Pierre-Philippe Choffard

Pierre-Philippe Choffard after Nicolas André Monsiaux (1754–1837).
(1730–1809)

Approchez, contemplez ce monument pieux où pleuroit en silence un fils religieux.

Etched plate in Jacques Delille (1738–1813), Les Jardins: poëme.
Nouvelle édition considérablement augmentée.
Paris: Chez Levrault freres, 1801.

Purchased on the Gordon N. Ray Fund, 2004

PML 129580
Item description: 

First published in 1782, the Abbé Delille's poem extolling the landscape garden went through many editions, six of which are now at the Morgan. The augmented edition of 1801 acquired over one thousand new lines and a new set of Romantic illustrations by Nicolas André Monsiaux. This vision of Alexander Pope in his garden, weeping on the monument to his late mother, faces verses describing the visit of the dying poet to his mother's tomb: "Approach, contemplate this pious monument where wept in silence a faithful son."