Medusa _with_ Gorgonian _Terror guards._

It has been hinted elsewhere, that 'tis ungenerous to criticise on

_Dryden_'s Conduct and Sentiments, which 'tis plain he varied at

Pleasure, and wrote like a great Original, whose Example was to be a

Rule to others, and himself to take Rules from none; but it is not true,

as we read in the above-cited _Guardian_, _That his very Faults have

more Beauty in them, than the most elaborate Compositions of many more

correct Writers_: For I will repeat some few Lines that are monstrous,

and then let the Reader judge how they can be beautiful.

_'Tis false, she is not ill, nor can she be;

She must be chaste, because she's lov'd by me.

--------I'll squeeze thee like a Bladder,

Or make thee groan thy self away in Air.

She who dares love, and for that Love dares die,

And knowing this, dares yet love on, am I.

Good Heaven thy Book of Fate before me lay,

But to tear out the Journal of this Day.

But take what Friends, what Armies thou canst bring,

What Worlds, and when you are united All,

Then I will thunder in your Ears; she shall.

--------Fight, love, despair;

And I can do all this, because I dare.

What are ten thousand Subjects, such as they?

If I am scorn'd, I'll take my self away.

Thou shalt not wish her thine, thou shalt not dare

To be so impudent as to dispair.

There's not a Star of thine dares stay with thee,

I'll whistle thy tame Fortune after me._

I cannot repeat any more of it: These are Mr. _Dryden_'s Faults, in

which, according to the _Guardian_, there are more Beauties than in the

most elaborate Pieces of more correct Writers. I confess it grieves me

to mention such Enormities as these are: For no Man can do more justice

to Mr. _Dryden_'s fruitful Imagination, and harmonious Versification

than my self: But it does not therefore follow, that even Errour in him

is more beautiful than Regularity in others.

It I had more Room, and more Leisure, I should have endeavour'd to

explain the Difference between the several Ways of Thinking. Some of

them I have attempted, and I hope it may stir up a greater Genius, to do

in _English_ as Pere _Bouhours_ has done in _French_, which would

introduce a beautiful and just Manner both in Thought and Expression. It

would then be known why it is that Archbishop _Tillotson_ and Bishop

_Sprat_ are both esteem'd Masters of the _English_ Language; why Sir

_William Temple_, and Sir _Roger L'Estrange_, the _Tatler_, and the

_Spectator_, are generally spoken of as fine Writers; though their

Manner is as different as their Faces. Every Thing that pleases in

Writing is with us, as I have already hinted, resolved into Wit, whether

it be in the Thought or the Expression. _Nay some_, says the

_Spectator_, _carry the Notion of Wit so far, as to ascribe it to Puns

and Quibbles, and even to external Mimickry, and to look upon a Man as

an ingenious Person that can resemble the Tone, Gesture, or Face of

another_. With such admirable Judges as these, Sir _Isaac Newton_'s

Discourse of _Fluxions_ is very witty, as the Machine called the

_Orrery_ was said to be very _wittily_ contrived. With these _Estcourt_,

_Penkethman_, and even _Norris_ are Wits, as the _Spaniards_ take the

_Apes_ to be, and that they won't speak because they would not work. I

have known two or three Actors who got into Vogue by Grimace only, and

acting Parts that had neither Wit nor Sense in them.

Every one of the Kinds of right Thinking has its opposite, as every

Virtue has its Vice; and the Sublime especially is apt to be mistaken in

the Pomp and Puffiness of Description. Of this Kind is that Passage,

where Mr. _Eachard_ describes the Sea-Fight between the _English_ and

the _Dutch_, in the Time of the _Rump_.

"The Battle grew so fierce and so furious, that there were scarce any

Thing to be seen but Masts _overturn'd_ into the Sea, _Splinters_ flying

on all Sides, _Sails_ rent and torn in Pieces, Cables and _Cordage_ cut

in sunder: _How it terrifies one!_ In one Place a _Vessel_ boarded, and

in a Moment the Men chaced off or blown up with the Decks into the Air.

_Four or Five Hundred Men would not have made a Figure dreadful enough

unless the Wooden Decks had gone along with them._ And in another was

seen a Ship swallow'd up by the Waves with several Hundreds of Men, and

the Sea turn'd red with Human Gore, and cover'd with dead Bodies, and

floating Parts of scatter'd Ships. _What's the Reason that we freeze in

the midst of so much_ Fire? _This is what the_ French _call the Cold and

the Puerile Stile._ Again; All which instead of dismaying the

Combatants, serv'd only to excite their Rage, and enflame them to a more

cruel and implacable Slaughter; and the continual Outcries of miserable

wounded Wretches render'd them but the more bloody minded, and rouz'd

them to a more cruel and remorseless Revenge. The rising Coasts on both

Sides the Channel were violently shaken with the resounding Thunders of

the roaring Guns, and those engag'd seem'd to be involv'd in the Wreck

of Nature."

This Fight was over against the Island of _Portland_, and I really

believe the pronouncing of these Words, _roaring Guns_, _resounding

Thunders_, _rising Coasts_, _Wreck of Nature_, among the Rocks under the

Light-houses, would have as good an Effect with the Help of Eccho, as a

Broadside at Sea, which the Historian assures us at the same Time shook

the Hills of _England_ and _France_. Whence comes it that we read all

this without the least Emotion, where there is so much Affectation to

move? Are we not so stun'd with the Sound that the Sense is lost in it,

and we are no more concern'd than at the Sight of a Storm in a

Half-penny Picture? _Dryden_ lets us a little into this Secret in his

_Preface_ to _Troil._ and _Cress._ He is speaking of the puffy Style,

_the common Practice of those Writers, who not being able to infuse a

natural Passion into the Mind, have made it their Business to ply the

Ears, and to stun their Judges by the Noise_. A better Judge than Mr.

_Dryden_ has directed us in this Matter.

_The Words, which in Magnificence abound,

Grow tedious oft, and lose themselves in Sound._

Rosc.

This Way of Writing is much more easy than that which is truly great and

sublime, as in Liquors, 'tis easier to give them Ferment and Froth, than

Spirit and Purity. _There are more Authors_, says _Dryden_, who can make

a _pompous Description, than who can write with an equal and natural

Stile_. He adds, that _Shakespear_ himself did not distinguish _the

blown puffy Stile from true Sublimity_; which could not wholly be

attributed to the Time, because we meet with the true Sublimity very

often in _Spencer_ and _Fairfax_, who were both Contemporaries with

_Shakespear_, and _Spencer_ much the elder. Two Lines of Sir _John

Denham_'s, on a like Subject with that of _Echard_, fills one with

Horrour and Amazement.

_Tost by a Whirlwind of tempestuous Fire,

A Thousand Wretches in the Air expire._

Mr. _Addison_ observes after _Pere Bouhours_, That _it is impossible for

any Thought to be beautiful, which is not just, and has not its

Foundation in the Nature of Things: That the Basis of all Wit is Truth,

and that no Thought can be valuable, of which good Sense is not the

Ground-work_. Therefore when Mr. _Echard_ writes his _Oxcellency_ for

his _Excellency_, speaking of the Parliament's General the Earl of

_Essex_, the _Tyrannical_ Parliament for the _Triennial_ Parliament, the

New _Noddle_ for the _New Model_ with respect to the Army, and the like,

we are not to be imposed upon by him, and to take it upon his bare Word

for Wit. Neither is there any Wit at all in his burlesquing such Phrases

as these; _Presence of God_, _Seeking the Lord_, _Call of God_, _Jesus

Christ_, &c. Which he also would impose upon us for Witicisms.

His Descriptions are not all so lofty and sounding as that of the

_Sea-Fight_, particularly when he paints _Oliver Cromwel_, without his

Breeches, running away from the Cavaliers in his _Drawers_ only, and

then turning back upon them and beating them. Of this Kind is the

incomparable Picture of the Aldermen _Gloucester_: Their _Visages were

pale, lean, and ugly; their Cloaths strange and unusual; their Voices

pert, shrill, and fearless_; Ambassadors _from the godly City of

Gloucester_. His Similes are not more elevated, especially that where he

compares the _Silent_ and _Victorious_ General Monk to a Cat, and

General _Lambert to a Mouse_. He watched him as a Cat watches a Mouse, a

singular Proof of his Perfection in Eloquence, which naturally leads us

to _Expression_, and I doubt not the Historian thinks a finer Historical

Stile than his own is not to be met with.

As in Thoughts so in Expression, we in _England_ are apt to confound all

the various Kinds under the general Terms of good Language, and a fine

Stile. The Sublime, the Natural, the Didactick, the Narrative, the

Tragick, the Comick, the Polite, the Affected, are seldom rightly

distinguish'd, and the latter very often mistaken for the Polite. The

Admirers of Mr. _Echard_'s History do, doubtless, take what follows to

have as much of the Sublime in it as the _English_ Tongue is capable of.

It introduces the glorious Reign of King _Charles_ II.

_Having gone through a stormy and tempestuous Season of various Misery,

we arrive at a sudden Brightness and Splendour, a most unexpected Order,

and glorious Calm and Sunshine. The Splendour and Brightness harder to

be born than the preceeding Clouds and Darkness._ What is Stormy and

Tempestuous? what Brightness, Sunshine, and Splendour? What Clouds and

Darkness? but other Words for the same Things, and instead of

Amplification comes under the Denomination of another Figure very common

in such puffy Rhetorick, call'd _Tautology_, which I am afraid the

Historian and his Admirers mistake for the Sublime, there being but very

few that can distinguish Sound from Sense, or Wind from Spirit. _Let a

Discourse be never so fine_, says _Rapin_, _it loses its worth when 'tis

out of its Place, and appears affected_. Affectation in Stile has the

same Effect with ordinary Judges as Affectation in Air has with Women

and Fops. It passes upon them for Politeness; and Delicacy, tho' there

is nothing more vicious in Language. I might fill a Volume with Examples

of this Vice, taken out of the Earl of _Clarendon_, and the Archdeacon's

Histories, but as I had never troubled my self about them, had there

been nothing in them but Want of Method, and an affected Stile, I shall

content my self with two or three Observations only, which are

sufficient to convince all those that can judge right; and as for

others, I have not Leisure nor Words enough to attempt it.

He says the Sight of the _Gloucester_ Aldermen at once _gave Mirth to

the most severe Countenances, and Sadness to the most cheerful Hearts_.

What Idea can one have of these _Cavaliers_, as he expresses himself,

but that of some Idiots whom we have seen to laugh and cry in a Breath.

He has two Expressions about Mines, which are very extraordinary, both

as he is a _Naturalist_ and as he is an _Orator_: The one is the

_Brass-Mine_ in _Cumberland_, the only _Brass-Mine_ that ever was, or

ever will be in the World. A _Copper-Mine_ might have been found out

there, and a Mine of _Lapis calaminaris_, which put together, would

produce _Brass_ enough, if there were Ore enough. Where he speaks of the

Cleanliness of his Writing, he intimates, that he is one of those who

_dive into the rich Mines of Nature_. What can one imagine about diving

better than that of a Duck and a Dog in a Pond, or Boys in the _Bath_?

To dive into a Mine, methinks, is like running a Man's Head into a

Rock. If he had said he had been digging in the rich Mines of Nature,

one might have expected some Mettal to have come of it, of one Sort or

another. When the Parliament, that brought in King _Charles_ II, met the

first Time, Mr. _Echard_ says, _We are now arrived at the_ VAST _Day_,

which I humbly conceive to be beyond Conception, and a strange Specimen

of the Author's Talent in Elocution. He had a mind to make this Day

something _prodigious_ and _uncommon_, and therefore swells it up with

an Epithet which bursts in the Operation. VAST might have been proper,

if he had been speaking of the Ton of _Heidelbergh_, or Admiral

_Russel_'s Punch Bowl at _Lisbon_: But under what Figure will he put Day

for the Word VAST to become it well? Doctor _Littleton_ in his

Dictionary makes VAST to be _huge_, _burly_, _wide_, _broad_, _large_,

and what is much less for the Archdeacon's Purpose, _misshapen_,

_ill-favoured_, _desolate_, _insatiable_, _outragious_; put Day to ever

a one of them, and see how the Coat fits. Mr. _Bailey_ in his very good

Dictionary is contented with two or three Interpretations only, as a

_huge Day_, a _spacious Day_. _Ludlow_, I believe, would have followed

_Littleton_, and then for VAST would have understood _desolate Day_,

_ill-shapen Day_, _insatiable Day_; so dangerous is it for People to

meddle with Words which they do not understand. Of all the Blunders in

Expression which are to be avoided, there was the best Provision made

against this that could be, if a Man had had the least Acquaintance with

the politer Authors, Monsieur St. _Evremont_ having written a

Dissertation on this very Word VAST, and whoever reads it, will pity a

Writer who could fall into so gross an Errour, if there were no Malice

in what he had written. I suppose that almost all Mr. _Echard_'s Readers

have taken this VAST in the Sense he intended for _Important_, and if he

had said this _Mountainous Day_, it would have done as well: They would

have expected a Birth from the Mountain, and the Arch-Deacon's History

is a Labour of the same Kind.

As we in _England_ are apt to confound Sentiments and Expressions, so we

do the same by Talents, and think if a Man can make a _School-Book_ or

two, he can write a History. _Jeremiah Collier_ wrote a _short View of

the Stage_, which sold wonderfully, and immediately the Booksellers

hir'd him to write Three Histories in Folio: And I question not but,

because Sir _Isaac Newton_ has outdone all Philosophers in his Treatise

of _Fluxions_, they would employ him in _Heroick_ Poetry, if he were

young enough, and would be employ'd by them. There was a _Pertness_ in

_Collier_'s Stile, which was mistaken for Vivacity, and tho' there

cannot be any Thing more affected, yet it recommends his _Essays_,

_Views_, &c. as somewhat in the Perfection of our Language. I wonder Dr.

_Felton_ should forget him, when he mentions Sir _Roger L'Estrange_, Mr.

