27. Since that. Mr. Pope has imitated these verses al. 1 In deference to the above-mentioned criticism, most verbatim in his Windsor Forest: and I|I thought fit to leave out, vestigia cunctis indethought fit to transfer them bither, rather than prensa procis; for there lies all the confusion, expose my own weakness. I never was heartily 30. mortified before; I just know how to admire him and to despise myself! the reader inay be as Foot-race. v. 766. sured, I durst not presume to do this without | I must own, I think this foot-race an inimi must own. I think that gentleman's consent; who not only gave me table piece of poetry. The design itself is equal. leave to use his translation, but also to alter any | Jy as just; the circumstances perhaps are more circumstances that might not correspond with | beautiful than those upon the same subject the original. I remember a paper in the Guar in the Greek or Roman poet. Had Statius given dian that consists chiefly of parallel descriptions the prize to Idas, (than which nothing was more upon this occasion; and thither I refer the cu. easy) I cannot but think the moral would have rious. been highly defective. Yet Euryalus in Virgil Balde the Jesuit has some bold strokes in an wins the race by downright fraudulence. In the ode whose title I forgot, though 'tis written partly descriptive parts our author borrows nothing in imitation of the war-horse in Job. I mention considerable from either of the above cited this, purely to do justice to that poet's memory, poets. I wish he had taken one circumstance who (notwithstanding some extravagances) came from Homer, which pleases me much. It is the nearer to the spirit and abruptness of Pindar, passage where Ulysses follows Ajax : than any of his cotemporaries. ---αυλας οπιαθεν ΓΙχνια τύπ7ε πόδεοσι σάρος κόνιν αμφιχυθήναι. Earth opening seem'd to groan (a fatal sigo !) v. 600. - llis fue he pljes, Because Amphiaraus was afterwards to be ds to be And treads each footstep, e'er the dust can rise, swallowed under ground. See the latter end of 31. the seventh Thebaid : Thus in some storm the broken billows rise Illum ingens haurit specus, & transire parantes Round the vast rock- v. 909: Merget equos : non arma manu, non fræna 'Tis with great judgment the poet introduces remisit Sicut erat, rectos defert in Tartara currus: this simile, which admirably paints the size and Respexitque cadens cælum, campumque coire unmoveableness of Capaneus. I have endeaIngemuit voured to give it this turn, adding the epithet vast, to strengthen the idea. A translator can I take this to be one of the most noble des seldom do his author this justice, and I see no criptions I ever met with in any language. reasons against it, if the deviation exceeds not 28. one word. However, it is manifest the original alludes only to the noise, and sudden overflow. Loud shouts each chief that from high Elis ing of the waters. 'Tis impossible to give a more leads lively image of Alcidamas. Statius has comHis native train, &c. v. 639. prized himself also into a shorter pass than usual, I have open'd this passage a little, but with that the mind might not be too much suspended due respect to geography. See the fourth Theb. in the midst of so important an action. Besides, Resupina Elis, demissa Pisa. there is a particular beauty in the versification : 29. it seems to run by starts, short and violent : Lives there a warrior in the world of fame, Assilit, ut præceps cumulo salir unda, minaces Who never heard of Atalanta's name ? v. 649. In scopulos, & fracta redit The commentators are all mighty merry upon 32. these verses. It seems Statius has confounded the history of Atalanta (there being two of that The fight of the cæstus. v. 966. name) and takes the wife of Hippomenes for that I have taken notice in the foot-race, that of Pelops ; the famous racer in days of yore. Statius has varied from Virgil, with admirable This (say they) is a remarkable oversight, and he judgment. The same may be advanced here in very few of them can heartily forgive it. The respect to Homer, who in his fight of the cæsmatter is hardly worth debate: poets were never tus, rewards insolence and pride, instead of thought infallible. Whoever reads the critical! punishing them. There is an exact parity of discourse upon the Iliad, will find many errours character between Capaneus and Epëus: but even in Homer; though not so many as La not the same success. Motte fancied. Aristotle, Cicero, and Diony The boaster in this place meets with the most manifest disadvantage: a sius of Halicarnassus were seldom right in their quotations. Macrobius tells us, that Virgil ran great improvement of the moral. into many palpable mistakes, purely to disengage Upon the whole: it may be required I should attempt something like a comparison