are by kind, I need neither praise nor incite your virtue. You are
acquainted with the Roman history, and know, without my information,
that patronage and clientship always descended from the fathers to
the sons, and that the same plebeian houses had recourse to the same
patrician line which had formerly protected them, and followed their
principles and fortunes to the last. So that I am your lordship's by
descent, and part of your inheritance. And the natural inclination
which I have to serve you, adds to your paternal right; for I was
wholly yours from the first moment when I had the happiness and honour
of being known to you. Be pleased therefore to accept the rudiments
of Virgil's poetry, coarsely translated, I confess, but which yet
retain some beauties of the author, which neither the barbarity of our
language, nor my unskilfulness, could so much sully, but that they
appear sometimes in the dim mirror which I hold before you. The subject
is not unsuitable to your youth, which allows you yet to love, and is
proper to your present scene of life. Rural recreations abroad, and
books at home, are the innocent pleasures of a man who is early wise,
and gives Fortune no more hold of him, than of necessity he must. It
is good, on some occasions, to think before-hand as little as we can;
to enjoy as much of the present as will not endanger our futurity; and
to provide ourselves of the virtuoso's saddle, which will be sure to
amble, when the world is upon the hardest trot. What I humbly offer to
your lordship, is of this nature. I wish it pleasant, and am sure it is
innocent. May you ever continue your esteem for Virgil, and not lessen
it for the faults of his translator; who is, with all manner of respect
and sense of gratitude,
My Lord,
Your Lordship's
Most humble and
Most obedient servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.
FOOTNOTES:
[282] This was the son of Lord Treasurer Clifford, a member of the
Cabal administration, to whom our author dedicated "Amboyna." See Vol.
V. p. 5. Hugh, Lord Clifford, died in 1730.
[283] Dryden alludes to his religion and politics. I presume, Hugh,
Lord Clifford, was a Catholic, like his father, and entertained the
hereditary attachment to the line of Stuart; thus falling within the
narrow choice to which Dryden was limited.
[284] The well-known patrons of Virgil. It is disputed, which had the
honour to present him to the emperor.
[285] One of the _Juvenilia_, or early poems, ascribed to Virgil.
[286] Manlius, contrary to the general orders of his father, Manlius
Torquatus, engaged and slew the general of the Latins: his father
caused his head to be struck off for disobedience.
[287] The author alludes to the Piscatoria of Sannazarius. They were
published, with some other pieces of modern Latin poetry, by Atterbury,
Bishop of Rochester, in 1684. I do not pretend to judge of the purity
of the style of Sannazarius, but surely the poetry is often beautiful.
I doubt if Dryden was acquainted with the poems of Phineas Fletcher,
whom honest Isaac Walton calls, "an excellent divine, and an excellent
angler, and the author of excellent Piscatory Eclogues." They contain
many passages fully equal to Spenser.
PREFACE
TO THE
PASTORALS,
WITH
A SHORT DEFENCE
OF
_VIRGIL_,
AGAINST SOME OF THE REFLECTIONS OF
MONSIEUR FONTENELLE.
BY WILLIAM WALSH, ESQ.
As the writings of greatest antiquity are in verse, so, of all sorts
of poetry, pastorals seem the most ancient; being formed upon the
model of the first innocence and simplicity, which the moderns, better
to dispense themselves from imitating, have wisely thought fit to
treat as fabulous, and impracticable. And yet they, by obeying the
unsophisticated dictates of nature, enjoyed the most valuable blessings
of life; a vigorous health of body, with a constant serenity and
freedom of mind; whilst we, with all our fanciful refinements, can
scarcely pass an autumn without some access of a fever, or a whole
day, not ruffled by some unquiet passion. He was not then looked upon
as a very old man, who reached to a greater number of years, than in
these times an ancient family can reasonably pretend to; and we know
the names of several, who saw and practised the world for a longer
space of time, than we can read the account of in any one entire body
of history. In short, they invented the most useful arts, pasturage,
tillage, geometry, writing, music, astronomy, &c. whilst the moderns,
like extravagant heirs made rich by their industry, ungratefully deride
the good old gentleman who left them the estate. It is not therefore to
be wondered at, that pastorals are fallen into disesteem, together with
that fashion of life, upon which they were grounded. And methinks I see
the reader already uneasy at this part of Virgil, counting the pages,
and posting to the "Æneïs:" so delightful an entertainment is the very
relation of public mischief and slaughter now become to mankind. And
yet Virgil passed a much different judgment on his own works: he valued
most this part, and his "Georgics," and depended upon them for his
reputation with posterity; but censures himself in one of his letters
to Augustus, for meddling with heroics, the invention of a degenerating
age. This is the reason that the rules of pastoral are so little known,
or studied. Aristotle, Horace, and the Essay of Poetry, take no notice
of it; and Monsieur Boileau, one of the most accurate of the moderns,
because he never loses the ancients out of his sight, bestows scarce
half a page on it.