_Trap_, and other masterly Writers. You cannot name _Collier_'s _Views_,

_Essays_, &c. in Company, but some body or other immediately cries out,

_Ay! that's Fine._ Wonderful fine, as will be seen presently.

In his Essays he has this Expression, _A Man may act an Excellency for

the Satisfaction if Significancy_, which has the same Effect in Prose,

as it is observ'd of some good Verses, that the _Smoothness_ or

_Roughness_ of the Numbers are an Image of the Roughness or Smoothness

of the Thing. You can hardly pronounce these Words without a prim Look,

and screwing up your Mouth with the Affectation of a Girl at a

_Boarding-School_. Would one imagine that this was said by the same

Author in another place; _Nothing is more nauseous than to be affected_:

And yet see further, _Don't let Miss suffer her Heels to get too much

into her Head_, not to say any Thing about the _Attitude_, which would

be very extraordinary in a Picture. Again, _Seeing and Hearing are the

most creditable Senses; the Brain has an unpromising Aspect_, which

cannot be known without Dissection. What Idea does this leave upon the

Mind? or this, _A PRINCE made but a lame Figure in Comparison with our

APOSTLE._ One would think _Collier_ had Prince _Prettiman_ and the

_Spanish_ Fryer in his Head when he wrote it. He is so fond of this

Conceit, that he endeavours to prove, in his Essay on Theft, and

elsewhere, that our Saviour's Disciples were Men of Quality, well-born,

and well-bred, and if they did fish at any time, 'twas only for their

Pleasure. As the _Barber_ of _Northampton_ told _Estcourt_, He was a

Doctor by Profession, and shav'd only for his Diversion. But _Collier_

seems to have less Regard for his Brotherhood in the last Centuries,

when he informs us that by Queen _Elizabeth_'s Injunctions a Clergyman

could not marry till he had made his Complaint against Celibacy before

two Justices of the Peace, and gain'd their Consent, and the _good Will

of the Master or Mistress where the Damsel serv'd_, by which he gives us

to understand, that soon after the Reformation the Priests Wives were

all _Abigail_'s.

_Collier_'s Dialogues serve two principal Ends, the one to carry on an

Argument the more freely and loosely; and the other, which is not the

least, to give himself a fat Figure in his own Picture, for he himself

is the Man who has always the best of the Dispute.

_Well, I can't stand the Force of your Argument:

You are smart, you have brought your self well off._

Thus he conquers his _Alphius_, and compels him _to own, That the

Priests are an independant State_; and thus Boys build Houses of Cards

to blow them down when they have done. What a Parcel of Flowers and

Graces might one pick up in his Writings, if it was more _a propos_,

such as _Slender Difficulty_, _Lean Temper_, _touchy Point_, _Cheek by

Joule_, _to con over_, _to be Uppish_, _Intents and Purposes_, _to

glitter upon the Senses_, _Enrichments_, _renverse_, _Deconcert_,

_bigger Entertainment of the Soul_, _don't_, _on't_, _can't_, _won't_,

_'tis_, _it's_, _at's_, and the frequent Use of Proverbs.

_Where there's Life there's Hope.

One Swallow makes no Summer_, &c.

The Use of Proverbs is so far from giving Disgust in common

Conversation, especially in the Country, that 'tis look'd upon to be Wit

as well as Mimickry, Buffoonry, Pun, Quibble, _&c._ and you would be

star'd at if you should object against either of them as the effect of

Ignorance or Folly. The _Spectator_ takes Notice that Puns made a

considerable Figure on the Banks of _Cam_, and Proverbs must needs do no

less on the Banks of _Isis_, when so great a Scholar as _Edward Llwyd_

set the Example, two in one Paragraph.

Rome _was not built in a Day.

Better late than never._

_On laisse aux Discours du Peuple les manieres de s'appliquer en

Proverbes._ 'Tis for the Vulgar only to express themselves by Proverbs.

But what are Proverbs, _&c._ to _Collier_'s huddling of Metaphors, a

Vice in Eloquence which is hardly taken Notice of in _English_ Writings;

_To be always pouring in Oil, is the Way to overset the Flame and

extinguish the Lamp: If you lay a Country constantly under Water, you

must spoil the Soil._ Here Fire and Water most lovingly agree together

to do the same Business. _To overset a Flame_ is a fine Way of speaking,

and as easily to be conceiv'd, as to overset a Cockboat or a _Wherry_.

Again, _I fancy we shall sift the Gentleman to the Bran, and make him

run the Gauntlet before he gets clear._ The _Bran_ Gentleman having run

the Gauntlet, we will add one Instance more, and have done with his

Metaphors; _They will glean up the best Thoughts, they will draw of the

Spirit of the Argument when the Mine has been work'd by such Hands._ The

_Gleaner_, the Chymist, and the Miner, are at once at work for him in

the same short Sentence. If the Writer or Reader's Head can be clear

under such Operations, it will be a Wonder. The _Spectator_ has a Remark

on this Subject, equally pleasant and judicious: _Thus I have known a

Heroe compar'd to a_ Thunder-bolt, _a_ Lion, _and the_ Sea, all _and

each of them proper Metaphors for Impetuosity, Courage, and Force; but

by bad Management it hath so happen'd, that the_ Thunder-bolt _hath

overflow'd the Banks, the_ Lion _has been darted through the Skie, and

the Billows have roll'd not of the_ Lybian _Desart_; neither of which is

so bad as _Collier_'s burning and drowning the same Thing at the same

Time.

The _Declamatory_ Stile, another great Vice in Eloquence, is the

Characteristick of these _Essays_; tho' I question not but it is thought

to be the very Cream of the Discourse. If 'tis excuseable any where it

is in Country Pulpits, where, if a Parcel of Words are well put

together, we should not be too scrupulous about the Sense. _Then

Commerce must give way to Religion, Baptism sway the Indenture, and the

Gospel govern the_ Exchange. Are not the Gospel, Baptism, and Religion,

the Exchange, Indenture, and Commerce, the same Things in the

_Contrast_. I am far from affecting a foreign Word when we have as good

a one of our own, much less when we have a better; and _Attitude_ and

_Contrast_ may be supplied by _Posture_ and _Opposition_, if the Reader

pleases; out the former was used for Decorum sake, the idea being too

gross when in an _English_ Dress. The Author is again declaiming: _It

may be the Failing of Drunkenness is imperceptible in the single

Instance, 'twill rise in the Sum_; _To go always a little out of the Way

makes a strange Mistake upon the progress_; _A Grain will grew to a

Burthen by Addition_; _To be always dipping an Estate, is the Way to

turn Beggar_; _A Drop that's perpetually pelting Will make a Stone give

way._ How new, how eloquent is all this, and that which comes after! He

is preaching to the Booksellers about selling _Arian Books_, _Sceptical

Books_, _Books of Divorce_, _Impotence_, &c. _Whatever they think on't,_

Atheism _and_ Lewdness _is the most fatal Mortality_;--_The Plague of

the Heart the most frightful Distemper_--_Infection is safer lodged in

the Veins, than in the Will_--_A Man had much better be poyson'd in his

Blood, than in his Principle._ The Stream is the same still, but as a

Boar pisses it comes by Spirts. Again, _Are we never to do any Thing

without a Majority_; _If we are govern'd by Numbers, we shall live

strangely_; _If you go to Poll, Sense and Conscience will lose it in

most Cases._ Of all the Modern Criticks, who have given us Rules, Dr.

_Felton_ upon the _Classicks_ is the Author, who seems to have stood

most upon his own Legs: Others have learnt much of the _French_, and

have been much blam'd for it by those who have and have not read their

Books. _Rymer_ confesses the _French_ began the _Art_ of _Criticism_

among the Moderns: _They fell not to it in earnest_, says he, in his

Preface to _Rapin_, _till the_ Royal Academy _was founded,_ and

_Cardinal_ Richelieu _encourag'd and rally'd all the scatter'd Wits

under his Banner: Then_ Malherbe _reform'd their ancient licentious

Poetry._ _Malherbe_ died Seven Years before the _Royal Academy_ was

thought of; however he did begin the Reformation of the _French_ Poetry,

and was happily follow'd by _Voiture_, _Sarazin_, _Maynard_, _Godeau_,

&c. The _Academy_ have indeed assum'd to themselves the sole Glory of

refining the _French_ Tongue, tho' they can by no means engross the

Merit of it. _Malherbe_ began it before they had a Being, and several

eminent _French_ Authors have written since, who were not of the

_Academy_, as St. _Evremont_, _Menage_, _&c._ But there's something

pleasant in the Complements that are paid to it, and the _Antiquaries_

have found out just such another Society in _Rome_, under the Patronage

of _Augustus_, to refine the _Roman_ Language, which, by the way, had

been refined before by _Terence_, _Lucretius_, _Cicero_, _Hortensius_,

and their Contemporaries, at the latter End of the Republick. The

Learned Antiquaries go so far as to name the _Roman Academicians_,

_Mecænas_,

_Pollio_,

_Plotius_, _Valgius_,

The Two _Messala's_,

The Two _Bibulus's_,

_Piso_, the Father,

_Servius_, _Fulvius_,

_Tibullus_,

_Horace_.

_Ovid_ perhaps was left out because he was in Exile at _Tomos_; but why

could they not have put in _Livy_, _Propertius_, &c. They have given

this Academy, the Temple and Library of _Apollo_, to meet and study in,

and it is pretended, that _Horace_'s Epistle to the _Piso's_ was written

by Direction of the Academy, and if there had ever been such an Academy

at all, one might the sooner have given Credit to it. The _French_

Academy set an Example to other learned and ingenious Men, to make

themselves Masters of their own Language, and the Encouragement they met

with from _Lewis_ XIV produced an Age of Poets, Orators, and Criticks.

The latter have done more towards explaining the _Classicks_ than had

been done before from the _Augustan_ Age to their own. They threw

Pedantry and Jargon out of their Writings, and render'd them as polite

as judicious. Such are the Criticisms of _Rapin_, _Bossu_, _Segrais_,

_Boileau_, _Bouhours_, and _Dacier_, who are all read with like Profit

and Pleasure; and this is the Reason of the frequent Use of them, and

not an Affectation of foreign Phrases, and technical Cant, as is

insinuated by such as never read, or never understood them, and by such

too as have not only both read and understood them, but have learnt of

them all the Reading they have, and yet make use of no other Names than

_Quintillian_, _Longinus_, _Donatus_, _Eustathius_, and the Ancients.

This is very common, and I could easily prove it upon those who have

charg'd others with Ignorance and Illiterature. The Reading _French_

Authors is inconceivably beneficial to such as do not understand _Latin_

so well as Mr. _Dryden_, and _Greek_ so well as Mr. _Pope_: They will

learn as much of the _Greek_ History from _Ablancourt_'s _Thucydides_,

and of the _Latin_ from _Du Ryer_'s _Livy_, as they could from the

Originals. And as to the Poets, they had better read Madam _Dacier_'s

_Homer_, and _Segrais_'s _Virgil_, which they do understand, than the

Original _Homer_ and _Virgil_ which they do not. My Lord _Roscommon_

owns of the _French_,

_The choicest Books that_ Rome _or_ Greece _have known,

Their excellent Translators made their own._

And tho' in all Translations the Spirit and Beauty of the Original must

in a great measure be lost by Transfusion, yet in History especially you

are sure to have the Method, the Facts, and the Politicks, tho' you have

not the Strength and Ellegance of the Style. _Dryden_ tells the late

Duke of _Bucks_, in the Dedication to his _Virgil_; _Impartially

Speaking, the_ French _are as much better Criticks, as they are worse

Poets._ The Latter is incontestable; and not to mention _Milton_, who is

above all Parallel. They have nothing of _Epick_ Poetry so good as our

King _Arthur_; neither are their _Corneille_ and _Racine_ a Match for

our _Shakespear_ and _Otway_. They have no Body to name against

_Wycherley_, _Etherege_, _Shadwel_, _Congreve_, _Vanburgh_, _Steel_.

_Moliere_, the best of their Comick Poets, could write _Scapius_,

_Dandins_, _Sganarelles_, and all Kinds of Farce perfectly well; but for

Wit and Humour, Repartee, Polite Conversation, for what the Criticks

call the _Vis Comica_, you must have recourse to the _English_ Comedies,

if you would know what it is. A _French Marquis_, as _Moliere_ shew'd

him upon his Stage, would only make a very good Taylor upon ours. They

have no _Hopkins_ for Elegy, no _Philips_ for Pastoral: _Scarron_ will

hardly serve for a _Ralpho_ to our _Hudibras_. In the _Ode_, I think,

_Malherbe_ is at least equal to _Cowley_, and _Voiture_ and _Sarazin_

are not behind our _Suckling_ and _Waller_, in the gallant Way: Nor is

our _Prior_ behind their _La Fontaine_ for Taletelling. On the other

Hand, I am afraid we must allow, that we have no Translation in

_English_ equal to _Seagrais_'s _Virgil_ for Intelligence of the

Original, and a correct as well as harmonious Diction, especially if the

Character given of it by _Ruæus_ is just. Did we look into other

Sciences, we should find our selves more than a Match for them; What

Names have they to set against our _Newton_ and _Halley_ in the

Mathematicks, and our _Sydenham_ and _Willis_ in _Physick_. They have

no _Bacon_, no _Boyle_ in Philosophy. In History indeed they have a

_Varillas_ and a _Maimbourg_ for our _Nelson_ and _Brady_, and doubtless

the Royal Historiographers will, in the History of _Lewis_ XIV, come up

to the _Grand Rebellion_, and Mr. _Echard_'s History for Impartiality

and Truth. If I were a _Frenchman_ I should make a Start here, and cry

out, What is their _Tureune_ and their _Conde_ to our _Marlborough_, and

their Great _Monarch_, who took Pleasure in Slaughter and Devastation,

to our Glorious King _George_, whose only Care and Delight is to

maintain Liberty and Peace.