between himself from too much exactness, and to imitate Homer. Mons. la Mothe le Vayer has written the descriptions of this game in Homer, Virgil, and Statius. To speak my own sentiments, I an entire treatise upon this subject : and I think cannot bui prefer the latter, not only for its it worth reading, merely as a mortification for human vanity, greater variei y of incidents, but for the character of arrogance, which is wrought up to much more perfection : it was this they all la Nor breath'd its spirit to congenial skies. boured at. Capaneus is so far blinded with his F. 1029. own admiration, that he still fancies himself the conqueror: though the odds appeared visibly Or to congenial stars more literally, accordagainst him: so apt is pride to magnify. This ing to the philosopby of Pythagoras. The wickis superadded to the characters in Homer and ed, says Lactantius, were punished by their Virgil: and I think it a most natural improve-stars (ab ipsis astris, stellisque are his words) ; ment. the good enjoyed their light for ever. For a farther explication of this ancient doctrine, I 33. refer the reader to Servius and Ruæus's notes The mountain-cypress thus, that firmly stood upon the 227th line of Virgil's 4th Georgie, Sy. From age to age 5. 994. deris in numerum, &c. See also Plato in Originally; Timæo. 36. . So Hercules, who long had toild in vain, I have read in one of our modern critics, or in Heav'd huge Anthë us. v. 1040. some book of travels, that no cypresses grow I cannot bot admire this poble simile; besides upon the Alps. The author upon this takes oc- the parity of circumstances, the savage characcasion to fall foul upon an eminent Roman poet, ter of Antheus suits admirably well with the and wonders at his ignorance. It is no matter I brutal fury of Agylleus : nor is it a small comwhere I met with this remark, it not being of 1 pliment to little Tudeus, to compare him with much consequence: yet I thought fit to leave Hercules for strength. I fancy Spenser drew out Alpinus; and added a more indefinite the story of Maleger at large from this picture. epithet. I am the more inclined to think so, because in Since my writing this note, I chanc'd to read the combat of prince Arthur, and Pyrrhocles, Bernartius's comment apon Statius. He is he translates almost literally from Statins those much chagrined at this oversight. As a spe. verses that describe Agylleus after his fall: simen of his humanity and taste for criticism, I though it must be owned, he has interwoven 2 I shall transcribe his own words at length : “ At simile that much improves them : tigit ut videtur Papinius hic guttam è flumine Lethes. Nam in Alpibus nusquam cupressi : Nought booted it the Paypim then to strive, nisi forte speciem pro genere posuit, quod non But as a bittour in an eagle's claw, inepte affirmare possumus. That may not hope by fight to 'scape alive, Still hopes for death, with dread and trembling 34. So he now subject to the victor's law, awe : Not half so bloody: or with half such rage Did not once move, nor upwards cast his eye. Two mighty monarchs of the herd engage. 37. v. 1006. Here end the funeral games, which are put Statius seems to have copied this simile from off (as in Virgil) by a prodigy, foreboding that the combat of Hercules and Achelöus in the none of the seven captains should return, except ninth book of Ovid's Metamorphoses. I shall Adrastus: as that in Virgil foretold the burgpleasure the reader with them both. And first ing of the ships by the Trojan matrons. Ovid; To conclude, whosoever will read the origjual impartially, will find Statius to be a much better Non aliter vidi fortes concurrere tauros, poet than the world imagines. What the transCom pretium pugnæ, toto nitidissima saltu lation is, I know not: nor can the notes be exExpetitur conjux: spectant armenta,paventque traordinary, when no body has written any! Nescia quein tanti maneat victoria regni. thing tolerable before me. The reader may be Non sic ductores gemini gregis, horrida tauri lieve, or disbelieve them as he pleases; 1 deliver Bella movent: medio conjux stat candida prato conjectures, not doctrines. If my present verVictorem expectans; rumpunt obnixa surentes sion has the fortune to please, I may perhaps Pectora proceed farther: if not, I cannot but think my. self happy in reviving at least so fine a piece of The latter in my opinion is far more natural poetry. I have but just given the sketch of a than the former. There is a beautiful contrast, picture, it remains for others to deepen the or variation of mumbers, very tender and flowing, strokes, and finish the whole. Whoever can ил take such pains, will oblige me, as much as the medio coujux- &c. world, Which is somewhat faintly preserved in the translation. DIVINE POEMS. Spenserlas a simile something