Joseph Trapp

A man cannot command his own motions while he reads this; the very verses are alive; and the reader is transported out of himself.

Some beauties are the more so, for not being capable of explanation. I feel it, though I cannot account for it.

When in her turn the moon obscure withdraws Her light, and setting stars persuade to sleep: Lonely she pines within the empty court, Lies on the couch which just before []he left; Him absent, absent still she hears and sees.

As when, complaining in melodious groans, Sweet Philomel, beneath a poplar shade, Mourns her lost young, which some rough village hind Observing, from their nest, unfledged, has stole: She weeps all night; and, perched upon a bough, With …

Confounded with the crowd of various thoughts, And stiffening with amaze, the hero stood, In silence deep: within his bosom boils Disdainful shame, and grief to madness wrought, And love inflamed with rage, and conscious worth.

To him the wind with doubtful terror wafts The mingled noise: hoarse murmurs of distress And clamours from the city pierce his ears. Ah me! what sounds confused, what cries disturb The town? Why rush the clamours from the walls? He said; …

Two gates of sleep there are: the one of horn, Through which with ease the real phantoms pass; With polished elephant the other shines, Through which the manes send false dreams to light.

Aurora, from Tithonus' saffron bed Now rising, sprinkled over the world with light.

If Helenus has any skill, If any faith, and if Apollo right Inspires his prophet: one thing, goddess-born, One thing, above the rest, I will advise, and oft repeat it: with religious prayer First Juno's deity adore; to her

Her Amazonian files with lunar shields Penthesilea leads, and in the midst Of thousand storms, beneath her naked pap Her golden belt she buckles, warlike maid, And, though a virgin, dares engage with men.

Arms and the man I sing who first from Troy Came to the Italian and Lavinian shores, Exiled by fate; much tossed on land and sea By power divine and cruel Juno's rage; Much too in war he suffered, till he reared A city and to Latium …

Of mine the world will and ought to be judge, whatever I say or think, and its judgment in these matters is never erroneous.

If some gentlemen are resolved that blank verse shall be prose, they have my free leave to enjoy their saying, provided I may have theirs to think they mean nothing by it, unless they can prove that rhyme is essential to metre; …

He who says he values no translation of this or that poem because he understands the original, has indeed no true relish, that is, in effect, no true understanding of either.

Poetry itself being the music of thoughts and words, as music is the poetry of sounds.

However poetry may have been dishonoured by the follies of some and the vices of others, the abuse or corruption of the best things being always the worst, it will notwithstanding be ever regarded, as it ever has been, by the wisest and …

The art and triumph of poetry are in nothing more seen and felt than in moving the passions.