Dr. _Felton_ declares we began to refine our Language much sooner than

the _French_, and that the Writers in Queen _Elizabeth_'s Reign are far

preferable to _Shakespear_, _Fletcher_, _Waller_, _Suckling_, _May_,

_Sands_, and all the Writers from the _Gunpowder_ Plot to the

Restoration. He will not be advis'd by the best Critick in Poetry, as he

represents him. Mr. _Dryden_, who speaking of _Beaumont_ and _Fletcher_,

writes thus; _I am apt to believe the_ English _Language in them arrived

to its Perfection_: They wrote between the Beginning of King _James_ I

and the Reign of King _Charles_ II, a Period in which Dr. _Felton_ makes

the _English_ Language to have declin'd; though, if I were permitted to

give Judgement, I should continue the Improvement of our Tongue till the

Time of the _Spectator_, and the Translation of _Homer_, where, I think,

it is in the greatest Purity and Elegance, and that one of the first

deplorable Signs of its Declension was even the Discourse upon the

_Classicks_. _Dryden_ himself continues the good Taste till the Opening

of the Long Parliament 1640, when, if you'l believe him, the Muses were

struck dead at a Blow, abandon'd to a barbarous Race of Men, Enemies of

all good Learning, such as _Selden_, _Whitlock_, _Bathurst_, _Wilkins_,

and the immortal _Milton_. This Passage should have been transplanted

into the two famous Histories of those Times, publish'd since King

_William_'s Death, particularly that of the _Grand Rebellion_, which Dr.

_Felton_ protests is the most impartial one that ever was written; but

it is very well it does not stand in need of his Certificate, for there

would have been great Exception taken against his Authority. As good a

Word as the Doctor gives Mr. _Dryden_ as a _Critick_, _Dryden_ out-does

him in his own Panegyrick.

_Let_ Dryden _with new Rules our Stage refine,

And his great Models form by this Design._

This Piece of Modesty in Verse is excelled by another in Prose; _Our

present Poets,_ himself the Top of them, _have far surpast all the

antient and modern Writers of other Countries._

Thus has he put himself above _Homer_, _Sophocles_, _Virgil_, _Horace_,

_Corneille_, _Racine_, _Boileau_, &c. Notwithstanding we were so happy

in Mr. _Dryden_'s Criticisms, Doctor _Felton_ is of Opinion the Art is

not brought enough to Perfection among us; and therefore earnestly

sollicites Sir _Richard Steel_ to write Comments upon _Homer_ and

_Virgil_, as Mr. _Addison_ has done upon _Milton_. I am satisfied Sir

_Richard Steel_ did not keep his Countenance if ever that Passage of the

Doctor's came in his Way. I will not say the same of Mr. _Trap_, who,

they tell me, is a Poet by his Place, or a _made_ Poet, better by half

than one born so; but if Doctor _Felton_ had foreseen that the ingenious

Gentleman would have came off as He did with _Virgil_, and in what a sad

Place Doctor _Swift_ would find his Translation, I believe he would have

postpon'd the Encomium, _What a polite Critick may do if he pleases_,

says the Doctor, _and in how different an Aspect_ Criticism _appears,

when formed by Men of Parts and Fire, we may see in Mr._ Trap; and the

Encomium continues for a Page or two: But the aforesaid Translation

having cut the Matter short, I will repeat no more of it.

_Cowley_ was in as great Vogue 60 or seventy Years ago, as any Composer

or Translater of our Time has been, and Doctor _Felton_ without knowing

that his Character is worn, informs us, that his _Davideis_ is as good

an Epick Poem as the _Ilias_, that his Lyricks are as good as _Pindar_'s

or _Horace_'s, that he wrote Elegies as well as _Tibullus_, Epistles as

well as _Ovid_, Pastorals as well as _Theocritus_; and that his _Cutter

of Colmanstreet_ is as good a Comedy as the _Adelphi of Terence_. The

Doctor's own Words are; _He rivalled the_ Greek _and_ Latin _Poets in

every Thing but Tragedy._ His saying so is the more remarkable, for that

he had seen the Preface to _Dryden_'s Fables, wherein that incomparable

Critick, as he terms him, says _Cowley_ is sunk in his Reputation, and

the late Duke of _Bucks_ in his Essay acknowledges as much:

Cowley _might boast to have perform'd his Part,

Had he with Nature joyn'd the Rules of Art:

But ill Expression gives sometimes Allay

To noble Thoughts------------

Tho' All appears in Heat and Fury done,

The Language still must soft and easy run._

Doctor _Felton_ in Praise of Criticism tells us, with equal Elegance and

Perspicuity, _If the Rules had not been given, we had not been troubled

with_ many fewer _Writers:_ And in the Pursuit of his own excellent

Work, he declares, _He has tempered the_ Briskness _of Thought with the

Sedateness of Judgement._ The _French_ have their _Pensees Brusques_,

but the Doctor could not fall so low as that. _Brusque_ signifying

_blunt_, _rash_, and the like. This _Briskness_ is, I suppose, more

agreeable to the Conception of a certain Bookseller, who being written

to by a certain Squire for a _brisk History_, sent him by the next

Carrier that of _Don Quixot_. This was thirty Years ago, before we were

so well furnished with _brisk Histories_ as we have been since.

I take _brisk_ in our Tongue to be to _lively_, as _pert_ is to _witty_:

But I cannot depend on my own Judgement; the Translator of _Homer_

having used _Briskness_ in the same Sense as Doctor _Felton_ uses it:

_Heaven and Earth became engaged in the Subject, by which it rises to a

great Importance, and is hastened forward into the briskest Scenes of

Action._ If that Author could bear the least Objection to any Thing that

belongs to him, I would ask the Reader whether he does not fancy there

is some Affectation in the Expression. But let that pass; if we are

rightly informed, the Word _Brisk_ is in the _Teutonick Friesch_, which

is in plain English _Frisk_, and then for the Gods and Demi-gods to

frisk up and down the Field of Action, or the Doctor to frisk up and

down his Closet is very indecorous. The Duke of _Buckingham_ in the

_Rehearsal_ seems to take _Brisk_ in the latter Sense, as when Thunder

and Lightning act their Parts on the Stage. The former says, I am the

_bold Thunder_, the latter the _brisk Lightning I_. And not at all to

derogate from the Character of Lightning, which has been so serviceable

to all Sorts of Poetry and Poets, I cannot help confirming my Opinion

by a very common Simile, and saying _As brisk as bottled Ale_.

Among all the Refiners of our Tongue, 'tis the vulgar Notion, that Sir

_Roger L'Estrange_ was most eminent. True it is, Doctor _Felton_ owns he

was good for nothing but _Banter_ and _Railing_; for that is what we in

_England_ generally mean by Raillery. Tho' _Smith_ and _Johnson_ in the

_Rehearsal_ are not the most lively Characters; yet their Dialogue with

_Bayes_ is what the _French_ call _Raillery_. We in _England_ do mean

very often the Dialogue of _Billinsgate_, where it is common enough to

hear one Fish-Woman cry to another, _No more of your Raillery_, which is

there the worst Sort of Railling; and for that and Banter the Doctor

assures us _L'Estrange_ was most proper. The same say I, and that he

understood no more of true Eloquence than he did of _Greek_, out of

which the Booksellers hired him to translate _Josephus_, and he did it

from the _French_ Translation. The Philosopher _Seneca_'s Works he

pretended to translate from the _Latin_, and I wish Mr. _Trap_ would

translate the following Phrases in his _Seneca_'s _Morals_ back into

that Tongue again, _One good Turn is the shoeing Horn to another._ _He

does me Good in spite of my Teeth._ _After a Matter of eight Years_; and

this into _Greek_ for _Esop_'s Fables, The _Moon was in a heavy

Twitter_: Yet I'm satisfied these fine Sayings are some of those that

gained him the Reputation of being a polite Writer of _English_: I have

heard that about the Moon very much commended, which shews that we are

not sufficiently sensible how mean Words debase a Thought. _There's

nothing_, says _Boileau_, _which debases a Discourse more than mean

Words. A mean Thought exprest in noble Terms, is generally better than

the most noble Thoughts exprest in mean Terms._ I know no greater

Instance of the ill Effect of mean Terms, than what we find in two

Verses of Mr. _Montague_'s Epistle to the Lord _Dorset_ on King

_William_'s Victory at the _Boyne_. 'Tis in the greatest Heat of that

glorious Action, and in the Middle of the _Sublime_, which is not

wanting in that Poem.

_Stop, stop, brave Prince! What does your Muse, Sir, faint!

Proceed, pursue his Conquest. Faith I can't._

Mr. _Philips_'s Poems, the _splendid Shilling_ and _Cyder_, are full of

Instances where mean Thoughts are raised by noble Expressions, and they

are wonderfully pleasing; as in _Cyder_; this of the _Pear-Tree_.

_What tho' the Pear Tree rival not the Worth

Of_ Ariconian _Products, yet her Freight

Is not contemn'd, and her wide branching Arms

Best screen thy Mansion from the fervent Dog,

Adverse to Life. The wintry Hurricanes

In vain employ their Roar; her Trunk unmov'd,

Breaks the strong Onset, and controuls their Rage;

Chiefly the_ Bosbury, _whose large Increase,

Annual in sumptuous Banquets, claims Applause.

Thrice acceptable_ Bevrage! _could but Art

Subdue the floating_ Lee, Pomona_'s self

Would dread thy Praise, and shun the dubious Strife.

Be it thy Choice, when Summer Heats annoy,

To sit beneath her leavy Canopy,

Quaffing rich Liquids, Oh! how sweet t'enjoy

At once her Fruits, and hospitable Shade._

I have never met with any Author who so happily imitated the manner and

stile of _Milton_ as _Philips_ has done, and there seems to be hardly

any other Difference than that of the Subjects they wrote of.

What I have quoted out of _L'Estrange_ is nothing to the Delicacy of a

modern Writer of Plays, who without Wit, Language, Learning, or Manners,

wrote three or four Farces, which took as much as _Pradon_'s in

_France_; but the _English_ have not recollected themselves so soon as

the _French_ did; for _Pradon_ out-liv'd the Vogue he was in, and became

a greater Jest than ever he had made. What think ye of our Poet's

Delicacy and Wit, who in a gallant Letter to his Mistress, tells her,

_He's gall'd with riding, Love is forging Darts in his Belly; he's a Dog

in a Doublet_, &c. There's a deal of graver Nonsense with it, but it

being mostly _Blasphemy_, I dare not repeat it. This Author had his

Portion of temporary Fame. _Ogilvy_ had his Day, and _Dryden_ says:

_Fame, like a little Mistress of the Town,

Is gain'd with Ease; but then she's lost as soon._

However, as long as the Credit lasts, these temporary Authors bear the

Port of the greatest Genius, are clapt and star'd at, as those Merchants

who are driving in their Coaches to Bankrupcy, have generally the best

Equipage. What are become of the _Marots_, the _Ronsards_, the

_Scuderies_ of our neighbour Nation, yet these Writers were infinitely

superiour to what most of our taking Authors have been. Could any Body

have thought that Sir _Richard Baker_'s Chronicle would ever have past

from the Justice's Hall Window to the Butler's Cellar, or that

_Cowley_'s _Mistress_ would have lost all her Charms in thirty Years

Time, and become a Cast-Off for City Prentices and Lawyers Clerks, to

say nothing of _Orinda_, _Flatman_, &c. Yet these Writers were Originals

which raises their Merit much above all Sorts of Translators, and it

ought to be a Lesson to all Poets and Historians, whether first Hand or

second Hand, to pay the World for their Applause with Modesty, which is

the surest Way to keep it in a good Humour; _Since 'tis Posterity only_,

says _Boileau_, _which sets a Value upon all Writings, you must not, as

admirable as you take a modern Author to be, presently put him upon a

Level with those Writers who have been admired for so many Ages, because

one cannot be sure his Works will pass with Glory to the next. Indeed

without going far for Examples, How many Authors have we seen admired in

our Age, whose Glory is vanished in a very few Years. How were_

Balzac_'s Works admired thirty Tears ago?_ So much that Cardinal

_Richelieu_ at the same Time that he was meditating the universal

Monarchy for the Crown of _France_, wrote in Vindication of them. The

Bishop of _Rochester_ did the same for _Cowley_; but neither the

Cardinal nor the Bishop could defend them from the Fate of all Temporary

Authors. Neither _Cowley_ nor _Balzac_ are now any more mentioned in

_France_ or _England_. And the main Reason why they lost their Credit

was for want of duly considering what their particular Talents were

adapted to; for that they had both very great Talents is universally

acknowledged, _Mons. de_ Balzac _a passe toute sa vie a ecrire des

lettres, dont il n'a jamais pu attraper le veritable Charectere._ Balzac

_spent all his Time in writing Letters, but could never hit the true

Character._ _Cowley_ applied himself to Poetry, and never enough knew

the Power and Harmony of Numbers. He had a great deal too much Wit to

charm his Mistress with his Passion. Very few of us are let into this

Secret. We cannot believe that a Poet can have too much Wit, and indeed

the Offence given that Way is not very common. The last Duke of _Bucks_

rightly instructs us:

_Another Fault which often does befall,_ }

_Is when the Wit of some great Poet shall_ }

_So overflow, as to be none at all._ }

Again,

_That silly Thing we call sheer Wit avoid_.

This probably was a Rebuke to the Author of the _Plain-Dealer_ and

_Country-Wife_, who has transgressed in this kind as much as any Body,

and was the best able to do it. The Author of the _Relapse_ is not

entirely free from this Censure, nor the Authors of _Love for Love_, and

the _Funeral_. But it will not be more surprising than it is true, that

_Peter Motteux_ declared he had taken a great deal of pains with a

Character in a Farce of his, to bring it within the Duke of

_Buckingham_'s Rule in those Places where he told me he had given it too

much Wit. Mr. _Walsh_, one of the greatest Criticks of our Nation,

observes, that the Softness, Tenderness, and Violence of Passion, are

wanting in Mr. _Cowley_'s Love Verses, insomuch that he _could hardly

fancy he was in Love when he wrote them_. _Pref._ to _Lett._ Yet there

were Variety and Learning enough in them, and more Wit than in all our

witty Poets since the Restoration, excepting those above-mentioned. Mr.

