Jonson, who sung this of him, ere he went,
Himself, to rest,
Or taste a part of that full joy he meant
To have express'd,
In this bright asterism!--
Where it were friendship's schism,
Were not his Lucius long with us to tarry,
To separate these twi-
Lights, the Dioscuri;
And keep the one half from his Harry.
But fate doth so alternate the design,
Whilst that in heaven, this light on earth must shine.
(BEN JONSON: _A Pindaric Ode on the death of Sir H. Morison_. 1629.)
This ode of Jonson's is apparently the earliest, and remained for a long
time the only, notable English ode based on the strict structure of the
Greek original. The Greek ode was commonly divided into the strophe, the
antistrophe, and the epode; the strophe and antistrophe being identical
in structure, though varying in different odes, and the epode being of
different structure. Jonson therefore followed the classical form
carefully, and introduced English terms to express the original three
divisions.
Professor Bronson observes, in his Introduction to the Odes of Collins:
"It is a commonplace that the Pindaric Ode in English is an artificial
exotic, of slight native force, and unable to reproduce the effects of
the Greek original. The reason is obvious. The Greek odes were
accompanied by music and dancing, the singers moving to one side during
the strophe, retracing their steps during the antistrophe, ... and
standing still during the epode. The ear was thus helped by the eye, and
the divisions of the ode were distinct and significant. But in an
English Pindaric the elaborate correspondences and differences between
strophe, antistrophe, and epode are lost upon most readers, and even the
critical reader derives from them a pleasure intellectual rather than
sensuous." (Edition of Collins, Athenæum Press Series, Introduction, pp.
lxxiv, lxxv.)