“The style of Habakkuk,” Says Bishop Lowth, “is poetical, especially in his Ode, which may justly be deemed one of the most complete of its kind.” Poeticus est Habbaccuci stylus; sed maxime in Oda, quae inter absolutissimas in eo genere merito numerari potest—Proel, 21. And in describing the character of this ode he says—“The Prophet indeed embellishes the whole of this poem with a magnificence equal to its commencement, selecting from so great an abundance of wonderful events the grandest, and setting them forth in the most splendid dress, by images and figures, and the most elevated diction; the high sublimity of which he augments and enhances by the elegance of a remarkable conclusion: so that hardly any thing of this kind would be more beautiful or more perfect than this poem, were it not for one or two spots of obscurity which are to be found in it, occasioned, as it seems, by its ancientness.” Equidem totum hunc locum pari qua ingressus est magnificentia exornat vates; ex tanta rerum admirandarum copia nobilissima quaeque seligens, eaque coloribus splendidissimis, imaginibus, figuris, dictione elatissima illustrans; quorum summam sublimitatem cumulat et commendat singu-laris clausulae elegantia: ita ut, nisi una atque altera ei insideret obscuri-tatis nebula vetustate, ut videtur, inducta, vix quidquam hoc poemate in suo genere extaret luculentius aut perfectius.—Proel. 28.