Note 490 — Chapter VIII · LATIN POETRY
Reading edition
A didactic poem in three books; Pope's Poemata Italorum, vol. i. pp. 211-270. The description of the Resurrection, the Last Judgment, and the entrance of the blessed into Paradise, forming the conclusion of the last book, is an excellent specimen of barocco style and bathos. Virgil had written, 'Ite domum pasti, si quis pudor, ite juvenci!' Paleario makes the Judge address the damned souls thus: 'Ite domum in tristem, si quis pudor, ite ruentes,' &c. How close Milton's path lay to the worst faults in poetry, and how wonderfully he escaped, may well be calculated by the study of such verse as this.