of this nature in the combat between the Red-cross knight and Sansfor, Lib. I. Canto 2. DEDICATION honour of receiving my education) these Divine Incredible to thought. There low'rs of oak Poeins are humbly dedicated by his Float o'er the surges; there enormous whales most obliged,. In awkward gainbols play, th' inferior fry These with observance due, when hunger calls Show'rs down his bounty with a copious hand. When God withholds his all-sustaining care, To dust, their former priociple, they tall. : Then thy prolific spirit forins anew Each undecaying species. Mighty God! [is, Awake my soul! in hallow'd raptures praise | How great, how good thy pow'r; that was, and 'Th'Almighty God, who in th' empyreal height And e'er shall be immutably the same! Majestic shines, too glorious to behold. Earth at thy look with reverential fear Methinks the broad expansion of the sky Er'n to the centre shakes: the mountains blaze O'erspreads thy throne: in air thy chambers Beneath thy touch. Hail awful pow'r of Heav'n, hang Eternal three and one! The slaves of vice Eternal, and unmov'd. Clouds rollid on clouds Is | Thy vengeance, like a sudden whirlwind's rage, Thy chariot form; in thund'rings wrapt and tires mngs wrapt and pres Sweeps from mankind. My Muse, thrice gloThou walk'st, incumbent on the wings of wind. rious task! Active as fames, all intellect, God forms While my blest eyes behold the cheerful Sun, Angels of essence pure, whose finer parts While life shall animate this inori al frame, Invisible, and half dissolv'd in light, [hand | In Heav'nly flights shall spread a bolder wing. Should fleet tbrough worlds of air. Th’Almighty And sing to Him, who gave her first to sing ! Fixt earth's eterual basis, and prescrib'd Its utmost limits to the raging main. Forth from their deeps a world of waters rose And delug'd earth. He spoke, the waves obey'd PSALM THE CUTII, In peace, subsiding to their ancient springs. PARAPHRASED. Part murmur headlong down the mountain's sides: Mortais, rejoice! with raptures introduce Part through the vales in slow mæanders play, Your grateful songs, and tell what inercies God As pleas'd, yet loth to leave the flow'ry scene. Deigus to bestow on man: but chiefly you Thither by instinct savage beasts repair The progeny of David, whom the Lord To slake their thirst. Along the margin trees Selected from each region of the globe Wave in the watry gleam, amid whose boughs Beneath the arctic or antarctic pole: The winged songsters chant their Maker's pow'r. Or where the purple Sun with orient beams God with prolific dews, and genial rain Strikes parallel on Earth, or prone descenis Impregnates tarth, then crowns the smiling fields T'illumine worlds beyond th' Hesperian main. With lively green: the vegetative juice With weary feet, and mournful eyes they Flows briskly through the trees; the purple grape pass'd Swells with nectareous wines t'inspire the soul. ul. Erroneous through the dreary waste of plains, With verdant fruits the clust'ring olive bends Iunmeas'rable: the broad expanse of Hear'n Whose spritely liquor smooths the shining face. Their canopy, the ground, of damp malign, On Lebanon the sacred cedar waves, Their bed nocturnal. Thus in wild despair And spiry fir-tree, where the stork conceals Anxious they sought some hospitable town. Her clam'rous young. The rocks bare,unadorn'd, In shame and bitterness of soul once more Have uses too: there goats in quest of food They recognized the Lord, and trembling cry'll Ilang pendulous in air, there rabbits form “ Have mercy on us!” he, the source of mercy, Their mazy cells—in constant course the Moon Kindly revisited his fav'rite race, Nocturnal sheds her kindly influence down, Consol'd their woes, and led the weary train Marks out the circling year, and rules the Through barren wilds to the long-promis'd land, tides. Then plac'd 'em there in peaceful habitations. In constant regularity the Sun Purples the rosy east, or leaves the skies. CHORUS. Then awful night o'er all the globe extends " that the sons of men in grateful songs, Her sable shades : the woods and deserts ring Wou'd praise th’ unbounded goodness of the With hideous yell, what time the lions roar Lord, And tear their prey; but when the glimm'ring Declare bis miracles, and laud his pow'r!" morn Dawns o'er the hills, their depredations cease He cheers the sad, and bids the famish'd soul And sacred silence reigns. The painful man Luxuriant feast till nature craves no more. Commences with the Sun his early toil, He often saves th'imprison'd wretch that lies With him retires to rest. O Pow'r supreme ! Tortur'd in iron chains, no more to see How wonderful thy works! the bounteous earth The cheerful light, or breathe the purer air. Pours from its fruitful surface plants and herbs (The due reward imperious mortals