SATIRE I. TO MR. FORTESCUE. P. THERE are, (I scarce can think it, but am told,), There are, to whom my Satire feems too bold: b a Scarce to wife Peter complaifant enough, And fomething faid of Chartres much too rough. The lines are weak, another's pleas'd to fay, Lord Fanny spins a thousand fuch a day. 'I come to Council learned in the Law: NOTES. 5 10 F. I'd fmall one to the mind of a reader-the pleasure of comparifon. He that has the leaft acquaintance with thefe pieces of Horace, which refemble the Old Comedy, immediately perceives, indeed, that our Author has affumed a higher tone, and frequently has deferted the free colloquial air, the infinuating Socratic manner of his original and that he clearly refembles in his ftyle, as he did in his natural temper, the fevere and serious Juvenal, more than the fmiling and sportive Horace. Let us felect fome paffages in which he may be thought to have equalled, excelled, or fallen fhort of the original; the latter of which cannot be deemed a difgrace to our Poet, or to any other writer, if we confider the extreme difficulty of transfufing into another language the subtle beauties of Horace's dignified familiarity, and the uncommon union of fo much facility and force. WARTON, VER. 10. Advice; and (as you use)] Horace, with much seeming feriousness, applies for advice to the celebrated Roman lawyer, C. Trebatius Tefta, an intimate friend of Julius Cæfar, and of Tully, Tranfnanto Tiberim, fomno quibus eft opus alto; NOTES. Aut, Tully, as appears from many of his epiftles to Atticus; the gravity and felf importance of whofe character is admirably fupported throughout this little drama. authoritative, and decifive. 66 His anfwers are short, Quiefcas, aio." And, as he was known to be a great drinker and fwimmer, his two abfurd pieces of advice have infinite pleasantry. All these circumftances of humour are dropt in the copy. The lettuce and cowflip-wine are infipid and unmeaning prefcriptions, and have nothing to do with Mr Fortefcue's character. The third, fourth, and ninth lines of this Imitation are flat and languid. We must also observe, from the old commentators, that the verbs tranfuanto and habento are in the very style of the Roman law; "Vide ut dire&is jurifconfultorum verbis utitur ad Trebatium jurifconfultum." There are many excellent remarks in Acro and Porphyrio: from whom, as well as from Cruquius, Dacier has borrowed much, without owning it. Dacier's tranflation of Horace is not equal to his Ariftotle's Poetics. In the former, he is perpetually ftriving to difcover new meanings in his author, which Boileau called, the Revelations of Dacier. 66 Cicero, as appears from many of his letters, had a great regard for this Trebatius, to whom he fays, fpeaking of his accompanying Cæfar in his expedition to Britain, "I hear there is neither filver nor gold in that island.” On which Middleton finely obferves, "From their railleries of this kind, on the barbarity and mifery of our ifland, one cannot help reflecting on the furprifing fate and revolutions of kingdoms; how Rome, once the miftrefs F. I'd write no more. P. Not write? but then I think, F. You could not do a worse thing for your life. Hartshorn, or fomething that fhall clofe your eyes. NOTES. 14 19 Or, of the world, the feat of arts, empire, and glory, now lies funk in floth, ignorance, and poverty; enslaved to the most cruel, as well as to the most contemptible of tyrants, fuperftition and reli gious impofture: while this remote country, antiently the jeft and contempt of the polite Romans, is become the happy feat of liberty, plenty, and letters; flourishing in all the arts and refinements of civil life; yet running, perhaps, the same course which Rome itself had run before it; from virtuous industry to wealth; from wealth to luxury; from luxury to an impatience of difcipline and corruption of morals; till, by a total degeneracy and lofs of virtue, being grown ripe for deftruction, it falls a prey at last to fome hardy oppreffor, and, with the lofs of liberty lofing every thing else that is valuable, finks gradually again into its original barbarifm." WARTON. VER. 11. Not write? &c.] He has omitted the most humor. ous part of the answer, Peream male, fi non Optimum erat: and has loft the grace, by not imitating the concifenefs, of verum nequeo dormire. For concifenefs, when it is clear, (as in this place,) gives the higheft grace to elegance of expreffion. But what follows is as much above the Original, as this falls fhort of it. WARBURTON. Aut, fi tantus amor fcribendi te rapit, aude CÆSARIS invecti res dicere," multa laborum Pramia laturus. H. Cupidum, pater optime, vires Deficiunt: neque enim quivis horrentia pilis Aut labentis equo defcribat vulnera Parthi. T. *Attamen et juftum poteras, et fcribere fortem ; Scipiadam ut fapiens Lucilius. VER. 23. What? like Sir Richard, &c.] Mr. Molyneux, a great Mathematician and Philofopher, had a high opinion of Sir Richard Blackmore's poetic vein. All our English poets, except Milton, (fays he, in a Letter to Mr. Locke,) have been mere balladmakers in comparison of him. And Mr. Locke, in answer to this obfervation, replies, I find, with pleasure, a frange harmony throughout, between your thoughts and mine. Juft fo, a Roman Lawyer, and a Greek Hiflorian, thought of the poetry of Cicero. But thefe being judgments made by men out of their own profeffion, are little regarded. And Pope and Juvenal will make Blackmore and Tully pass for Poetalters to the world's end. WARBURTON. Pope has turned the compliment to Auguftus into a fevere farcafm. All the wits feem to have leagued against Sir Richard Flackmore. In a letter now lying before me from Elijah Fenton to my father, dated Jan. 24, 1707, he fays, "I am glad to hear Mr. Phillips will publifh his Pomona: Who prints it? I fhall be mightily obliged to you if you could get me a copy of his verfes against Blackmore." As the letter contains one or two literary particulars, I will tranfcribe the reft. As" to what you write about making a collection, I can only advise you to buy what poems you can, that Tonfon has printed, except the Ode to the Sun; unless you will take it in, because I writ it; which I am freer to own, that Mat. Prior may not fuffer in his reputation by having it afcribed to him. My humble fervice to Mr. Sacheverell, and Or, if you needs muft write, write CESAR's Praife, With ARMS, and GEORGE, and BRUNSWICK Crowd the verse, Rend with tremendous found your ears afunder, 25 With Gun, Drum, Trumpet, Blunderbufs, and Thunder? Or nobly wild, with Budgel's fire and force, Paint Angels trembling round his falling Horse? k F. Then all your Mufe's fofter art display, NOTES. 30 P. Alas! and tell him, I will never imitate Milton more, till the author of Blenheim is forgotten." In vain was Blackmore extolled by Molyneux and Locke: but Locke, to his other fuperior talents, did not add good taste. He affected to defpife poetry, and he depreciated the antients: which circumftance, as I was informed by the late Mr. James Harris, his relation, was the fource of perpe. tual discontent and difpute betwixt him and his pupil Lord Shaftesbury; who, in many parts of his Characteristics, and Letters to a Clergyman, has ridiculed Locke's selfish philofophy, and has reprefented him as a difciple of Hobbes; from which writer it must in truth be confeffed that Locke borrowed frequently and largely. Locke had not the fine tafle of a greater philofopher, I mean Galileo, who wrote a comment on Ariofto full of juft criticism, and whose letter to Fr. Rinuccini on this fubject may be seen in Martinelli's Letters, p. 255. London, 1758. WARTON. VER. 28. falling Horfe?] The horse on which his Majefty charged at the battle of Oudenard; when the Pretender, and the Princes of the blood of France, fled before him. WARBURTON, |