_Wycherly_, who wrote as good Comedies as any in the _English_, or any

other Tongue, did not value himself so much upon them as on a Folio of

as bad Verses as any. _Creech_ having had Success in _Lucretius_, was

put upon translating _Horace_, and it is said by _Dryden_, that he might

lose so much of his Reputation, as to prevent Rivalship. Nay, _Butler_,

tho' he knew the Follies of Mankind so perfectly well, did not perceive

that there is no greater Folly than to undertake what one is not fit

for, and was persuaded to let _Hudibras_ translate _Ovid_. On this Rock

many Authors have split, who would have succeeded had they consulted

their Talents, and taken the right Course: but it is a general Maxim

with us in _England_, Verses are Verses. He that can write one Thing,

can write another, and till our Taste is so refined, that we can

distinguish the Good and the Bad in the various Kinds of Thinking,

Writers will not be at the Pains to consult their Talents, but content

themselves with pleasing their own Fancy, or that of the Publick, by

which Means, like Flies, they make a buzzing for a Day or two, and are

forgotten for ever. The _Spectator_ very judiciously animadverts on this

Weakness: _Our general Taste in_ England _is for Epigram, Turns of Wit,

and forced Conceits, which have no manner of Influence, either for the

bettering or enlarging the Mind of him who reads them, and have been

carefully avoided by the greatest Writers, both among the Antients and

Moderns._ He adds after Mr. _Dryden_, _The Taste of most of our_ English

_Poets is extreamly_ Gothick, _which I have endeavoured to banish in

several of my Speculations_.

Another remarkable Observation of Dr. _Felton_'s is, that the _best

Performers are the best Judges_. He has only _Horace_ against him of the

Antients, and _Dacier_ of the Moderns, as is already observed in this

Essay. I believe no Body will deny, but Mr. _Walsh_ before-mentioned was

one of our best Judges of Regularity and Wit, yet hardly any Body will

say he was one of our best Performers. There's nothing more common with

small Genius's and small Judges, than to demand of all Criticks _to

write themselves_ before they criticise upon others Writings. They would

stare if it should be said, that _Dursey_ knew no more of Poetry than he

did of Philosophy, nor of _English_ than of _Hebrew_; though it is very

true, if it be understood of the Art of Poetry, and the Beauty of

Language; yet, that he was a Performer, is I doubt not well known to the

Doctor, and well approved of. To teach us good Language by Example, Dr.

_Felton_ expresses himself thus elegantly and unaffectedly. _When I

wrote these Sheets, my Lord_ Landsdown_'s Poems lay dispersed up and

down in the Miscellanies; but some kind Hand_, as for Instance the

Bookseller, upon a very laudable Motive, _hath assembled those scattered

Stars, and added another Lyre to the Constellation_; which, though it is

meant, to do singular Honour to those Poems, must have an ill Effect in

astronomical Observations; it makes thirteen to the Dozen in the twelve

Houses, and must cause as much Confusion, as two Signs of the Harp in a

short Lane. The Modesty of the following Passage adds as much to its

Merit as to the Truth of it: _If I offered any Thing which is not

commonly observed, I hope it will not be interpreted any Singularity,

but such as may render your Lordship more eminent and distinguished in

the World_; and having taught his noble Pupil what he should imitate, he

gives him warning what he should avoid, and that is the Reading any

Thing written by a _Presbyterian_: _What crude indigested Volumes! How

many tedious Sheets without Argument or Consistency, are the Writings of

some of the_ Dissenters! whom does he mean, such as _Bates_, _Manton_,

_How_, _Pool_, _Clarkson_, _Alsop_, &c. He and some other good

Church-Criticks make _Presbyterianism_ to be a Sort of _Hellebore_, if

you do but snuff it up in your Nose you run mad immediately. Thence it

is, that the _Presbyterians_ are termed _Fanatici_, by the learned and

sober Writers of our two famous Universities. Is it expected, that every

Orthodox Doctor should know as much as Bishop _Stillingfleet_, or write

as well as Archbishop _Tillotson_? Where is the Reason or Justice of

censuring a Body of Men for the Enthusiasm and Ignorance of a few? Would

this Doctor suffer the Tables to be turn'd, and a Judgement to be made

of the Writings of good Church-men, by the Argument and Consistency of

the Works, with which the learned World are obliged by those of the

Country Clergy, whose Pieces can crawl to the Press, whether in Prose or

Verse, Meditations or Hymns. I do verily believe he did not think of Dr.

_Bates_, when he fell thus furiously on Dissenters, or had ever seen any

of his Writings, which are as polite as the Politest of our Age; the

Sentiments as pious, as great, as noble, and as just, according to the

Subject, and the Language as pure and as harmonious. What can be more

so, than this Passage of his _Harmony of the divine Attributes_,

speaking of the Fall of _Adam_: _Prodigious Pride! He was scarce out of

the State of Nothing, no sooner created but he aspired to be as God; not

content with his Image, he would rob God of his Eternity to live without

End; of his Sovereignty to command without Dependance; of his Wisdom to

know all Things without Reserve. Infinite Insolence! that Man the Son of

Earth, forgetful of his Original, should usurp the Prerogatives, which

are essential to the Deity, and set himself up a real Idol, was a

Strain of the same Arrogancy which corrupted the Angels._ This is what

Dr. _Felton_ calls _Presbyterian Crudity_. It is strange, but it is

true, that there is a Narrowness of Soul, and a Conceit in some of our

Ecclesiasticks founded on the Establishment which we do not meet with in

others; nay, not in those who pretend to Supremacy and Infallibility.

Father _Bouhours_, though as zealous a Jesuit as any in _France_, yet

had so just a Notion of every one's Merit in polite Learning, that he

freely owns the Refinement of the _French_ Tongue, and the _French_

Manners was owing to those of the reformed Religion, even to

_Presbyterians_. _Nous devons aux dernieres Heresies une partie de

l'Embellissement de notre Langue, & de la politesse de notre Siecle._

And another _French_ Bigot tells us; _One of their Historians has

observed, that the pretended Reformers began to speak well and write

well, and were the First that shewed their Way to others_. They were all

of them _Presbyterians_:

--------Parvos femando libellos

Sucratis populumq; rudem amorcando parolis.

Our _Staunch_ Criticks will not allow, that a _Presbyterian_ ever had or

could have any Wit or any Eloquence, though it was only to make an ill

Use of it. No, no Body must be well-born or well-bred, that is without

the Pale. No Man must be brave, nor Woman beautiful. The Men are all

painted with cropt Hair, and the Women with Forehead-Cloaths, unless

they assent and consent. No Wit, no Language, no Honour, nor any Thing

that's good, is to be had any more than Matrimony without a Licence.

_Vide Grand Rebellion_, and Mr. _Echard_'s _History of England_.

I am so very well entertain'd with _Dryden_'s _Virgil_, that I am glad

to meet with any Excuse for his Translation; and would allow Dr.

_Felton_'s, that _the Faults are to be ascribed partly to some Defects

of our Language_; if the Doctor himself, a few Lines before, had not

said of the same Language, _that it is capable of all the Beauty,

Strength, and Significancy of the_ Greek _and_ Latin. The Faults which

have been generally found with _Dryden_ as to _Virgil_, have been his

mistaking or altering the Sense of the Original, and turning the _Epick_

Stile into _Elegiack_. I doubt not but the _English_ Tongue has

Expression for _English_ Sentiments, let them be ever so great and

sublime; but I may very well doubt whether it has Diction equal to the

Strength and Dignity of the _Ilias_, without the Helps _Milton_ made use

of, as compounding of Words and reviving some old Teutonicks, which

would look very uncouthly among the Softnesses and Gingles of our fine

Writers of late.

I wish the Doctor had explain'd how he would have us to understand him,

when he informs us, that to translate well is more difficult than to

write well; by which he intimates, that to form a Fable for a great and

important Action, to mark the Characters with suitable Sentiments, to

conduct the One and maintain the Other with Art and Elevation

diversify'd with proper Episodes; through such a Work as the _Ilias_, is

so far from being the principal Part of an _Epick_ Poem that it is no

Part at all; for with all this the Translator has nothing to do. The

Labour and Merit of it, according to Dr. _Felton_, consist in the

Language and Verses, in finding Words to express the Action and

Sentiments, and to adorn those Words with Numbers and Harmony. This is

all that is necessary in a Translation; and being also but some Parts of

the Original, it cannot be more difficult to do a Part than to do the

Whole. Can one suppose, that to write such a History as Mr. _Echard_'s

from printed Books, written Books, from the Hearsay and Report of Men,

Women and Children, is more difficult than to contrive and write such a

One as the _Cassandra_ of _Calprenade_? or in plain _English_, that to

invent and tell a Story, is much easier than the bare telling it only?

It needs no Reflection. If the Version of _Homer_ had been born when he

wrote, he must of Consequence have preferr'd it to the _Ilias_, which

would have cost the Translator's Modesty, as much as Sir _Richard

Steele_'s to be put upon a Comment on _Homer_ and _Virgil_. My Lord

_Roscommon_ has explain'd this Matter to us sufficiently:

_Though Composition is the nobler Part,

Yet good Translation is no easy Art._

Monsieur _Maucroix_, who translated _Cicero_ into _French_, writes thus

of translating to Monsieur _Boileau_: _You have told me more than once,

that Translation is not the Way to Immortality_; and he excuses his

meddling with it, on Account of his Want of Application and Knowledge:

As to Immortality it is to be question'd, whether that was the main

Thing our Translators had in View. It will not be deny'd, but that

_Dryden_'s Bookseller put him upon translating _Virgil_, by the

Temptation of so much a Line. And other Undertakers pay well enough to

make a mortal Life a little comfortable, it is not much Matter whether

the Work be immortal or not. _Ogilby_ however is sure of Immortality;

for though his Translations are as dead as his Carcass, yet he will be

remember'd in good Satyr for the Badness of them. _My Author_, says

Monsieur _Maucroix_, _is learned for me, the Topicks are all digested,

the Inventing and Disposing are none of my Business; I have nothing to

do but to utter my self_. Which Utterance is much more difficult, as Dr.

_Felton_ will have it, than to study, to digest, to invent, to dispose,

and to utter too. I do not suppose, that a Man ever applied himself to

Translation, if he felt in himself any of the heavenly Fire which

animates a great Genius, or was ambitious of Fame by the Merit of an

Epick Poem. It must be own'd, that Judgement is requisite in Translation

as well as Composition, not only to preserve the Spirit of the Original,

but also to make Choice of such a One as the Translator may be best able

to manage. Mr. _Charles Hopkins_ was Master of this Secret; and instead

of attempting _Homer_ or _Virgil_, he contented himself with _Ovid_, and

succeeded to Admiration. _Hopkins_ knew, that the Manners and Sentiments

in _Ovid_ were natural and universal, which must please in all Ages;

whereas, but a very few can relish the Quarrels and Battles, which are

the main Subject of the _Ilias_. The Learned have explained to us, for

what it is that our Adoration is due to _Homer_: For the Unity and

Greatness of his Fable, the Variety and Dignity of his Characters, and

his sublime Thought and Expression; I dare not say Diction and

Sentiments, because the _Spectator_ has disgraced the Use of technical

Terms, by calling it Cant; and supposing, that those who use them, do it

to disguise their Ignorance, and shew their Vanity in critical Phrase.

I should be glad to know, which it is of all _Homer_'s before-mention'd

Excellencies, that has so delighted the Ladies, and the Gentlemen who

judge like Ladies; or whether ever a One of those Excellencies has been

at all distinguished from the Other; or whether there is any

Possibility of expressing the Sublime of the _Greek_ Tongue in our

Language. As to the Sentiments, which are a principal Part of Epick

Poetry, they may be translated; we very probably think much after the

same Manner the _Greeks_ did, though we do not speak so. The Passions

are the same in all humane Nature; and probably the Expression of them,

by so great a Master of our Tongue as the Translator of _Homer_, may

gain as much as it may lose by the Translation. But the Mischief of it

is, these Sentiments are that Part of the _Ilias_ which the Criticks

have made most bold with:

_For who, without a Qualm, hath ever look'd

On holy Garbage, though by_ Homer _cook'd?

Whose railing Heroes, and whose wounded gods,

Make some suspect he snores as well as nods.

But I offend_--------

Roscom.

_Dormitat Homerus_; that _Homer_ sometimes sleeps, was said before by

_Horace_. The _Spectator_ informs us, that _Homer_ is censured by the

Criticks, for his Defect as to the Sentiments in several Parts of the

_Ilias_ and _Odysses_. However, it is most certain, that the Translation

of _Homer_ must have pleased Ladies and Gentlemen by these very

Sentiments, or by the Translator's beautiful Diction and Versification.

But then all the great Parts of Epick Poetry are lost to them,

especially those that depend on the Dignity and Strength of Expression,

which will not be pretended to be entirely preserved in the _English_

Version.

Reading _Dacier_ a few Days since, I was extreamly surprised at a

Criticism of his on a Translation of _Homer_, by a much greater Critick

than himself, even _Horace_ his Master, who has thus translated the

Beginning of the _Odyssey_:

Dic mihi, Musa, virum, captæ post tempora Trojæ,

Qui mores Hominum Multorum vidit & Urbes.

