_Virgil_'s Æneid.

Now I will take all the Passages of that Poem mentioned in my Letters
to you, and compare them in these two Translations: And if it shall
appear by the Comparison that the _rhym'd_ Verses have not only more
Harmony and Conciseness, but likewise that they express _Virgil_'s
Sense more fully and more perspicuously than the _blank_ Verse, will
it not be easy to determine which of these two Sorts ought to be
preferr'd?

Octob. 22. 1736.

_I am_, SIR, _&c._

* * * * *

_P.S._

When I was taking notice of _Virgil_'s Arts of Versification, I should
not have omitted his sudden varying the Tense of the Verb from the
Preterperfect to the Present.

"_Non tua te nobis, Genitrix pulcherrima talem_
Promisit, _Graiisque ideo bis_ vindicat _armis_.

This is very agreeable both as to the Verse and the Sense; for it
makes the thing described more immediately present than it would be
otherwise. I cannot just now recollect an Example in _Milton_ of this
nature, but I remember one in _Fairfax_, in a Couplet already cited.