That Writer he felects, with aukward aim
His fenfe, at once, to mimic and to maim.
So Florio is a fop, with half a nose:
So fat Weft Indian Planters drefs at Beaux.
Thus, gay Petronius was a Dutchman's choice,
And Horace, ftrange to say, tun'd Bentley's voice.
Horace, whom all the Graces taught to please,
Mix'd mirth with morals, eloquence with ease;
His genius focial, as his judgement clear;
When frolic, prudent; fmiling when severe;
Secure, each temper, and each taste to hit,
His was the curious happiness of wit.
Skill'd in that nobleft Science, How to live;
Which Learning may direct, but Heaven must give:
Grave with Agrippa, with Mæcenas gay;
Among the Fair, but just as wife as they :
First in the friendships of the Great enroll'd,
The St. Johns, Boyles, and Lytteltons, of old.
While Bentley, long to wrangling schools confin'd,
And, but by books, acquainted with mankind,
Dares, in the fulness of the pedant's pride,
Rhyme, though no genius; though no judge, decide.
Yet he, prime pattern of the captious art,
Out-tibbalding poor Tibbald, tops his part:
Holds high the fcourge o'er each fam'd author's head;
Nor are their graves a refuge for the dead.
To Milton lending fenfe, to Horace wit,
He makes them write what never Poet writ:
The Roman Mufe arraigns his mangling pen;
And Paradise, by him, is loft again.
Such was his doom impos'd by heaven's decree,
With ears that hear not, eyes that shall not fee,
The low to fwell, to level the fublime,
To blast all beauty, and beprose all rhyme.
Great eldeft-born of Dulness, blind and bold!
Tyrant! more cruel than Procruftes old;
Who, to his iron-bed, by torture, fits,
Their nobler part, the fouls of fuffering Wits.
Such is the Man, who heaps his head with bays,
And calls on human kind to found his praife,
For points tranfplac'd with curious want of skill, 155 For flatten'd founds, and fenfe amended ill.
So wife Caligula, in days of yore,
His helmet fill'd with pebbles on the shore,
Swore he had rifled ocean's richeft fpoils,
And claim'd a trophy for his martial toils.
Yet be his merits, with his faults, confeft:
Fair-dealing, as the plaineft, is the best.
V. 144. This fagacious Scholiaft is pleased to create an imaginary editor of Milton; who, he says, by his blunders, interpolations, and vile alterations, loft Paradife a fecond time. This is a poftulatum which furely none of his readers can have the heart to deny him; because otherwife he would have wanted a fair opportunity of calling Milton himself, in the perion of this phantom, fool, ignorant, ideot, and the like critical compellations, which he plentifully beftows on him. But, though he had no taite in poetry, he was otherwife a man of very confiderable abilities, and of great crudition.
Long lay the Critic's work, with trifles stor'd,
Admir'd in Latin, but in Greek ador'd.
Men, fo well read, who confidently wrote,
Their readers could have fworn, were men of note:
To pafs upon the croud for great or rare,
Aim not to make them knowing, make them stare.
For thefe blind votaries good Bentley griev'd,
Writ English notes-and mankind undeceiv'd:
In fuch clear light the ferious folly plac'd,
Ev'n thou, Browne Willis, thou may'st see the jest.
But what can cure our vanity of mind,
Deaf to reproof, and to discovery blind?
Let Crooke, a Brother-Scholiaft Shakespeare call, 175
Tibbald, to Hefiod-Cooke returns the ball.
So runs the circle ftill in this, we fee
The lackies of the Great and Learn'd agree.
If Britain's nobles mix in high debate,
Whence Europe, in fufpenfe, attends her fate;
In mimic feffion their grave footmen meet,
Reduce an army, or equip a fleet :
And, rivaling the critic's lofty ftile,
Mere Tom and Dick are Stanhope and Argyll.
Yet thofe, whom pride and dulness join to blind, 185
To narrow cares in narrow space confin'd,
Though with big titles each his fellow greets,
Are but to wits, as fcavengers to streets:
The humble black-guards of a Pope or Gay,
To brush off duft, and wipe their spots away.
Or, if pot trivial, harmful is their art;
Fume to the head, or poifon to the heart.
Where ancient Authors hint at things obfcene,
The Scholiaft speaks out broadly what they mean.
Disclosing each dark vice, well-loft to fame,
And adding fuel to redundant flame,
He, fober pimp to lechery, explains
What Caprea's Isle, or V *'s Alcove contains:
Why Paulus, for his fordid temper known,
Was lavish, to his father's wife alone:
Why thofe fond female vifits duly paid
To tuneful Incuba; and what her trade :
How modern love has made fo many martyrs,
And which keeps oftneft, Lady C *, or Chartres.
But who their various follies can explain?
The tale is infinite, the task were vain.
'Twere to read new-year odes in fearch of thought; To fum the libels Pryn or Withers wrote;
To guess, ere one epiftle saw the light,
How many dunces met, and club'd their mite;
To vouch for truth what Welfted prints of Pope,
Or from the brother-boobies fteal a trope.
That be the part of perfevering Waffe,
With pen of lead; or, Arnall, thine of brass;
V. 209. See a Poem published fome time ago under that title, faid to be the production of feveral ingenious and prolific heads; one contributing a fimilé, another a character, and a certain gentleman four fhrewd lines wholly made up of asterisks.
V. 213. See the Preface to his edition of Salluft; and read, if you are able, the Scholia of fixteen annotators by him collected, besides his own.
A text for Henley, or a glofs for Hearne,
Who loves to teach, what no man cares to learn.
How little, knowledge reaps from toils like thefe!
Too doubtful to direct, too poor to please.
Yet, Critics, would your tribe deferve a name,
And, fairly useful, rise to honest fame;
First, from the head, a load of lumber move,
And, from the volume, all yourselves approve :
For patch'd and pilfer'd fragments, give us fenfe,
Or learning, clear from learn'd impertinence,
Where moral meaning, or where tafte prefides,
And wit enlivens but what reafon guides:
Great without fwelling, without meannefs plain;
Serious, not filly; fportive, but not vain;
Un trifles flight, on things of ufe profound,
In quoting fober, and in judging found.
VERSES prefented to the Prince of ORANGE, on his vifiting OXFORD, in the Year 1734.
ECEIVE, lov'd prince, the tribute of our praise,
This hafty welcome, in unfinish'd lays.
At best, the pomp of song, the paint of art,
Difplay the genius, but not fpeak the heart;
And oft, as ornament muft truth supply,
Are but the fplendid colouring of a lye.
These need not here; for to a foul like thine,
Truth, plain and simple, will more lovely thine.
|