It is the design therefore of the few following pages, to clear this
sort of writing from vulgar prejudices; to vindicate our author from
some unjust imputations; to look into some of the rules of this sort
of poetry, and enquire what sort of versification is most proper for
it; in which point we are so much inferior to the ancients, that this
consideration alone were enough to make some writers think as they
ought, that is meanly, of their own performances.
As all sorts of poetry consist in imitation, pastoral is the _imitation
of a Shepherd, considered under that character_. It is requisite
therefore to be a little informed of the condition and qualification of
these shepherds.
One of the ancients has observed truly, but satirically enough, that,
"Mankind is the measure of every thing." And thus, by a gradual
improvement of this mistake, we come to make our own age and country
the rule and standard of others, and ourselves at last the measure
of them all. We figure the ancient countrymen like our own, leading
a painful life in poverty and contempt, without wit, or courage, or
education. But men had quite different notions of these things, for the
first four thousand years of the world. Health and strength were then
in more esteem than the refinements of pleasure; and it was accounted
a great deal more honourable to till the ground, or keep a flock of
sheep, than to dissolve in wantonness and effeminating sloth.[288]
Hunting has now an idea of quality joined to it, and is become the
most important business in the life of a gentleman; anciently it
was quite otherways.[289] Mr Fleury has severely remarked, that
this extravagant passion for hunting is a strong proof of our Gothic
extraction, and shews an affinity of humour with the savage Americans.
The barbarous Franks and other Germans, (having neither corn nor
wine of their own growth,) when they passed the Rhine, and possessed
themselves of countries better cultivated, left the tillage of the
land to the old proprietors; and afterwards continued to hazard their
lives as freely for their diversion, as they had done before for their
necessary subsistence. The English gave this usage the sacred stamp of
fashion; and from hence it is that most of our terms of hunting are
French.[290] The reader will, I hope, give me his pardon for my freedom
on this subject, since an ill accident, occasioned by hunting, has
kept England in pain, these several months together, for one of the
best and greatest peers[291] which she has bred for some ages; no less
illustrious for civil virtues and learning, than his ancestors were for
all their victories in France.
But there are some prints still left of the ancient esteem for
husbandry, and their plain fashion of life, in many of our surnames,
and in the escutcheons of the most ancient families, even those of the
greatest kings, the roses, the lilies, the thistle, &c. It is generally
known, that one of the principal causes of the deposing of Mahomet the
Fourth, was, that he would not allot part of the day to some manual
labour, according to the law of Mahomet, and ancient practice of his
predecessors. He that reflects on this, will be the less surprised to
find that Charlemagne, eight hundred years ago, ordered his children to
be instructed in some profession; and, eight hundred years yet higher,
that Augustus wore no clothes but such as were made by the hands of the
empress and her daughters; and Olympias did the same for Alexander the
Great. Nor will he wonder, that the Romans, in great exigency, sent
for their dictator from the plough, whose whole estate was but of four
acres; too little a spot now for the orchard, or kitchen-garden, of a
private gentleman. It is commonly known, that the founders of three the
most renowned monarchies in the world were shepherds; and the subject
of husbandry has been adorned by the writings and labour of more than
twenty kings. It ought not therefore to be matter of surprise to a
modern writer, that kings, the shepherds of the people in Homer, laid
down their first rudiments in tending their mute subjects; nor that
the wealth of Ulysses consisted in flocks and herds, the intendants
over which were then in equal esteem with officers of state in latter
times. And therefore Eumæus is called #dios hyphorbos# in Homer; not so
much because Homer was a lover of a country life, to which he rather
seems averse, but by reason of the dignity and greatness of his trust,
and because he was the son of a king, stolen away, and sold by the
Phoenician pirates; which the ingenious Mr Cowley seems not to have
taken notice of. Nor will it seem strange, that the master of the horse
to king Latinus, in the ninth Æneïd, was found in the homely employment
of cleaving blocks, when news of the first skirmish betwixt the
Trojans and Latins was brought to him.
