'Twixt his right ribs deep pierced the furious blade,
And open'd wide those secret vessels where
Life's light goes out, when first they let in air.


But he has allusions vulgar as well as learned in a visionary
succession of kings:


Joas at first does bright and glorious show,
In life's fresh morn his fame does early crow.


Describing an undisciplined army, after having said with elegance,


His forces seem'd no army, but a crowd
Heartless, unarm'd, disorderly, and loud,


he gives them a fit of the ague.

The allusions, however, are not always to vulgar things; he offends
by exaggeration as much as by diminution:


The king was placed alone, and o'er his head
A well-wrought heaven of silk and gold was spread.