Spence, Joseph; Tindal, Nicholas [Editor]; Dodsley, James [Oth.]: A Guide To Classical Learning: Or, Polymetis Abridged: Containing, I. By Way of Introduction, the Characters of the Latin Poets and their Work ... II. An Inquiry concerning the Agreement between the Works of the Roman Poets and the Remains of the Antient Artists ... Being a Work absolutely necessary, not only for the Right Understanding of the Classics, but also for forming in Young Minds a True Taste for the Beauties of Poetry, Sculpture, and Painting (London: Printed for J. Dodsley, 1786)

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to sit a little lighter upon him. His love of being
witty had forsaken him, though it grew upon him
when leafi: becoming, in his old age; for his Me-
tarriorphosis (which was the last poeiri he wrote at
Rome) has more instances of falle wit than per-
haps all his former writings put together. His
transitions from one (lory to another, for which he
is so much cried up, are by Quintilian rather
excufed than commended ; we have a consider-
able loss in the lattet half of his Fasti, and in
his Medea, which is much applauded.
P H JE D R U S.
Though Phjedrus did not appear till the reign
of Tiberius, he deserves to be reckoned among
thole of the Augustan age. He prbfefiedly follows
TEsop in his fables, and declares that he keeps in
his manner, even where the subjed is of his own
invention. By this it appears that JEsop’s way
* of telling stdries was ihort arid plairi; for Phse-
drus’s distinguishing beauty is conciseness and sim-
plicity.
M A N I L I U S.
There are so many passages in Mani Lius
which relate to his own times;,, and which all
have a regard to the Augustan age, that he is at
present reckoned of that age, though no one an-
tient writer speaks of any such poet about those
times. The strongest argument in his favour is,
that his treatise of astronomy agrees exactly in
many