Being therefore of such quality, they cannot be supposed so very
ignorant and unpolished: the learning and good-breeding of the world
was then in the hands of such people. He who was chosen by the consent
of all parties to arbitrate so delicate an affair as, which was the
fairest of the three celebrated beauties of heaven--he who had the
address to debauch away Helen from her husband, her native country,
and from a crown--understood what the French call by the too soft name
of _galanterie_; he had accomplishments enough, how ill use soever he
made of them. It seems, therefore, that M. Fontenelle had not duly
considered the matter, when he reflected so severely upon Virgil, as
if he had not observed the laws of decency in his Pastorals, in making
shepherds speak to things beside their character, and above their
capacity. He stands amazed, that shepherds should thunder out, as he
expresses himself, the formation of the world, and that too according
to the system of Epicurus. "In truth," says he, page 176, "I cannot
tell what to make of this whole piece, (the sixth Pastoral.) I can
neither comprehend the design of the author, nor the connection of
the parts. First come the ideas of philosophy, and presently after
those incoherent fables, &c." To expose him yet more, he subjoins,
"It is Silenus himself who makes all this absurd discourse. Virgil
says indeed, that he had drank too much the day before; perhaps the
debauch hung in his head when he composed this poem," &c. Thus far M.
Fontenelle, who, to the disgrace of reason, as himself ingenuously
owns, first built his house, and then studied architecture; I mean,
first composed his Eclogues, and then studied the rules. In answer to
this, we may observe, first, that this very pastoral which he singles
out to triumph over, was recited by a famous player on the Roman
theatre, with marvellous applause; insomuch that Cicero, who had heard
part of it only, ordered the whole to be rehearsed, and, struck with
admiration of it, conferred then upon Virgil the glorious title of
_Magnæ spes altera Romæ._
Nor is it old Donatus only who relates this; we have the same
account from another very credible and ancient author; so that here
we have the judgment of Cicero, and the people of Rome, to confront
the single opinion of this adventurous critic. A man ought to be
well assured of his own abilities, before he attacks an author of
established reputation. If Mr Fontenelle had perused the fragments of
the Phoenician antiquity, traced the progress of learning through the
ancient Greek writers, or so much as consulted his learned countryman
Huetius, he would have found, (which falls out unluckily for him,)
that a Chaldæan shepherd discovered to the Egyptians and Greeks the
creation of the world. And what subject more fit for such a pastoral,
than that great affair which was first notified to the world by one
of that profession? Nor does it appear, (what he takes for granted,)
that Virgil describes the original of the world according to the
hypothesis of Epicurus. He was too well seen in antiquity to commit
such a gross mistake; there is not the least mention of _chance_ in
that whole passage, nor of the _clinamen principiorum_, so peculiar to
Epicurus's hypothesis. Virgil had not only more piety, but was of too
nice a judgment to introduce a god denying the power and providence of
the Deity, and singing a hymn to the atoms and blind chance. On the
contrary, his description agrees very well with that of Moses; and
the eloquent commentator Dacier, who is so confident that Horace had
perused the sacred history, might with greater reason have affirmed the
same thing of Virgil; for, besides that famous passage in the sixth
Æneïd, (by which this may be illustrated,) where the word _principio_
is used in the front of both by Moses and Virgil, and the seas are
first mentioned, and the _spiritus intus alit_, which might not
improbably, as M. Dacier would suggest, allude to the "_Spirit moving
upon the face of the waters_;" but, omitting this parallel place, the
successive formation of the world is evidently described in these words,
_Rerum paulatim sumere formas_:
And it is hardly possible to render more literally that verse of Moses,
"_Let the waters be gathered into one place, and let the dry land
appear_," than in this of Virgil,
_Jam durare solum, et discludere Nerea ponto._
After this, the formation of the sun is described, (exactly in the
Mosaical order,) and, next, the production of the first living
creatures, and that too in a small number, (still in the same method,)
_Rara per ignotos errent animalia montes._
And here the foresaid author would probably remark, that Virgil keeps
more exactly to the Mosaic system, than an ingenious writer, who will
by no means allow mountains to be coeval with the world. Thus much
will make it probable at least, that Virgil had Moses in his thoughts
rather than Epicurus, when he composed this poem. But it is further
remarkable, that this passage was taken from a song attributed to
Apollo, who himself, too, unluckily had been a shepherd; and he took
it from another yet more ancient, composed by the first inventor of
music, and at that time a shepherd too; and this is one of the noblest
fragments of Greek antiquity. And, because I cannot suppose the
ingenious M. Fontenelle one of their number, who pretend to censure
the Greeks, without being able to distinguish Greek from Ephesian
characters, I shall here set down the lines from which Virgil took this
passage, though none of the commentators have observed it:
#----eratê d' hoi hespeto phônê,
Krainôn athanatous te theous, kai gaian eremnên,
Hôs ta prôta genonto, kai hôs lache moiran hekastos#, &c.
