genuine graces of pastoral
poetry, he is inferior to the Sicilian.[2] The contempt with which
Warton speaks of those eminent and unfortunate Greek scholars, who
diffused the learning of their country over Europe, after the capture of
Constantinople, and whom he has here termed "Graeculi famelici," is
surely reprehensible. But for their labours, Britain might never have
required an editor of Theocritus.

In 1760, he contributed to the Biographia Britannica a Life of Sir
Thomas Pope, twice, subsequently published, in a separate form, with
considerable enlargements: in the two following years he wrote a Life of
Dr. Bathurst, and in his capacity of Poetry Professor, composed Verses
on the Death of George II., the Marriage of his Successor, and the Birth
of the Heir Apparent, which, together with his Complaint of Cherwell,
made a part of the Oxford Collections. Several of his humorous pieces
were soon after (in 1764) published in the Oxford Sausage, the preface
to which he also wrote; and in 1766, he edited the Greek Anthology of
Cephalas. In 1767, he took the degree of Bachelor in Divinity; and in