_Muse, sing the Man, who after_ Troy _was taken

The Manners of many Men and Cities saw._

I have aimed to be literal here, the better to explain _Dacier_'s

Remarks. _There are considerable Faults in this Translation_, says

Monsieur _Dacier_, _he has forgotten the Epithet [Greek: polytropon],

which marks_ Ulysses_'s Character; he neglects the Circumstance that

makes us most concern'd for him, [Greek: hos mala planchthê], who

wandered a long Time, he says in a loose Way, after the Taking of_ Troy;

_whereas, it is in_ Homer _after having ruined_ Troy. Now, if _Horace_,

who had studied and admired _Homer_ so much, as to make him a Pattern

for all future Writers of _Heroick_ Poems, could mistake three Times in

translating two Lines, what a Discouragement must it have been to those

who knew how he had succeeded in attempting it? 'Tis true, no Poet will

ever undertake a Translation with more Advantage than the last

Translator of _Homer_ had; for besides Eight or Ten Versions in _Latin_,

_Italian_, _French_, &c. there are Three or Four in _English_; a Prose

Translation by Madam _Dacier_, and a Cart-load of Comments in all

Languages. I am satisfy'd so good a Versifyer as the Translator of the

_Ilias_ might with those Helps, have made a very good Translation,

without understanding any more _Greek_ than my self; and nothing in the

World could have been more easy, than out of one Commentator to have

corrected another, and to have alter'd and amended the Reading in the

Name of any of the Criticks, from _Eustathius_ down to _Dacier_. I do

not boast of being Master of _Greek_ enough to read _Homer_ with so much

Pleasure in the Original as I could do in a good Version, and it is much

to be question'd, whether every one that can read him in the Original do

understand what they read: Several Ladies and Gentlemen have subscribed

for _Chaucer_ of the _Christ-Church_ Edition, but I doubt very much

whether they understand him or not, and whether a great many, who can

read _Greek_, do really know what they read. One of the greatest Masters

of the _Greek Tongue_, in our Time, has often question'd whether there

were Twenty Men in _England_ who understood the Strength, Beauty, and

Elegance of that Language, tho' there are a Thousand that pretend to it.

He represented it as a Study for a Man's Life, and I am confirm'd in

this Judgement by what _Menage_ tells us of himself, and others upon

this Subject. 'Tis well known _Menage_ wrote several Things in _Greek_,

particularly some Odes in Imitation of _Anacreon_, which are not

thought inferiour to the _Teian_ Poet's; _J'ay toujours fait beaucoup de

cas de ceux qui savent le grec_, &c. _He always highly valued those that

understood_ Greek. He does not mean to construe and parse it as Boys do

at School, which is the most of what we find in those who pretend to be

Masters of it. _Without this Language_, continues he, _a Man can't be

said to be more than half Learned: Monsieur_ Cotelier, _Monsieur de_

Treville, _and Monsieur_ Bigot, _are the only Men in_ France, _who can

read the_ Greek _Fathers in the Original._ I suppose the Fathers are not

so difficult as _Homer_ with respect to the Tongue at least; for the

Language of Poetry is peculiar to it, a made Language compounded and

metaphorical. If it be so, the Translation of the _Ilias_, from the

_Greek_ of _Homer_, must shew the Translator to be a greater Master of

the _Greek_ Language than all the Learned Men in _France_ except Three,

and all the Learned Men in _England_ except about Twenty. For my own

Part, I confess, I make bold with all Kinds of Versions to help me out

in Originals, and am not asham'd to do as _Menage_ did; _I own I do not

understand_ Pindar _enough_, says he, _to take Pleasure in him_. I have

heard _Pindar_ quoted a Hundred Times by Persons who were very far from

being so modest as _Menage_, and fully satisfy'd themselves that they

understood him as well as the _Græcians_, to whom he read his _Odes_,

tho' I suspected the contrary. _Menage_, again; _I never read a_ Greek

_Author without having before read the Translation_.

I do not insinuate any thing to depreciate the Translator of _Homer_'s

excellent Performance, which, as I have observ'd, has the Merit of the

most pure and harmonious Diction and Versification; but to hint a little

of the Confusion of our Taste, and the Irregularity of our Judgement,

which like Things for Beauties which they have not, and not for those

which they have. Thus the Version of _Homer_ is lik'd as a Translation

of the best _Epick_ Poem that ever was written, and not for the Softness

and Sweetness of the Elegy, which are every where to be met with, as

where the God _Apollo_ appears in the Shape of _Agenor_:

_Flies from the furious Chief in this Disguise,

The furious Chief still follows as he flies._

This is what the _French_ call _Jeu des Mots_, playing upon Words, and

what _Dryden_'s _Virgil_ is full of, tho' he knew as well as any Body

that it was a Fault: _The Turn of Thoughts, and Words_, says he, _is the

chief Talent of the_ French; _but the_ Epick _Poem is too stately to

receive such little Ornaments_, which would have been in Perfection in a

Version of _Ovid_, and very little agrees with _Waller_ in his Epistle

to my Lord _Roscommon_;

_Well sounding Verses are the Charm we use,

Heroick Thoughts, and Virtue to infuse:

Things of deep Sense, we may in Prose unfold,

But they move more, in lofty Numbers told:

By the loud Trumpet, which our Courage aids,

We learn that Sound, as well as Sense, perswades._

In these Things our Taste is strangely confin'd: provided the Verses run

smoothly, and the Language is soft and harmonious, we think it is fine:

Let the Subject be a _Boreas_, or a _Zephyr_: Nay, I do not question but

the Couplet I quoted out of the _English_ _Homer_ is reckon'd one of the

finest of the Version by Ladies, and Gentleman who judge like Ladies,

and who are the Nine in Ten of all Readers of Poetry. I confess, I am

much more pleas'd with the following Verses, as rough and rumbling as

they are, because they participate of the Roughness of the Thing which

is imag'd to us,

_Jumping high o'er the Shrubs of the rough Ground,

Rattle the clattering Cars, and the shockt Axles bound._

When such assimilating the Sound to the Sense is not affected 'tis very

agreeable; but when there is any Force or Affectation in it, 'tis

puerile and distasteful.

The following Description of the Poetical Fire, which several Poets were

enflam'd with, seems to be somewhat deficient, and to want farther

Explanation; especially where the Translator tells us, MILTON's Fire _is

like a Furnace, but_ Shakespear_'s like a Fire from Heaven_: VIRGIL's

like a _Kenning-Glass_, and _Lucan_'s and _Statius_'s like _Lightning_.

The _Kenning-Glass_ should have given me no Manner of Disturbance: But

why is _Milton_'s _Celestial Fire_ compar'd to that which destroy'd the

_Three Children_; the Fire of a Furnace is boisterous and voracious,

consuming whatever is within its Reach. _Milton_'s Fire, like that of

the Sun, warms and enlivens; and if ever any was fetch'd from Heaven,

'twas that, which shines with so much radiant Brightness throughout his

whole Poem. I was the more shockt with this Misrepresentation of

_Milton_'s Fire, for that there's something burlesque in the very

Expression, a _Furnace_, and one can't help being jealous that this

Passage of _Hudibras_ might give the Hint for it.

Talgol, _who had long possest

Enflamed Rage in glowing Breast,

Which now began to rage, and burn as

Implacably as Flame in Furnace._

Tho' I am very far from taking _Dryden_ to be a perfect Master of

Criticism, yet I do not think his Deficiency proceeded from Want of

Judgement so much as from Inconsistency and Vanity, and an Opinion that

he was Tyrant of _Parnassus_, and might govern by Will and Pleasure

instead of Law and Reason. I have observed elsewhere that he adapts his

Prefaces to the Circumstances of every Play and Poem, and very often

contradicts in one what he had said in another: Nay, in his Essay on

_Dramatick Poetry_, the Contradiction is within a few Lines of the

Assertion, as thus; _There is no Theater in the World has any Thing so

absurd as the_ English Tragi-Comedy, which he confirms by this Verse;

_Atq; ursem & Pugiles media inter Carmina poscunt_.

And a little after; _I cannot but conclude, to the Honour of our Nation,

that we have invented, encreased, and perfected, a more pleasant Way of

Writing than was ever known to the Antients or Moderns of any Nation,

which is_ Tragi-Comedy. _One of the most monstrous Inventions_, says the

_Spectator_, _that ever enter'd into the Poet's Thought. An Author might

as well think of weaving the Adventures of_ Æneas _and_ Hudibras _into

one Poem, as of writing such a motley Piece of Mirth and Sorrow_.

Whatever others thought of Mr. _Dryden_'s Criticisms, he did himself

full Justice, and seem'd to despise all other Criticks at the same Time

that he laid himself most open to them. _These little Criticks do not

well consider what the Work of the Poet is, and what the Graces of a

Poem; the Story is the least Part of either._ Pref. to _Moch-Astrol._

Against him is every Critick, ancient and modern, from _Aristotle_ to

_Rimer_, and more than all of them against him is his own self. In

another Place he writes thus; _The Fable is without doubt the chief Part

of a Tragedy, because it contains the Action, and the Action contains

the Happiness or Misery, which is the End of Tragedy. Without the Fable

the Poet, who had otherwise good Manners, Sentiments, and Diction, would

no more have made a regular Poem, than a Painter would have made a good

Picture that had mingled Blue, Yellow, Red, and other Colours confusedly

together._ I do not mention these Things to lessen Mr. _Dryden_'s great

Character as a Poet; but to shew how well Dr. _Felton_ could judge of

it, when he recommended him to us as a Critick. Against Mr. _Dryden_, as

to the _Story_, _is Rapin_, who he assures us would _be alone

sufficient, were all other Criticks lost, to teach a-new the Rules of

Writing_. Against his _Rapin_ we find the Translator of _Homer_ in an

extraordinary Manner in his Notes on the Fifth _Iliad_. I hope it did

not arise from any Resentment for that Jesuit's reflecting on those

Poets who seem to place the Essence of Poetry in fine Language, and

smooth Verse, to which he ascribes its present Decay. _As if the Art

consisted only in Purity and Exactness of Language: This indeed pleased

well, and was much to the Advantage of Women that had a Mind to be

tampering in Writing Verse: They found it their Concern to give Vogue to

this Kind of Writing, of which they were as capable as the most Part of

Men: For all the Secret was no more than to make some little easy

Verses, in which they were content if they cou'd dress some soft

passionate Thoughts_, &c. The most of our modern Poets being interested

in this Affair, I shall say no more of it.

I have hinted more than once, that such Poets, and their Admirers,

almost always mistake Affectation for Beauty, and I wonder the

Translator of _Homer_ should give them the least Countenance by his

Example; for I am very much deceiv'd if there is a more affected Period

in the _English_ Tongue than what follows: _Nothing is more lively_ and

Picturesque _than the_ Attitude _of_ Patroclus _is describ'd in; The_

Pathetick _of his Speech is finely_ contrasted _by the_ Fierte _of_

Achilles. Again, _There's something inexpressibly_ riant _in the_

Compartments of _Achilles_'s Shield. In the _Spectator_, Nº 297. you

read thus: _The last Fault which I shall take notice of in Stile, is the

frequent Use of_ technical _Words or Terms of Art_. The bringing in more

_French_ Words to soften and enervate our Stile is of very ill

Consequence. The Translator, besides _Riant_, has also _Traits_,

_ensanguin'd_, &c. I doubt, the Last is hardly a Word in any other

Language, and does not at all enrich our own. _Dryden_, in an Epistle to

the Earl of _Orrery_, has this Remark upon it: _I wish we might at

length leave to borrow Words of another Nation, which is now a

Wontonness in us, not a Necessity: But so long as some affect to speak,

there will not be wanting others, who will have the Boldness to write

them_.

If I might make Use of the Word _Contrast_, nothing can be more so than

Affectation and Simplicity; and the Translator seems, either not to have

a just Notion of the Latter, or to have a very ill Opinion of it: For

without distinguishing between Simplicity and Negligence, he affirms,

_That Simplicity is a Word of Disguise for a shameful unpoetical Neglect

of Expression_, he makes no Exception in this general Charge. And thus

one of the greatest Beauties of both Thought and Expression is rendered

one of the greatest Deformities. Father _Bouhours_ asserts, that

_Simplicity contributes the most of any Thing to make a Stile perfect_;

and again, _The Holy Scripture, the Stile of which is, at the same Time,

so_ simple _and so_ sublime.

Mr. _Addison_ has treated of the noble Force of Simplicity as it relates

to Thought; and in the following Verses, if I am not mistaken, the

Simplicity of Expression as well as Thought is noble:

_So chear'd he his fair Spouse, and she was chear'd;

But silently a gentle Tear let fall

From either Eye, and wip'd them with her Hair.

Two other precious Drops, that ready stood

Each in their chrystal Sluice, he 'ere they fell

Kist, as the gracious Signs of sweet Remorse,

And pious Awe, that fear'd to have offended._

It is certain, Simplicity, as well as other Virtues in Speech, has its

Vice, and that is Meanness which falls naturally into Burlesque, as this

Line:

_Then he will talk--good gods! How he will talk._

Which the _Spectator_ speaks of as inexpressibly beautiful for its

Simplicity, though I think one can hardly repeat it with a grave Tone;

and when I have heard it pronounced on the Stage in a burlesque Way, as

it is in _The Plot and No Plot_; it has never fail'd of a hearty Laugh

and Clap. _Spectator_, Nº 39. _There is a Simplicity in the Words,

which out-shines the utmost Pride of Expression_; and he attributes it

to the Break, _good gods_! He also informs us, that the Thought is at

once _natural_, _soft_, _passionate_, and _simple_. It would have been

well for us, if the learned Critick had told us in what this Thought is

_simple_, in what _passionate_, in what _soft_, and in what _natural_,

there being so few Words to express it; and I cannot help thinking, that

it is but one fond Rant of an amorous Woman. True it is, Simplicity is

not of it self very wordy, but methinks the Break, _good gods!_ has more

of the _Passionate_ in it, than of the _Simple_ or the _Soft_; and may

be as well used in Anger as in Love, as well in a Fright as in a

Transport. It would have gone a good Way in explaining the different

Kinds of Thought, if the judicious Author had distinguished them in this

Line; for there are not so many Kinds in one Verse in all Father

_Bouhour_'s _Maniere de bien penser_. I would not be mistaken here, nor

be charged with Ostentation, in setting up my Judgement in Opposition to

the _Spectator_'s; from whose Writings and Lessons, I have learned more

than from all other Authors. I only offer it as an Instance, that the

Best of our Criticks do not seem to have gone to the Bottom of this

Subject. It never enter'd into the Heads of Writers and Readers in

General, that Thought was any Thing but Thought, or Stile any Thing but

Stile, or that there were any other Terms or Distinctions for them, but

the Good and the Bad, as is already hinted; nor were they at all

sensible of my Lord _Roscommon_'s Meaning in these Verses:

_Whose incoherent Stile, like sick Men's Dreams,

Varies all Shapes, and mixes all Extreams._

The same may be said of Thought.