find, (pise Adapt for ev'ry use: its bowels hold When swell'd with earthly grandeur, they dese Rich veins of silver, and the golden ore. The Pow'r supreme) thus Jesse's sacred seed, • Unnumber'd wonders in the deeps appear, Elated with the nun, 'rous gifts of Heav'n, Slighted the giver: then the wrathful Lord Of arrogated greatness, without law Then raises from the dust the humble soul death TO MY SOUL. FROM CHAUCER. | Far from mankind, my weary soul, retire, Sated with luxury his stomach loaths Still follow truth, contentment still desire. Most palatable meats: with heavy pain Who climbs on high, at best his weakness shows, His eyes roll slowly; if he drops to rest, Who rolls in riches, all to fortune owes. He starts delirious, and still seems to see Read well thy self, and mark thy early ways, Horrible fiends, that tear bim from mankind. Vain is the Muse, and envy waits on praise. His flushing cheeks now glow like flames of fire : Now chill'd, he trembles with extremes of coid Wav'ring as winds the breath of fortune blows, That shoot, like darts of ice, through every vein. No pow'r can turn it, and no pray’rs compose. Ev'n then, when art was conquer'd, pray'rs Deep in some hermit's solitary cell Repose and ease and contemplation dwell. and vows Lenient of anger soon appeas'd the Lord, Let conscience guide thee in the days of need; Whose saving providence restor'd his health, Judge well thy own, and then thy neighbour's And snatch'd th' expiring from the jaws of death. deed. But mostly they who voyage o'er the deeps What Heav'n bestows with thankful eyes receive; Observe the works of God. Sudden, from high First ask thy heart, and then through faith beDown pours a rushing storm, more dreadful Slowly we wander o'er a toi some way, (lieve, made Shadows of life, and pilgrims of a day. By darkness: save what light the flashing waves “ Who wrestles in this world, receives a fall; Disclose. The vessel rides sublime in air Look up on high, and thank thy God for all!" High on the surging billows, or again Precipitous through yawning chasms descends. Hearl-thrilling plaints, and hands up-rear'd to Heav'n, AN ESSAY ON SATIRE: Speak well their anguish, and desire to live. PARTICULARLY ON THE DUNCIAD. Shock'd by each bursting wave that whirls 'em round, PRINTED 1730. CONTENTS. 1 1. The origin and use of satire. The excelThe silent deep, and wave their pendent sails. | lency of epic satire above others, as adding exThen ev'ry heart exults : joyous repose ample to precept, and animating by fable and Dismisses each terrific thought, when once sensible images. Epic satire compared with (At Heav'n's command) the weary vessel makes epic poem, and wherein they differ : of their Her long-expected haven.-" O that men extent, action, unities, episodes, and the nature Would praise th' unbounded goodness of the of their morals. Of parody: of the style, figures Lord, and wit, proper to this sort of poem, and the Declare his miracles, and laud his pow'r !" superior talents requisite to excel in it. To him onee more address your songs of praise II. The characters of the several authors of In ev'ry temple sacred to his name, satire. 1. The ancients; Homer, Simonides, Or where the rev'rend senators conven'd Archilochus, Aristophanes, Menippus, Ennius, In council sit. He turns the limpid streams, Lucilius, Varro, Horace, Persius, Petronius, And flow'ry meadows to a dreary waste. Juvenal, Lucian, the emperor Julian, 2. The Where corn bas grown, and fragrant roses fill'd moderns: Tassone, Coccaius, Rabelais, Reg'The skies with odoriferous sweets, he bids nier, Boileau, Dryden, Garth, Pope. The baleful aconite up-lift its head III. From the practice of all the best writers ('The curse of impious nations): and again and men in every age and nation, the moral jus. In lonely deserts at his bigh behests tice of satire in general, and of this sort in parSoft-purling rills in sportive mazes glide ticular, is vindicated. The necessity of it shown Mæander'd through the valleys: there he bids in this age more especially, and why bad wriThe hungry souls increase and multiply. [down ters are at present the most proper objects of His bounteous hand the while pours goodness satire. The true causes of bad writers. ChaIneffable, and guards their num'rous herds. racters of several sorts of them now abounding. Though thousands fall, his mercy still renews | Envious critics, furious pedants, secret libellers, The never-ending race.