Thus Linus too began his poem, as appears by a fragment of it preserved
by Diogenes Laertius; and the like may be instanced in Musæus himself;
so that our poet here, with great judgment, as always, follows the
ancient custom of beginning their more solemn songs with the creation,
and does it too most properly under the person of a shepherd. And thus
the first and best employment of poetry was, to compose hymns in honour
of the great Creator of the universe.
Few words will suffice to answer his other objections. He demands why
those several transformations are mentioned in that poem:--And is not
fable then the life and soul of poetry? Can himself assign a more
proper subject of pastoral than the _Saturnia regna_, the age and scene
of this kind of poetry? What theme more fit for the song of a god, or
to imprint religious awe, than the omnipotent power of transforming
the species of creatures at their pleasure? Their families lived in
groves, near the clear springs; and what better warning could be given
to the hopeful young shepherds, than that they should not gaze too much
into the liquid dangerous looking-glass, for fear of being stolen by
the water-nymphs, that is, falling and being drowned, as Hylas was?
Pasiphaë's monstrous passion for a bull is certainly a subject enough
fitted for bucolics. Can M. Fontenelle tax Silenus for fetching too far
the transformation of the sisters of Phaëton into trees, when perhaps
they sat at that very time under the hospitable shade of those alders
and poplars--or the metamorphosis of Philomela into that ravishing
bird, which makes the sweetest music of the groves? If he had looked
into the ancient Greek writers, or so much as consulted honest Servius,
he would have discovered, that, under the allegory of this drunkenness
of Silenus, the refinement and exaltation of men's minds by philosophy
was intended. But, if the author of these reflections can take such
flights in his wine, it is almost pity that drunkenness should be a
sin, or that he should ever want good store of burgundy and champaign.
But indeed he seems not to have ever drank out of Silenus's tankard,
when he composed either his Critique or Pastorals.
His censure on the fourth seems worse grounded than the other. It is
entitled, in some ancient manuscripts, the "History of the Renovation
of the World." He complains, that he "cannot understand what is meant
by those many figurative expressions:" but, if he had consulted the
younger Vossius's dissertation on this Pastoral, or read the excellent
oration of the emperor Constantine, made French by a good pen of their
own, he would have found there the plain interpretation of all those
figurative expressions; and, withal, very strong proofs of the truth
of the Christian religion; such as converted heathens, as Valerianus,
and others. And, upon account of this piece, the most learned of all
the Latin fathers calls Virgil a Christian, even before Christianity.
Cicero takes notice of it in his books of Divination; and Virgil
probably had put it in verse a considerable time before the edition of
his Pastorals. Nor does he appropriate it to Pollio, or his son, but
complimentally dates it from his consulship; and therefore some one,
who had not so kind thoughts of M. Fontenelle as I, would be inclined
to think him as bad a Catholic as critic in this place.
But, in respect to some books he has wrote since, I pass by a great
part of this, and shall only touch briefly some of the rules of this
sort of poem.
The first is, that an air of piety, upon all occasions, should be
maintained in the whole poem. This appears in all the ancient Greek
writers, as Homer, Hesiod, Aratus, &c. And Virgil is so exact in the
observation of it, not only in this work, but in his "Æneïs" too, that
a celebrated French writer taxes him for permitting Æneas to do nothing
without the assistance of some god. But by this it appears, at least,
that M. St Evremont is no Jansenist.