I want very much to be informed, whether there is a perfect Agreement of

Thought in these several Quotations out of _Homer_, or how they must be

understood so as not to contradict one another. The first Couplet is

against _Wine_:

_Inflaming Wine, pernicious to Mankind,

Unnerves the Limbs, and dulls the noble Mind._

The next Couplet is for Wine:

_With_ Thracian _Wines recruit thy honour'd Guests,

For happy Counsels flow from sober Feasts._

What follows taken out of the _Notes_ upon _Homer_ is against Wine.

_What_ Hector _says against Wine in the two first Verses has a great

Deal of Truth in it: It is a vulgar Mistake to imagine the Use of Wine,

either raises the Spirits or encreases Strength._

The next Words are for Wine:

_Then with a plenteous Draught refresh his Soul,

And draw new Spirits from the generous Bowl._

Again for Wine:

_For Strength consists in Spirits and in Blood,

And those are ow'd to generous Wine and Food._

And the Translator's Observation, that the moderate Use of Wine does not

raise the Spirits, is not the truer, because it is said by _Hector_, the

Son of _Priam_. Father _Sirmond_, a sober reverend as well as learned

Priest says quite another Thing:

Si bene commemini causæ sint quinque bibendi,

Hospitis Adventus, præsens Sitis, atque futura,

Et Vini bonitas, & quælibet altera Causa.

_If all be true_, &c.

Whoever reads an Author with Exactness cannot fail of meeting with

several Passages, where Self-love, Humour, Party, or Complexion, are

uppermost. Thus a good Catholick will never have a good Word for a

Heretick, nor a _Puritan_ for a _Papist_. Dr. _Ch----_ will never speak

well of Punch, nor Dr. _Mand----_ of Watergruel. He who writes well is

jealous of him who judges well, and he who judges well envies him who

writes well. The _Swifts_ turn every Thing into Grimace, the _Whistons_

into Mathematicks, and whatever touches an Author's own Taste, he is

always recommending to his Reader.

We all remember how the Duke of _Malborough_ was treated by the blessed

Peace-makers for beating their Friends the _French_. _Delight in War_

was a Mark set upon him in a most solemn Manner, and a memorable

Instance of our Wisdom and Gratitude. There is a Paraphrase upon it in

the Version of _Homer_; and when the Application is made will turn the

_Epick_ into Satyr.

_Curs'd is the Man, and void of Law and Right,

Unworthy Property, unworthy Light;

Unfit for publick Rule or private Care,

That Wretch, that Monster who delights in War;

Whose Lust is Murder, and whose horrid Joy

To tear his Country_, &c.

To _tear_ a Country is very much in Heroicks. The Image of _Discord_ has

good Lines in it; but methinks they would not have been the Worse, if

they had been heated a little in _Milton_'s Furnace:

_Discord, dire Sister of the slaughtering Pow'r,

Small at her Birth,_ but rising ev'ry Hour;

_While scarce the Skies her horrid Head can bound,

She stalks on Earth, and_ shapes _the World around:

The Nations bleed, where e'er her Steps she turns,

The Groan still deepens, and the Combat burns._

I refer to the Judgement of the Reader, whether the following Image of

Discord taken from a modern burlesque Poem, has not more of the Epick in

it:

Non tulit invisæ speciem Discordia Pacis,

Ilicet horrentes ad fibila concitat hydros,

Ulcisci jubet Ira nefas. Spumantia felle

Ora tument, micat ex oculis ardentibus Ignis.

_Discord enrag'd at the Approach of Peace

Made her Snakes hiss, and urg'd to dire Revenge.

Her foaming Mouth of horrid Poison full,

From her red Eyes she darted Flakes of Fire._

The new invented Words made use of by the Translator of _Homer_ are well

enough chosen, and well warranted by the Practice of the greatest Poets,

such as _Moveless_, _Instarr'd_, _Inurn'd_, _Conglobe_, _Deathful_,

_Fountful_, _Lengthful_:

_But if you write of Things abstruse and new,

Words of your own inventing may be us'd._

Roscom.

I have mention'd some of the Helps which were prepared for the

Translator of the _Ilias_. But Dr. _Felton_ informs us, Dr. _Busby_

would not allow of Notes; a very curious Remark That. It is not

impossible, but Dr. _Busby_ himself might have read and taught _Homer_

50 Years as a _Grammarian_, without understanding him as a Poet. A

Portion of that Genius which inspir'd the Author is requisite for the

Reader to see all the Beauties that are in a Poem. I believe the Lord

_Roscommon_'s Judgement will be preferred to that of both those Doctors:

_Search every Comment that your Care can find,

Some here, some there, may hit the Poet's Mind._

If the Translator of _Homer_ search'd every Comment, his Labour was more

than _Herculean_. I own my self extreamly edify'd by what he says of

Antiquaries; applying a Saying of my Lord _Bacon_'s to them: _In General

they write for Ostentation not for Instruction, and their Works are

perpetual Repetitions._ The Reason is plain, they have no Fund of their

own, they must therefore borrow from those that have. It is necessary

there should be such Men, but the Dryness and Barrenness of their

Studies are inconsistent with a lively Fancy and a good Taste; and I

know not which of the Antiquaries deserve most to be rever'd by us,

those that would restore lost Words, Letters, and Points, or those that

would recover lost Fable or History. To know exactly where _Brute_ built

his _Palace Royal_, where _Bladud_ set up his _Laboratory_ would be

something; as also to prove, that _Cassibelan_ liv'd where my Lord

_Essex_ now does at _Cashiobury_; or that _Constantine the Great_ was a

_Yorkshire_ Man; which Things have been attempted, would be as much to

the Glory of the Students in Antiquity, as to find out a lost _Comma_,

or restore a Letter to a Word that was robb'd of it 1500 Years ago. But

as for our Monkish Antiquaries, and the Monastick Learning, it seems to

be reserv'd for the Improvement of those, whose Minds, like barren

Soils, will never bear without dunging. They are always turning up the

Ruins of old Convents, and hope like the Cock to find a Jewel in the

Dunghill. They dig for holy Water-Pots and Crucifixes, as greedily as

the modern _Romans_ dig for Medals, Images, and Urns. To know whether

such an Abbey was founded in the Papacy of Pope _Joan_ or Pope

_Boniface_, in what Dormitory such a Monk slept, and in what

Penitentiary such a Nun was disciplined, must needs be very edifying.

But most of all the Deciding of historical Debates by old Charters,

which, with a little curious Examination, will be found to be forged

ones. Many of this Kind are printed by _Dugdale_, as I shall have

Occasion to remark elsewhere. If these Antiquaries could fix the same

Authority on _Monkish_ Writings, as we are told of _Homer_'s, that the

Claims of two Cities to certain Limits, were determined by what he said

of them in his _Ilias_, it would be worth every one's while to read the

Monks instead of the Classicks; And I doubt not Dr. _Felton_ would have

succeeded better if he had given us Instruction in the Monkish Learning,

than he has done in the _Classical_. But since their Writings prove

nothing but their Ignorance and Superstition, I believe Men of Taste and

Genius will be so generous as to leave such hidden Treasures to enrich

those, whose Invention and Judgement lie under the Calamity of the most

extream Poverty. There is nothing but Labour and Patience requisite to

acquire a Mastery in these Studies, whether the Matter collected be good

or bad, 'tis the same Thing if it be Old, if it be _Teutonick_ or

_Runick_, _Danish_ or _Saxon_, that's sufficient. A Man who has any

Warmth in his Imagination, and any Delicacy in his Taste, cannot be

always raking in the Rubbish of barbarous Ages, and groping in _Gothick_

Darkness. A good Proof of the small Talent necessary for this Work is,

that there hardly ever was an Author among these Monkish Antiquaries,

but his Language was as barbarous as his Subject. Such Sort of

Scholarship is, I own, very serviceable to those that know how to make a

good Use of others Labours; but the Merit of the Scholar consists

rather in the Goodness of his Eyes, and the Strength of his Head, than

in the Fineness of his Genius, or the Regularity of his Judgement. I am

apt to think the Translator of _Homer_ had not the Admirers of these

Antiquities in his Thoughts, but refer'd to the Criticks and

Commentators on the _Greek_ and _Roman_ Authors: For he says, in another

Place, _To talk of the Genius of an Ancient, as_ Macrobius _did, is at

once the cheapest Way of shewing our own Taste, and the shortest Way of

criticising the Wit of others_. This must be only meant of those whom

Mr. _Dryden_ calls _Dutch_ Commentators, of those that do by the

Classicks, as Correctors of the Press do by their Copies, and instead of

applying themselves to the Sense stick close to the Letters, and look

out for _Dele's_ and _Addenda's_. This they call correcting and

restoring the Text; and it is much to be fear'd, that by this restoring

and correcting of the Commentators, and the Mistakes, Blunders and

Negligences of the Copiers, we have few or no Books of the Antients in

their original Purity and Perfection. However, there is Perfection

enough left in the Classical Writings to prove, That what the Translator

of _Homer_ says, does not relate to the Classicks themselves, but to

those that make an ill Use of them, and under their Name and Authority

insult the Moderns. The Lord _Bacon_ says somewhere, that what we call

the Antiquity was the Youth of the World, and that we are properly the

Antients as the Inhabitants of an older World, and having made infinite

Improvements in all the most useful Parts of Learning.

I dare not say, there is a Quibble in the Expression of so illustrious a

Writer, but I must always take the Authors that wrote 1500 or 2000 Years

ago to be the Antients; and one may very well Question, whether there

was not as much useful Learning lost in twelve or thirteen Centuries of

Barbarism and Ignorance, as has been discover'd, or rather recovered in

two or three of the last Ages.

The Antiquaries the Translator speaks of would do Wonders, if they would

make it out that the Letter sent to the King of _Edessa_, and the

Passage in _Josephus_'s Book XVIII, relating to our Saviour, are

genuine, with several other Particularities, which are much insisted

upon by Ecclesiastical Writers. The _Spectator_ has told us something

too of Antiquity, which wants the Confirmation of the Antiquaries, and

that is a Quotation out of a Manuscript in the _Vatican_ Library, where

_Longinus_ is made to say, Paul _of_ Tarsus, _the Patron of an Opinion

not fully proved, must be reckon'd among the best_ Græcian _Orators_.

This must be a downright Forgery: _Longinus_ surely knew the _Greek_

Tongue too well, to cry up the Eloquence of a Writer in it, who, as St.

_Jerome_ says, did not understand _Grammar_, and mentions the Places

where he err'd, _Propter Imperitiam Artis Grammaticæ_. See _Gregory_ on

the _Septuagint_. It were to be wished, that the Ecclesiastical Writers,

even of the earliest Centuries, had suffer'd nothing to escape them that

was improbable, if not incredible. 'Tis also much wanted to have further

Proof of the Ceasing of Oracles at the Nativity of our Saviour, and that

_Virgil_ prophesy'd of it in his fourth Eclogue. We should be still more

oblig'd to them, if they would prove, that the _Sibyl_'s Verses are a

Prophecy of the same Thing, which Things are generally asserted in the

Writings of the Ecclesiasticks. As to Oracles _Lucian_ tells us, Answers

were given in his Time, that of the Emperor _Commodus_ 160 Years after,

_Juvenal_ makes their Ceasing to be only 100 Years after:

--------Delphis Oracula cessant.

_Theodoret_ writes, that _Julian_ the Apostate received an Answer from

_Apollo_ at _Delphos_, 300 Years after the Birth of our Saviour. All

which may be seen in Bishop _Potter_'s _Greek_ Antiquities, a most

excellent Book; and if we had more such Antiquaries as that learned

Prelate's and Mr. _Basil Kennet_'s who wrote the Antiquities of _Rome_,

we might at the same Time improve ourselves both in antient and polite

Learning. These being, I think the two most valuable Pieces of the Kind

in any Language. As the middle Way is safest in all Things, so as to the

Antients to run them down as _Perrault_ has done, or cry them up as

_Boileau_ is perhaps equally dangerous, and out of the Medium. Whatever

Advantages we have had of the Antients, probably they had the same of

those that preceeded them. This we know, that the _Latins_ borrow'd as

much from the _Greeks_ as we have borrow'd from them; and it would be no

difficult Matter to prove, that in all the Branches of polite

Literature, the Moderns, particularly the _English_, have excell'd the

Antients in as many as the Antients excelled them.

The Passage of my Lord _Bacon_'s before cited, gave Occasion to Monsieur

_Perrault_, to bring in that noble Author for an Evidence on his Side

against the Antients: But _Boileau_ vindicates him in this Point; and

Father _Bouhours_, as another Instance of his excellent Judgement,

declares he prefers the Lord Chancellor _Bacon_ before the most

celebrated Names of Antiquity. _Rapin_ calls him the greatest _Genius of

England_, and he has not more Glory from his own Countrymen than from

the learned Men in _France_.

