[33] Ut vidi, ut perii. The whole account here given of Jason's first appearance, and the beginning and progress of her passion, may be considered as a heautiful copy of nature. We may compare it with what Virgil says on the same subject, and in nearly the same manner. It is in Damon's part of the eighth Eclogue,
'The first time I saw you, was in your tender childhood, when your mother was with you, and your little hands were gathering the desty apples about our bedres, in which I was your guide. I was at that time just twelve years old, and could scarcely reach from the ground the nodding branches. How did I gaze, how was I lost, and hurried away by a fatal error?' Virgil was, without doubt, a greater master in every kind of poetry than Ovid; and it must be owned there are some soft and tender strokes in these lines that affect us strongly; yet both poets have suited their subject to their design, and in that light equally merit our praise. Virgil depicts a tender complaining passion, that urges the lover to end his misery with his life: Ovid describes a strong and violent one, that, slighted, pushes on to revenge. They both imitate Theocritus. Ut vidit, ut periit, ut in profundum satlavit amorem. Idyll. iii. ver. 42.“Sepibus in nostris parvam te roscida mala
(Dux ego vester eram) vidi cum matre legentem:
Alter ab undecimo tum me iam ceperat annus;
Iam fragiles poteram a terra contingere ramos.
Ut vidi, ut perii, ut me malus abstula error!
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