M. Fontenelle seems a little defective in this point: he brings in
a pair of shepherdesses disputing very warmly, whether _Victoria_
be a goddess or a woman. Her great condescension and compassion,
her affability and goodness, (none of the meanest attributes of the
divinity,) pass for convincing arguments, that she could not possibly
be a goddess.
_Les Déesses, toûjours fières et méprisantes,
Ne rassureroient point les bergères tremblantes
Par d'obligeans discours, des souris gracieux.
Mais tu l'as vu: cette auguste personne,
Qui vient de paroître en ces lieux,
Prend soin de rassurer au moment qu'elle étonne;
Sa bonté descendant sans peine jusqu' à nous._
In short, she has too many divine perfections to be a deity, and
therefore she is a mortal; which was the thing to be proved. It is
directly contrary to the practice of all ancient poets, as well as to
the rules of decency and religion, to make such odious preferences. I
am much surprised, therefore, that he should use such an argument as
this:
_Cloris, as-tu vu des déesses
Avoir un air si facile et si doux?_
Was not Aurora, and Venus, and Luna, and I know not how many more of
the heathen deities, too easy of access to Tithonus, to Anchises, and
to Endymion? Is there any thing more sparkish and better-humoured
than Venus's accosting her son in the deserts of Libya? or than the
behaviour of Pallas to Diomedes, one of the most perfect and admirable
pieces of all the Iliads; where she condescends to _raillé_ him so
agreeably; and, notwithstanding her severe virtue, and all the ensigns
of majesty with which she so terribly adorns herself, condescends to
ride with him in his chariot? But the Odysseys are full of greater
instances of condescension than this.
This brings to mind that famous passage of Lucan, in which he prefers
Cato to all the gods at once:
_Victrix causa diis placuit, sed victa Catoni_--
which Breboeuf has rendered so flatly, and which may be thus
paraphrased:
Heaven meanly with the conqueror did comply;
But Cato, rather than submit, would die.[292]
It is an unpardonable presumption in any sort of religion, to
compliment their princes at the expence of their deities.
But, letting that pass, this whole Eclogue is but a long paraphrase of
a trite verse in Virgil, and Homer;
_Nec vox hominem sonat: O Dea certe!_
So true is that remark of the admirable Earl of Roscommon, if applied
to the Romans, rather, I fear, than to the English, since his own death:
----one sterling line,
Drawn to French wire, would through whole pages shine.
Another rule is, that the characters should represent that ancient
innocence, and unpractised plainness, which was then in the world.
P. Rapin has gathered many instances of this out of Theocritus and
Virgil; and the reader can do it as well as himself. But M. Fontenelle
transgressed this rule, when he hid himself in the thicket to listen
to the private discourse of the two shepherdesses. This is not only
ill breeding at Versailles; the Arcadian shepherdesses themselves would
have set their dogs upon one for such an unpardonable piece of rudeness.
A third rule is, that there should be some _ordonnance_, some design,
or little plot, which may deserve the title of a pastoral scene. This
is everywhere observed by Virgil, and particularly remarkable in the
first Eclogue, the standard of all pastorals. A beautiful landscape
presents itself to your view; a shepherd, with his flock around him,
resting securely under a spreading beech, which furnished the first
food to our ancestors; another in a quite different situation of
mind and circumstances; the sun setting; the hospitality of the more
fortunate shepherd, &c. And here M. Fontenelle seems not a little
wanting.
A fourth rule, and of great importance in this delicate sort of
writing, is, that there be choice diversity of subjects; that the
Eclogue, like a beautiful prospect, should charm by its variety. Virgil
is admirable in this point, and far surpasses Theocritus, as he does
everywhere, when judgment and contrivance have the principal part. The
subject of the first Pastoral is hinted above.
The Second contains the love of Corydon for Alexis, and the seasonable
reproach he gives himself, that he left his vines half pruned, (which,
according to the Roman rituals, derived a curse upon the fruit that
grew upon it,) whilst he pursued an object undeserving his passion.
The Third, a sharp contention of two shepherds for the prize of poetry.
The Fourth contains the discourse of a shepherd comforting himself, in
a declining age, that a better was ensuing.