The art of preserving health ... To which is prefixed a critical essay on the poem / by J. Aikin. M.D.

  • Armstrong, John, 1709-1779
Date:
1795
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The art of preserving health ... To which is prefixed a critical essay on the poem / by J. Aikin. M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    in his Georgics, and are much more probable than the deep political defign attributed to that poem, of exciting the Roman nobility to the purfuits of agriculture. But while perhaps every poem ftrittly didactic labours under the inconvenience of a fubjec not calculated for difplaying the art of poetry in its faireft form, fome, both from their nature, and from the manner of treating them, are lefs defe€tive in this refpeét than others. #5 hus, certain arts are clofely conne¢ted in their theory with large and philofophical views of the fyftem of the univerfe, or of the principles of the human mind: Some, even in their practice, afford matter for pleafing defcrip- tion, and admit of eafy illuftration from the moft ftriking and agreeable objects of external nature. For example, the arts of hufbandry are evidently allied to a vaft variety of great and interefting topics; and we all know how advantageoufly Viretn has employed them as the ground-work of one of the moft pleafing poems of anti- guity. ‘This piece, however, will alfo ferve to fhew the