I expect no Quarter from the Dealers in monastick Learning, in Heraldry,

and Genealogy, who generally doat upon them even to Frenzy. _Du Val_ in

his Geography informs us, that there is a Nation in _America_, bordering

on the River of the _Amazons_, where old Women go off better than young;

under a Notion, that the Knowledge of the One is preferable to the

Vigour and Beauty of the Other. Thus these Men please themselves more

with the Dryness and Gravity of Antiquity, than with a beautiful

Imagination, and the Charms of Eloquence. I believe their Opinion will

not have many Followers, nor their Example be much imitated. However,

when such an Antiquary as the great _Selden_ appears in the World, the

Instruction it will receive from him, more than makes amends for the

Labour and Time which others lose in hunting after worthless

Manuscripts, forg'd Charters, and monkish Fables. The learned and polite

Dr. _Bathurst_ of _Oxford_, wrote an admirable Poem on the Death of

_Selden_:

_So fell the sacred_ Sibyl, _when of Old

Inspir'd with mere than mortal Breast could hold:

The gazing Multitude stood doubtful by,

Whether to call it Death or Extasy:

She silent lies, and now the Nations find

No Oracles, but i' th' Leaves she left behind._

_Selden etant sans Contredit le plus docte des Anglois moderns._ 'Tis

said by a _Frenchman_ and a _Papist_; but as much as _Selden_ was an

Oracle, and a Glory to our Country, Archbishop _Laud_ his Brethren would

have thrust his learned Head into a Pillory, if they could have come at

him. I don't know whether it was for his History of _Tythes_ or not; but

that would have been hard after he had been so fully answer'd by

Doctors of both Universities; who, however, were not, _Les plus Doctes

des Anglois moderns_. Judicious Antiquaries ever were, and ever will be

in Esteem. Those that meddle with Things solid and useful. None of the

Pretenders to this Sort of Knowledge, are more despicable than such as

deal in old Terms and Phrases, who generally affect a Contempt for those

that are in present Use as weak and effeminate. The Emperor _Augustus_

could not bear these Men, any more than _Punster_'s whom he heartily

despis'd. The Spectator, Nº 470. has with much Pleasantry animadverted

on those Criticks in Readings, and has brought in the _Cotton Library_,

_Aldus_, _Scaliger_, _Scioppius_, _Salmasius_, the elder _Stephens_, and

a Heap of old Manuscripts, to clear up the Difficulties in certain

Lyrick Verses, about _a Shape_, _an Eye_, _Wit_, _Charms_, Corinna _and_

Belvedera.

As scrupulous and as curious as these _Antiquaries_ would be thought to

be, one might fill Volumes with Examples of the most notorious Mistakes

and Blunders in the Writings of the most learned among them; which are

not taken notice of to lessen the Credit they have worthily acquir'd,

but to shew the Infirmity of humane Nature, which will always be

attended with Errours, and never arrive at Perfection as we have

elsewhere observ'd after _Horace_:

--------_Non ego Paucis_, &c.

But in such Authors, what is good more than atones for what is not so,

and 'tis only where a Writer shews a Defect in Will as well as

Judgement, that he renders himself blame-worthy, especially in History.

Several of these Blunders are collected by _Marville_ in his _Melange_,

&c. 'Tis remark'd of _Pliny_, that in translating _Democritus_, he says,

the Camelion is like a Crocodile, and altogether as big--The

_Crocodalos_ of _Democritus_ is in the _Jonick_ Dialect, a _Lizard_,

which may be about some ten thousand Times less than a Crocodile, and

yet a great many Times bigger than a _Camelion_. _Eutychius_ speaking of

_Eusebius_ of _Cesarea_, sirnamed _Pamphilus_, calls him _Eusebius_,

Bishop of the City of _Phili_. _Quintus Curtius_ mistakes _Arabia Fælix_

for _Arabia Deserta_. He confounds the _Euxine_ with the _Caspian_ Sea,

and makes the Rivers _Tygris_ and _Euphrates_ run through _Media_,

which they never enter'd. Mr. _Simon_, in his critical History, takes

_Suna_ and _Fratela_, two Officers of the _Gothick_ Army, for two

_German_ Ladies. The Life of _Charlemagne_, written by _Acciaioli_,

having been often joyn'd with _Plutarch_'s Lives, was published by

_Vicellius_ as written by _Plutarch_, who liv'd 6 or 700 Years before

_Charlemagne_. _Gerard Vossius_ affirms, that the Society of the

_Sorbonne_ was instituted by _Robert_, Brother of _S. Lewis_ King of

_France_, instead of _Robert_ sirnamed _Sorbonne_ from the Place of his

Nativity. _Pallavicini_ in his History of the Council of _Trent_, says

_Lansac_, the _French_ Ambassador, was Knight of the Order of the Holy

Ghost, which was not instituted till twenty Years after; but what has

particular Relation to us _Englishmen_ is the Charge against _Dodwel_:

_Dodowel dans ses Dissertations sur Saint Cyprien prend la Ville

d'Olympe pour une Olympiade,_ takes the City _Olympus_ for an

_Olympiade_, the Name of the Place where, for the Date of the Year when

it was done, which is Matter of much Humiliation to all such as believe

it impossible for so learned and orthodox a Man to commit so great an

Oversight; and plainly proves to us, that those who write of what past

1000 or 2000 Years ago, are as likely to err, as those who write of what

past three or fourscore Years ago. Whoever has a Curiosity to see more

of the _Blunderings_, which the most learned are charg'd with, such as

the _Port Royal_, _Baronius_, _Vasquez_, _Du Cange_, _Varillas_,

_L'Abbé_, &c. may have full Satisfaction in _Marville_'s _Melange_, _p.

208. & seq._ taken from a Book written by _Boileau_'s Uncle, entituled,

_Colloquium Criticum de Sphalmætis viromum in re literaria illustrium_.

Of what Size would the Book be, if we should examine with the same

Exactness, _Nalson_, _Heylin_, _Wharton_, _Collier_, _Dugdale_, _Brady_,

the _Grand Rebellion_, the _Histories_, _&c._ And collect and publish

the Errours, both of the Will and the Judgement. Nor are these Names by

any Means more illustrious, than those we meet with in the _Colloquium_.

The Translator of _Homer_ has an Excuse for Mr. _Dryden_, which is much

more generous than just: He says, _His Haste in Writing ought not to be

imputed to him as a Fault, but to those who suffer'd so noble a Genius

to lie under the Necessity of it._ Mr. _Dryden_'s Genius did not appear

in any Thing more than his _Versification_; and whether the Criticks

will have it ennobled for that _Versification_ only, is a Question. The

Translator seems to make a good _Genius_ and a good Ear to be the same

Thing. _Dryden_ himself was more sensible of the Difference between

them, and when it was in Debate at _Will_'s Coffee-house, what Character

he would have with Posterity; he said, with a sullen Modesty, _I believe

they will allow me to be a good Versifier_. If we will believe Mr.

_Dryden_, he did not lie under the Necessity of Haste: In several of his

Dedications and Prefaces, he has declared, He never wanted. When he

renounced his Allegiance to King _William_, and disqualified himself for

keeping the Laureat's Place with that of Historiographer, he had a

Pension from the then Lord Chamberlain, the Earl of _Dorset_, which was

an Instance of Generosity that is rarely to be met with in the History

of _Lewis_ XIV, who paid more to Poets and Historians than all the

Princes of _Europe_. His Bounty has been extoll'd, even by those whom

his Bigotry had banish'd, yet he seldom let it extend to any of the

Reformed Religion, let their Merit be ever so great. Mademoiselle _le

Fevre_, afterwards Madam _Dacier_, dedicated a Book to that Prince, and

the Duke _de Montausier_ introduc'd her at Court; but the King would not

accept of the Book, nor admit that his Name should be put before the

Epistle.

The Duke, whose Character had some Bluntness in it, said, _Sir, Is this

the Way to encourage Learning: The Lady deserves well of your Majesty

and the Publick, and if you will not reward her your self, suffer me to

give her 100 Pistoles, I matter not whether I am paid again_: or Words

to that Effect. This Learned Lady was far from being an Enemy to the

Government as _Dryden_ was, and he did not stick to shew it upon all

Occasions, even when he was pension'd by my Lord Chamberlain. The Truth

is, he was like fond Fathers who can see no Faults in their Children;

and as to his hasty Writing, 'tis pretty well known that as easy as his

Verses appear to be, he came hard by them: He thought it a good Day's

Work if he could finish 40 Verses a Day; and some learned _Antiquaries_,

I suppose from a _MSS._ of _Virgil_'s Amanuensis, assure us, that _Maro_

wrote as many, and drawing them off the _Lee_ afterwards, in his

Poetical Limbeck, reduced them to Ten. _Godeau_, Bishop of _Vence_,

us'd to write 2 or 300 Verses a-day. I my self paid a Visit once to a

Verse-maker in an Afternoon, and saw 200 political Verses on his Table,

which he told me he had written since Dinner: By this Dispatch he soon

furnish'd out a _Folio_. _Dryden_ was so far from spying Blemishes in

his Works, that he often took them for Beauties, and particularly what

the _Italians_ call _Concetti_. This noted Rant in the _Conq. Gran._

_I, alone am King of Me._

is happily imitated by him in his _State of Innocence_:

_I my self am proud of Me._

But to criticise on _Dryden_'s Prefaces and Plays is a much greater

Labour than to copy them all over, and equally ungenerous and

impertinent: If any one will compare his _Fall of Man_ with _Milton_'s

Paradise lost, he will quickly perceive to which of them it is that the

_noble Genius_ is to be apply'd; and if it belongs to _Milton_, some

other Epithet should be thought of for _Dryden_.

I have already observ'd, that I did not intend to form a regular

Discourse, and I think I have kept pretty well to my Intention: If the

Reader misses any Thing of Instruction by it, he will find it made up in

Entertainment. The Variety will excuse the Want of Method in a Subject

not so capable of it as where the Matter is certain and well known. I

wish I were able to give Examples of all Father _Bouhour_'s several

Kinds of Thoughts out of _English_ Authors, but Examples are much nicer

Work than Precepts. Every one may agree that a Thing ought to be so

done, but saw that it is so done. Men's Idea's of the same Things, vary

in the Reflection as much as their Views do in Prospect, according to

the Light they appear in. Dr. _Felton_ makes a Trifle of it in one Part

of his Preface, and an insuperable Difficulty in another. _I might, at

once, with the Trouble only of Transcribing, have adorn'd the Work, and

diverted the Reader._ Contrary to this, he says, _If any Body is pleas'd

to try, he will hardly find it practicable to illustrate these Rules by

Examples._ The Quotations, which he had before term'd transcribing

only, are not so easy as he imagin'd to be done with Beauty and

Judgement, was he sure of writing out nothing but what was as much to

the Purpose as if it had been made for it, otherwise he might have

transcrib'd puffy Thoughts for sublime, trifling Thoughts for pretty,

affected Thoughts for agreeable; in short, false Thoughts for fine ones,

and I am afraid that would have been his Misfortune, had he attempted

it. In his Preface he blames _Tully_ for quoting himself, and

_Aristotle_ for being dry; but as he has not gone much beyond the Latter

in his Criticisms, nor the Former in his Eloquence, so I believe their

Reputation will not be much the worse for him, and it had been better if

the Doctor had follow'd the Direction of _Quintillian_, Modesto tamen &

Circumspecto judicio, _&c. People should speak with a great deal of

Modesty and Circumspection of such great Men, for it may happen, as it

very often does, that they condemn what they do not understand._

I am apprehensive enough that this Undertaking will be censur'd as an

Effect of Vanity and Arrogance, and I am well enough acquainted with the

Spirit of the People I have to deal with,

_Genus irritabile Vatum._

But I please my self with the Reflection, that I have not mingled the

least Spice of Malice in the Composition, as it relates to Criticism,

and am so far from being vain and arrogant, that I frequently and

sincerely declare, my chief Design was to excite some more capable

Writer to do what I knew my self uncapable of; and if any such Person

shall, by exposing my Errours, give the World a true Light, I will not

only gratefully follow it, but rejoyce at it, and take hold or the

Opportunity to have my Share of the Instruction, if it comes from clean

Hands, and is not defil'd with ill Manners and ill Language: Such

tutoring I shall despise, and it being very common for Authors to have

as good an Opinion of themselves as of any Body else, I shall not think

any Name of Authority enough to justify either Insolence or Scurrility.

About 40 Years ago there was a Student at _Oxford_, who acquir'd a good

Hand at a Fiddle; but, falling afterwards into Melancholy, he grew

averse to Musick, and could not be prevail'd upon by his Friends to

touch it: They had but one Way to excite him to it, and that was for

some unskilful Hand to take his Violin and scrape upon it; he would then

immediately snatch it away from him, and, in a Kind of Resentment, give

it the utmost Elegance of Sound and Harmony. I freely own I had this

Man's Example in my Head when I began this Essay, and should the Success

be the same, the End of it is answer'd.

I cannot close this Essay without taking Notice of the Perverseness of

Men, who pretend to Wit and Judgement, towards one another: It appears

mostly in Pretenders, and is very well markt by _Boileau_, in these two

Verses translated by Mr. _Dennis_, and equal to the Original:

_Thus one Fool lolls his Tongue out at another,

And shakes his empty Noddle at his Brother._

It was not so when Judgement and Wit were something more than Pretence

only, when they were in the Heighth of Excellence, under the Patronage

of _Augustus_. My Lord _Roscommon_, in his Preface to _Horace_'s Art of

Poetry writes thus: _I am below the Envy of the Criticks, but if I

durst, I would beg them to remember, that_ Horace _ow'd his Favour and

his Fortune to the Character given of him by_ Virgil _and_ Varius;

_that_ Fundanius _and_ Pollio _are still valued by what_ Horace _say of

them, and that in that Golden Age there was a good Understanding among

the Ingenious; and those who were the most esteem'd were the best

natur'd._ _Dryden_ has made the same Observation: _Certainly, the Poets

of_ Ovid_'s Age enjoy'd much Happiness in the Conversation and

Friendship of one another._ _The antient Criticks_, says the

_Spectator_, _are full of the Praises of their Contemporaries. They

discover Beauties which escap'd the Observation of the Vulgar, and very

often find out Reasons for palliating and excusing such Slips and

Oversights, as were committed in the Writings of eminent Authors._ Mr.

_Addison_ has imitated them in his Remarks upon _Milton_'s _Paradice

Lost_; but it must be allowed that the Task was made very easy, and the

Beauties shine so brightly, that there's no taking one's Eye off of

them. It has also been wish'd, that the two or three Slips in Expression

which he quotes out of _Milton_ had been excused, as they might have

been by observing, that if there's a Pun in the _Paradice Lost_, 'tis

the Devil that makes it.

