tors: for Ovid only copied the Grecian fables; and moft of Chaucer's ftories were taken from his Italian contemporaries, or their predeceffors. Boccace's Decameron was first published; and from thence our Englishman has borrowed many of his Canterbury tales: yet that of Palamon and Arcite was written in all probability by fome Italian wit, in a former age; as I fhall prove hereafter: the tale of Grizild was the invention of Petrarch; by him fent to Boccace; from whom it came to Chaucer: Troilus and Creffida was alfo written by a Lombard author; but much amplified by our English translator, as well as beautified; the genius of our countrymen in general being rather to improve an invention, than to invent them felves; as is evident not only in our poetry, but in many of our manufactures. I find I have anticipated already, and taken up from Boccace before I come to him: but there is fo much less behind; and I am of the temper of moft kings, who love to be in debt; are all for present money, no matter how they pay it afterwards: befides, the nature of a preface is rambling; never wholly out of the way, nor in it. This I have learned from the practice of honeft Montaigne, and return at my pleasure to Ovid and Chaucer, of whom I have little more to fay. Both of them built on the inventions of other men; yet since Chaucer had something of his own, as The Wife of Bath's Tale, The Cock and the Fox, which I have tranflated, and fome others, I may juftly give our countryman the precedence in that part; fince I can remember nothing of Ovid which was wholly his.

:

Both of them understood the manners, under which name I comprehend the passions, and, in a larger sense, the defcriptions of perfons, and their very habits: for an example, I fee Baucis and Philemon as perfectly before me, as if fome ancient painter had drawn them; and all the pilgrims in the Canterbury tales, their humours, their features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had supped with them at the Tabard in Southwark yet even there too the figures in Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light: which though I have not time to prove; yet I appeal to the reader, and am sure he will clear me from partiality. The thoughts and words remain to be confidered in the comparison of the two poets; and I have faved myself one half of that labour, by owning that Ovid lived when the Roman tongue was in its meridian; Chaucer, in the dawning of our language: therefore that part of the comparison ftands not on an equal foot, any more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid; or of Chaucer and our prefent English. The words are given up as a poft not to be defended in our poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The thoughts remain to be confidered: and they are to be measured only by their propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from the perfons defcribed, on fuch and fuch occafions. The vulgar judges, which are nine parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and jingles wit, who fee Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether without them, will think me little lefs than mad, for preferring the Englishman to the Roman: yet, with

their leave, I must presume to say, that the things they admire, are not only glittering trifles, and fo far from being witty, that in a ferious poem they are nauseous, because they are unnatural. Would any man, who is ready to die for love, defcribe his paffion like Narciffus? Would he think of "inopem me copia fecit," and a dozen more of fuch expreffions, poured on the neck of one another, and fignifying all the fame thing? If this were wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor wretch was in the agony of death! This is just John Littlewit in Bartholemew Fair, who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his misery; a miserable conceit. On thefe occafions the poet fhould endeavour to raise pity: but, instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to laugh. Virgil never made use of fuch machines, when he was moving you to commiferate the death of Dido: he would not defroy what he was building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the purfuit of it: yet when he came to die, he made him think more reasonably: he repents not of his love, for that had altered his character; but acknowledges the injuftice of his proceedings, and refigns Emilia to PalaWhat would Ovid have done on this occafion? He would certainly have made Arcite witty on his death-bed. He had complained he was farther off from poffeffion, by being fo near, and a thousand fuch boyifms, which Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of the subject. They, who think otherwife, would by the fame reafon prefer Lucan and Ovid to Homer and Virgil, and Martial to all four of them.

mon.

As for the

turn

turn of words, in which Ovid particularly excels all poets; they are fometimes a fault, and fometimes a beauty, as they are ufed properly or improperly; but in ftrong paffions always to be fhunned, because paffions are ferious, and will admit no playing. The French have a high value for them; and I confefs, they are often what they call delicate, when they are introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more fimplicity, and followed nature more closely, than to use them. I have thus far, to the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge betwixt the parties in competition, not meddling with the defign nor the difpofition of it; becaufe the design was not their own ; and in the difpofing of it they were equal. It remains that I fay fomewhat of Chaucer in particular.

In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, fo I hold him in the fame degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, or the Romans Virgil: he is a perpetual fountain of good sense; learned in all sciences; and therefore speaks properly on all fubjects: as he knew what to fay, fo he knows alfo when to leave off; a continence which is practifed by few writers, and fcarcely by any of the ancients, excepting Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets is funk in his reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which came in his way; but fwept like a drag-net, great and small. There was plenty enough, but the dishes were ill-forted; whole pyramids of fweet-meats, for boys and women; but little of folid meat, for men : all this proceeded not from any want of knowledge,

but

but of judgment; neither did he want that in difcerning the beauties and faults of other poets; but only indulged himself in the luxury of writing; and perhaps. knew it was a fault, but hoped the reader would not find it. For this reason, though he must always be thought a great poet, he is no longer efteemed a good writer: and for ten impreffions, which his works have had in fo many fucceffive years, yet at prefent a hundred books are scarcely purchased once a twelvemonth :for, as my last lord Rochefter faid, though fomewhat profanely, Not being of God, he could not stand.

Chaucer followed nature every where; but was never fo bold to go beyond her: and there is a great difference of being Poeta and nimis Poeta, if we believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modeft behaviour and affectation. The verfe of Chaucer, I confefs, is not harmonious to us; but it is like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus commends, it was "auribus iftius tem"poris accommodata:" they who lived with him, and fome time after him, thought it mufical; and it continues fo even in our judgment, if compared with the Eumbers of Lidgate and Gower, his contemporaries : there is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect. It is true, I cannot go fo far as he who published the last edition of him; for he would make us believe the fault is in our ears, and that there were really ten fyllables in a verse where we find but nine: but this opinion is not worth confuting;. it is fo grofs and obvious an error, that common sense (which is a rule in every thing but matters of faith

and