*_Ode to Duty_.

[XIX.] This Ode, written in 1805, is on the model of Gray's 'Ode to Adversity,' which is copied from Horace's 'Ode to Fortune.' Many and many a time have I been twitted by my wife and sister for having forgotten this dedication of myself to the stern law-giver.
Transgressor indeed I have been, from hour to hour, from day to day; I would fain hope however not more flagrantly or in a worse way than most of my tuneful brethren.

But these last words are in a wrong strain.

We should be rigorous to ourselves, and forbearing, if not indulgent, to others, and if we make comparisons at all it ought to be with those who have morally excelled us.

[In pencil--But is not the first stanza of Gray's from a chorus of Aeschylus?
And is not Horace's Ode also modelled on the Greek ?] 438.