One of the surest Signs, that the Wits of the past and present Age,

_English_ and _French_, are not of the Size of those of the Age of

_Augustus_, is their Jealousies and Broils. The _Spectator_ has this

Remark, Nº 409; _I cannot think, that_ Corneille, Racine, Moliere,

Boileau, La Fontaine, Bruyere, Bossu, _or the_ Dacier_'s, would have

written so well as they did, had they not been Friends and

Contemporaries._ 'Tis said very much in Favour of good Nature, and

therefore is very agreeable: But I Question, whether Emulation, and

sometimes even Resentment, may not produce very good Effects in the

Works of the Ingenious. _Facit Indignatio versus._ _Godeau_, _Vaugelas_,

_Malherbe_, were Men of great Merit; and so were also, _Maynard_, _La

Mothe Le Vayer_, and _Costar_; yet they wrote against one another with

some Acrimony.

'Tis Envy and Spleen, that produce a Set of Writers in _England_, call'd

_Answerers_, whose Modesty may be conceived by some of their Titles,

_The best Answer that ever was._ Part 1st. _The best Answer that ever

was._ Part the 2d. _A better Answer_ than the _best Answer_. The

_Unanswerable Answer_, by _Lesley_ and others. You can't publish a

_Pamphlet_ or _Essay_, but it is immediately snapt at to be answer'd:

Nay, Dr. _Halley_'s Calculation of the Eclipse in a Half-sheet had two

or three _political_ Answers.

The Itch of Answering is so great, that some Authors have taken it in

Dudgeon, not to have been thought worthy of an Answer; and to prevent

such Disgrace a second Time, have written on Purpose that they might

answer themselves. I have heard, that the learned and ingenious

_Robinson Crusoe_ is in the Number of these.

How can it be expected, that Men of Passions, worldly Minds, and Lay-men

should escape this Infection, when the Fathers themselves in the first

Ages of the _Church_, could not help writing against one another, with

as much Sharpness as any modern Writers. St. _Jerom_, in Particular, is

charg'd with this Weakness, in his Writings against _Lactantius_, St.

_Ambrose_, St. _Hilary_, _Didymus_. 'Tis said, that _he spar'd neither

Antients nor Moderns_; no not the inspir'd Elders that translated the

Septuagint: Himself having translated the Bible into _Latin_, and he

seem'd to be as fond of his Works as are other Translators.

Our Neighbours, the _French_, have not been altogether free from this

Humour of _Answering_, or rather writing against one another; as will

appear by the following List of a dozen Authors of a Side; most of them

of the _French_ Academy; and I might name as many more of equal Rank:

_Balzac_, } {_Pere Goulu_, _Theophile_.

_Godeau_, } {_Maynard_, _Vavasseur_.

_Vaugelas_, } {_La Mothe Le Vayer_.

_Chapelain_, } {_Boileau_, _Ligniere_.

_Ablancourt_,} {_Marole_.

_Menage_, } Written against {_Pere Bouhours_.

_Costar_, } by {_Girac_.

_Malherbe_, } {_Costar_.

_Voiture_, } {_Richelet_.

_Bossu_, } {_Perrault_.

_Corneille_, } {_Dacier_.

_Richelet_, } {_Furetiere_.

As the most delicate Praise is that which has the _Face_ of Satyr, so

the most delicate Satyr is that which has the Face of Praise. Of the

latter Kind are the Verses to the honourable _Edward Howard_ on his

_incomparable_ and _incomprehensible_ Play. Those Verses were written by

the Duke of _Buckingham_, the Lord _Dorset_, Mr. _Waller_, and others.

Of the former Kind are several of _Voiture_'s Letters to the Prince of

_Conde_, and _Boileau_'s to the Duke _de Vivonne_ in Imitation of them.

Indeed we must allow, that the _French_ do understand the _Belle

Raillerie_ better than we do, at least for the Generality, there being

some Authors in _English_, that have succeeded in fine Raillery as well

as the _French_. Thus did Archbishop _Tillotson_ treat _Sergeant_ the

_Popish_ Priest: Thus Bishop _Sprat_ handled _Sorbiere_; and Dr.

_Burnet_ of the Charter-house treated one _Warren_ who had attack'd his

_Theory_. If our Answerers could write as they did, they would both

divert and instruct us. But we have already explained what they mean by

Raillery. They know not how to parry like good Fencers, and therefore

knock down like Cudgel Players.

The last Word puts me in Mind of a lower Order of Criticks, which are

rarely heard of within the Sound of _Bow-Bell_; and these are your

_Etymologists_ and your _Orthographists_, who turn to _Rider_ or _Holy

Oak_ for the Derivation of Words, and have the learned _Garretson_ and

other Helps for Spelling: But I know not whether this Essay may travel

far enough into the Country to be of any Use; and besides, I have not

converst enough with those Criticks that deal in Words and Letters only,

to be Master of the Subject, which is generally learn'd by such as make

a Penny of it in Conversation by laying Wagers, the Power and Test of

all rural Argument.

I must own the _Etymologists_ are by much the greater Men of the Two

than the _Orthographists_. I do affirm this, not only because it is

necessary to know the Roots of Languages, but because it is a greater

Mark of Scholarship, and has the Sanction of the most learned

Universities. The profoundest of our own Antiquaries have, in Favour of

the University of _Oxford_, found out an Etymology, that may match with

the famous One of _Diaper Napkin_: From whence comes King _Pepin_.

Bishop _Stillingfleet_ informs us, that the Champions for the Antiquity

of _Oxford_ say, that the old Name is _British_, and it is read

somewhere _Iren_ which should be read _Icen_, and that again _Ychen_,

and that _Rydychen_, and _Rydychen_ in the _British_ Tongue is _Vadum

Boum_ in _Latin_, and that in _English_, _Oxenford_, _Oxford_, and

_Oxon._ Such wonderful Discoveries are made by the venerable

Antiquaries. _Iren_ runs the Gauntlet through three Languages _Irish_,

_Welsh_, and _Latin_, before it drops into _English_, but considering

there is more _Greek_ in the _Welsh_ Tongue than there is _Latin_, it

may make Work for great Scholars, to shew their Scholarship in settling

the Matter as it should be with a Salvo for the Rights of the University

of _Cambridge_.

The Learned in _France_ have an Etymology almost as good as that of

_Oxford_ from _Iren_, which is the Word _Cemetiere_ a Church-yard; They

derive it from the _Latin_ Word _cum_ with, and _mittere_ to put, as

much as to say the dead Bodies are put together in one burying Place.

Thus the Boxes at the _Opera_ are a _Cemetiere_ or Church-yard, because

the Ladies and Gentlemen are put with one another there, and thus by

Virtue of the same Etymology, the Place where People are born and where

they are bury'd are all one, from _Cum_ with, and _Mittere_ to put, as I

have heard, that the same Word serves for Life and Death in one of the

oriental Languages.

As to _Orthography_, the only Passage I have read in a polite Author

concerning it is that of _Boileau_, who taxes _Perrault_ with false

Spelling, by putting an _s_ in one Word, and leaving out an _s_ in

another. By putting an _s_ into the Word _Contemples_, it lost the

Imperative Mood which is _Contemple_; and by leaving out an _s_ in the

Word _Casuiste_, written _Casuite_, it became no Word at all. When Moods

and Tenses, Numbers and Cases, Substantives and Adjectives, suffer by

_Orthography_, the curious Country-man has reason to cry out, otherwise

the Printer may be answerable for the Spelling.

After all that has been said of the _Sublime, &c._ perhaps the Criticks

do make more of Things than is necessary, or in Nature: Tho' Poets

pretend to Inspiration, and cry out, _The god, the god_, they are, in

the Main, but meer Men, and have their Tricks and Quirks to keep up the

Reputation of that Art: Nay, like other Professions, they would have us

believe, that there's Mystery in it too; not, I suppose, as Divines

understand it, but in the vulgar Sense, as it is understood when we say,

the Trade or Mystery of a _Cordwainer_. Some of these Poetical Mysteries

are as follow.

We are told that this Verse of _Homer_'s Third _Iliad_ was said, by

_Alexander the Great_, to be the best in all the Poem:

_Great in the Wars, and great in Arts of Sway._

Methinks our _Gazette_ Men, and _Courant_ Men, express themselves every

whit as well, when in Honour of a defunct General, whose Activity had

long furnish'd them with Matter for their News-Books, they tell us, He

was great alike in the Camp, and in the Cabinet, which easily runs into

as good a Verse as the other.

_Great in the Camp, and in the Cabinet._

The next best Verses that ever were, are _Boileaus_; and they were said

to be the best in all his Works, by _La Fontaine_: The Subject is the

_French_ King's setting up Lace-making at _Roan_.

Et nos voisins frustrez de ces tributs serviles,

Que paiat a leur Art, le Luxe de nos Villes.

_No more by foreign Tributes are we griev'd,

Which, from our Luxury, alien Arts receiv'd._

Why these are better Verses than all other best Verses, is the Mystery

we are speaking of, and like that of the Free-Masons, it cannot be

unfolded but by a Brother; nay, one may suspect of this Mystery what is

justly suspected of that; they do not tell it us, for fear we shou'd

laugh at it.

Of this Kind, doubtless, is the famous Couplet, taken out of Sir _John

Denham_'s _Coopers-Hill_, which _Dryden_ says, are the two best Verses

in the _English_ Tongue:

_Tho' Deep, yet clear; tho' Gentle, yet not dull;

Strong without Rage, without o'erflowing full._

He said he would not reveal the Secret why they were the best Verses,

but left it as a Riddle to Posterity. I dare say, there are a Thousand

as good Verses in Mr. _Pope_'s _Homer_, if by good Verses he means

smooth ones, and one would think Three such Monysyllables as _Yet_,

_Not_, _Dull_, all together, was enough to set aside the Claim of that

Line.

Having said so much already of my honest Intention In this _Essay_, I

must, at last, refer it to the Judgement of the Reader, and whatever it

is, shall receive it with Pleasure, when it is given with Candour.

If he approves of what I have said, I cannot but be pleased with having

given some few Hints to another.

If he does not approve of it, 'twill please me still more to receive new

Light my self.

Since this Essay was finish'd, I have seen a Book written by a _French_

Gentleman, which has been receiv'd with much Civility; and as that

Gentleman is commanded to make Remarks on our Manners in _England_, he

will not do us Justice unless he puts the Reception his Book has met

with, among the Instances of our Humanity to Strangers.

I must own I have not learnt a good deal by it, and the Reading of it

has not excited any Impatience in me to read any new _Heroick_ Poem. I

have long despair'd to see another good _Dramatick_, and much more an

_Epick_ Poem in _English_, and cannot hope now to see one in _French_,

which never yet was seen: However, I wish so well to all such generous

Enterprizes, that I think it barbarous to give them the least

Discouragement.

My Objections to this Gentleman's Criticisms are for what he says too

ill of _Milton_'s Poem, and too good of _Clarendon_'s History, which he

highly commends for the fine Characters, tho' he seems not to understand

them, or not to have inform'd himself sufficiently of the Facts on which

they are founded. He assures us the Lord _Clarendon_ has _unravell'd all

the Springs of the Civil Wars_. I pass by the Expression to _unravel a

Spring_, for that probably it sounds better in the _French_ Idiom than

in the _English_: But the Sense of it is not true in Fact. _He has

drawn, at full Length, the pictures of those whose Ambition shook the

Foundation of his Country._ He has drawn them at full Length indeed, but

as _Milton_ drew his shadowy Beings, _Death_, _Sin_, _Chaos_, by the

Extent of his Imagination, and with little Regard to Historical

Likeness, or copying after Nature; his Pictures on the King's Side being

to a Man, all so many Heroes; on that of the Parliament so many

_Scoundrels_; which was impossible to be true: For, besides that it was

not in the Course, so it was not in the Nature of the Thing, that so

many heroical Persons should take Party for Oppression and Superstition,

and so many Blockheads and Poltrons espouse the Cause of Religion and

Liberty.

But I do not wonder that this Critick is so extreamly civil to the

Author of the _History of the Rebellion_. He censures _Milton_ for

drawing the Pictures of _Death_ and the _Devil_ with so much Deformity.

_Satan_, _Sin_, and _Death_, must needs _shock the Readers of a delicate

Taste_. As if it was possible for the Imagination to paint any Thing so

ugly as the Devil is in every One's Conception, and that the more

shocking such Painting is, it was not the more natural, as being the

more conformable to the Idea which every one has conceiv'd of the

Original. 'Tis true, the _Devil_ and _Death_ are not Subjects to touch

the _Delicacy_ of Readers, but are extreamly proper to move Horrour and

Detestation, which are there the Moral of that Divine Poem. If the

Scene of _Paradise_ was opening, the Reader might have expected

something to have touch'd his _Delicacy_; but when he came, as in

_Milton_, to the Gates of Hell _wide open_, he certainly should have

left his Delicacy behind him. _Hans Holben_'s Death's Dance is a merry

Piece, but was no more proper to admit of Delicacy than the Droll Pieces

of _Heemskirk_; and it would not be more extravagant to put Perfumes

among the Ingredients of a _Stink-Pot_, than to put Delicacy in a

Picture of the Devil. One of the most masterly Pieces of the greatest

Matter of the _Lombard_ School, a Carcass on a Butcher's Stall with the

Gutts and Garbage about it, was much admir'd by the _Italians_, whose

Delicacy is exemplary to other Nations; whence one may conclude, that

whatever Subject has Truth and Likeness in it according to Nature, or

our Conception of it, will always please, as an exact: and lively

Imitation. I shall take no more Notice of the Criticisms on _Milton_ in

this Place, nor perhaps in any other; but I can never read the Remarks

of the Criticks on the _Paradise Lost_, without calling to Mind the

Boast of King _Alphonso_, who criticising on the Form of the _Creation_,

said, _If he had been consulted in it, it should have been more

perfect._

_FINIS._

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