--When tyrants, proud obscene poetesses, advocates for corruption, men scoffers at religion, writers for deism, desitical | And similies, like meteors of the night, and Arian clergymen. Just give one flash of momentary light. Application of the whole discourse to the Dun | As thinking makes the soul, low things exprest ciad, conc'uding with an address to the author In high-rais'd terms, define a Dunciad best. of it. Books and the man, demand as much, or more, For here (eternal grief to Duns's soul, And B- sthin ghost) the part contains the To arm our lives with honesty severe, whole: To shake the wretch beyond the reach of law, Since in mock-epic none succeeds, but he, The moral must be clear and understood : And sanctify the virtues of the wise, But finer still, if negatively good : Old Satire rose from probity of mind, Blaspheming Capaneus obliquely shows The poblest ethics, to reform mankind. T'adore those gods Eneas fears and knows, As Cynthia's orb excels the gems of night, A fool's the hero : but the poets end Is to be candid, modest, and a friend. The charms of parody, like those of wit, It gives not things, but beings to our eyes, If well contrasted, never fail to bit; Life, substance, spirit animate the whole : One half in light, and one in darkness drest, Fiction and fable are the sense and soul. (For contraries oppos'd still shine the best.) The common dulness of mankind array'd When a cold pause half breaks the writer's heart, In pomp, here lives and breathes, a wond'rous By this, it warms, and brightens into art. maid: When rhet'ric glitcers with too pompous pride, The poet decks her with each unknown grace, By this, like Circe, 'tis undeify'd. Clears her dull brain, and brightens her dark So Berecynthia, while her offspring vie face. In homage to the mother of the sky, [flow'rs, See! father Chaos o'er his first-born nods, (Deck'd in rich robes of trees, and plants, and And mother Night, in majesty of gods. And crown'd illustrious with a hundred tow'rs) See Querno's throne, by hands pontific rise, O'er all Parnassus casts her eyes at once, And a fools' pandæmonium strike our eyes. And sees an hundred sons—and each a dunce. Ev'n what on Curl the public bounteous pours The language next: from hence new pleasure Is sublimated here to golden show'rs. springs: A Dunciad or a Lutrin is compleat, For styles are dignified as well as things. And one in action ; ludicrously great. Tho' sense subsists, distinct from phrase or sound, Each wheel rolls round in due degrees of force; Yet gravity conveys a surer wound. Ev'n episodes are needful, and of course: The chymic secret which your pains would find, Of course when things are virtually begun Breaks out, unsought for, in Cervantes' mind: E'er the first ends, the father and the son ! And Quixote's wildness, like that king's of old, Or else so needful, and exactly grac'd, Turns all he touches into pomp and gold, That nothing is ill-suited, or ill-plac'd. Yet in this pomp discretion must be had: True epic's a vast world, and this a small, Though grave, not stiff; though whimsical, not One has its proper beauties, and one all. mad: Like Cynthia, one in thirty days appears ; In works like these if fustain might appear, Like Saturn, one rolls round in thirty years. Mock-epics, Blackmore, would not cost thee There opens a wide tract, a length of floods, dear. A height of mountains, and a waste of woods: We grant, that Butler ravishes the heart, Here but one spot: nor leaf nor green depart | As Shakespeare soar'd beyond the reach of art; From rules; e'en Nature seems the child of Art. (For Nature form'd those poets without rules As unities in epic works appear, To fill the world with imitating fools.) So must they shine in full distinction here, What burlesque could, was by that genius done; Ev'n the warm Iliad moves with slower pow'rs; Yet faults it has, impossible to shun: That forty days demands, this forty hours. | Th' unchanging strain for want of grandeur cloys, Each other satire humbler arts has known, And gives too oft the horse-laugh mirth of boys: Content with meaner beauties, though its own: The short-legg'dverse,and double-gingling sound, Enough for that, if rugged in its course So quick surprise us, that our heads run round: The verse but rolls with vehemence and force; Yet in this work peculiar life presides, Or nicely pointed in th' Horatian way, And wit, for all the world to glean besides. Wounds keen, like Sirens mischievously gay. } Here pause, my Muse, too daring and too Here all has wit, yet must that wit be strong young, Beyond the turns of epigram or song. Nor rashly aim at precepts yet unsung.' The thought must rise, exactly from the vice, Can man the master of the Dunciad teach? Sudden, yet finish'd; clean, and yet concise, And these new bays what other hopes to reach? One harmony must first with last unite: 'Twere better judg'd, to study and explain As all true paintings have their place and light. Each ancient grace he copies not in vain; Transitions must be quick, and yet design'd, To trace thee, Satire, to thy utmost spring, Not made to fill, but just retain the mind i Thy form, thy changes, and thy authors sing. |