Note 87 — CANTO III. MANIFESTO.
Reading edition
Must “duck” to death his stubborn pate.
More last words of Dr Darwin.
“The brow of man erect, with thought elate, Ducks to the mandate of resistless fate.” Temple of Nature, Canto iv.
I have exhibited this couplet at all the assemblages of poetizing brethren in Grub street and St Giles’s, not omitting the inhabitants of the “Wits’ corner, at the Chapter coffee-house, the elevated tenants of the cider cellar in Maiden Lane, and Col. Hanger’s knights of the round table,” all of whom agree in acknowledging the elegance and correctness of the metaphor, and that its beauties are so transcendently exquisite, and beyond the ken of mortal eye, as to be perfectly incomprehensible.