339

AND WRITINGS OF POPE. QUIAO THT MO YAP2G Ar this call of a fifter in misfortune, who b'siq basgow baldment Taşardı sad 0 had been vifited with a fad fimilitude of Diam bonis & Won d 1190 195 2970 I

griefs with her own, Eloifa breaks out in a religious transport, szem Ploom

I come, I

prepare your rofeate bow'rs, in Cœlestial palms, and ever-blooming flow'rs ; 19 Thither where finners may have reft I go ! (130Ə She then calls on Abelard, to pay her the last fad offices; and to be prefent with her în the article of deathjod blood) k

. See my lips tremble, and my eyeballs roll

And then a circumftance of perfonal fondnefs intervenes,

Suck my last Breath, and catch the flying foul 1:5 But she instantly corrects herfelf, and would have her Abelard attend end her at thefe laft

folemn moments, only as a devout priest, and not as a fond lover. The image, in which The represents him coming to adminifter extreme unction, is ftriking and picturesque;

Ah, no-in facred veftments mayft thou stand,
The hallow'd taper * trembling in thy Hard, Am

The words printed in Italics ought to be looked on as particularly beautiful. 11sv edi 1ebnu neso bed seda rohing & aliold duw RICH

ТА

Z 2

“Prefent

Prefent the crofs before my lifted eye,ld of in
Teach me at once, and learn of me, to die!

She adds, that it will be fome confolation to
behold him once more, tho' even in the ago-
nies of death,

Ah then! thy once-lov'd Eloifa fee!

It will be then no crime to gaze on me!

Which laft line I could never read without
great emotion; it is at once fo pathetic, and
fo artfully points back to the whole train
and nature of their misfortunes. The cir-
cumstances, fhe wishes may attend the death
of Abelard, are poetically imagined, and are
alfo agreeable to the notions of mystic devo-
tion. The death of St. Jerome is finely paint-
ed by DOMENICHINO, with fuch attendant
particulars.

In trance ecftatic may thy pangs be drown'd t,
C. Bright clouds defcend, and angels watch thee round,
From opening skies may ftreaming glories fhine,

And faints embrace thee with a love like mine, May one kind grave unite each hapless name, 24 And graft my love immortal on thy fame! This with was fulfilled. The body of AbeJard, who died twenty years before Eloifa, was t.V. 340.

fent

fent to Eloifa, who interred it in the monaftery of the Paraclete, and it was accompanied with a very extraordinary form of Abfolution, from the famous Peter de Clugny,

Ego Petrus Cluniacenfis abbas, qui Petrum Abelardum in monachum Cluniacenfem rẻcepi, & corpus ejus furtim delatum Heloiffe Abbatiffæ, & monialibus Paracleti conceffi, autoritate omnipotentis Dei, & omnium fanctorum, abfolvo éum, pro officio, ab omnibus peccatis fuis*."-" Eloisa herself, fays Vigneul Marville, follicited for this abfolution, and Peter de Clugny willingly granted it on what it could be founded, I leave to our learned theologifts to determine. In certain ages, opinions have prevailed, for which no folid reason can be given." When Eloifa died in 1163, fhe was interred by the fide of her beloved husband: I must not forget to mention, for the fake of those who are fond cf modern miracles, that when he was put into the grave, Abelard ftretched out his arms to receive her, and clofely embraced her.

Epift. Abel. & Heloiff. p. 238. + Melanges, T. ii. p. 55

ELOISA,

ELOISA, at the conclufion of the EPISTLE to which we are how atfiv'ds is judicioufly reprefented as gradually fettling into a trank quility of mind, and feemingly reconciled to hef fate. She can bear to fpeale of their being buried together, without violent emotions. Two lovers are introduced as vifiting their celebrated tombs, and the behaviour of thefe strangers is finely imagined 44 yas fumis lo

1 tsubo sisw veilt todi If ever chance two wand'ring lovers brings, "To Paraclete's white walls and filver fpringsid of O'er the pale marble fhall they join their heads, (11 And drink the falling, tears each other sheds

Then fadly fay, with mutual pity mov'd, Oh! may we never love as thefe have fovads to thes show visaqua s 1 THE poet adds, fill farther, what impref fions a view of their fepulchre would make

even on a spectator lefs interested than these two lovers; and how it could affect his mind, even in the midst of the most folemn acts of

religionem trang

From the full quire when loud Hofannas rife

And fwell the pomp of dreadful facrifice,

n

Amid that fcene, if fome relenting eye,

Glance on the ftone where our cold relics lie,

3

Devotion's felf fhallofteal a thought from heav'n,
One butan tear fall drop and be forgiven!
Bishore- medgaidoud to szub EdT †
• V.353.

WITH

343

AND WRITINGS OF POPE. I to nodulos si te A210 WT this laft line, at first it appears, that the poem, should have ended; for the eight additional verfes *, concerning fome poet, that haply might arife to fing their misfortune, are languid and flat, and diminish the pathos of the foregoing fentiments. They might stand it should feem for the conclufion of almost any story, were we not informed, that they were added by the Poet in allusion to his own cafe, and the ftate of his own mind. For I am well informed, that what determined him in the choice of the subject of this epistle, was the retreat of that lady into a nunnery, whofe death he had lately fo pathetically lamented, in a foregoing Elegy, and for whom he had conceived a violent paffion. She was first beloved by a nobleman †, an intimate friend of POPE, and, on his deferting her, retired into France; when?

And fure if fate fome future bard shall join "In fad fimilitude of grief to mine, Condemn'd whole years in abfence to deplore And image charms he must behold no more; A bim A Such if there be, who loves fo long, fo well; Let him our fad, our tender ftory tell ko sasl n'The well fung wors will fooths my penfive ghost;I He beft can paint 'em, who can feel 'em most... The duke of Buckingham-Sheffield.