thousand crowns a year (besides some considerable privileges) to the person who enjoys it. Our illustrious Corneille had not so much.

To conclude. Don't desire me to descend to particulars with regard to these English comedies, which I am so fond of applauding; nor to give you a single smart saying or humorous stroke from Wycherley or Congreve. We don't laugh in reading a translation. If you have a mind to understand the English comedy, the only way to do this will be for you to go to England, to spend three years in London, to make yourself master of the English tongue, and to frequent the playhouse every night. I receive but little pleasure from the perusal of Aristophanes and Plautus, and for this reason because I am neither a Greek nor a Roman. The delicacy of the humour, the allusion, the à propos-all these are lost to a foreigner.

But it is different with respect to tragedy, this treating only of exalted passions and heroical follies, which the antiquated errors of fable or history have made sacred. Edipus, Electra, and such-like characters, may with as much propriety be treated of by the Spaniards, the English, or us, as by the Greeks. But true comedy is the speaking picture of the follies and ridiculous foibles of a nation; so that he only is able to judge of the painting who is perfectly acquainted with the people it represents.

LETTER XX

ON SUCH OF THE NOBILITY AS CULTIVATE THE BELLES LETTRES

THERE once was a time in France when the polite arts were cultivated by persons of the highest rank in the state. The courtiers particularly were conversant in them, although indolence, a taste for trifles, and a passion for intrigue, were the divinities of the country. The Court methinks at this time seems to have given into a taste quite opposite to that of polite literature, but perhaps the mode of thinking may be revived in a little time. The French are of so flexible a disposition, may be moulded into such a

variety of shapes, that the monarch needs but command and he is immediately obeyed. The English generally think, and learning is had in greater honour among them than in our country-an advantage that results naturally from the form of their government. There are about eight hundred persons in England who have a right to speak in public, and to support the interest of the kingdom and near five or six thousand may in their turns aspire to the same honour. The whole nation set themselves up as judges over these, and every man has the liberty of publishing his thoughts with regard to public affairs, which shows that all the people in general are indispensably obliged to cultivate their understandings. In England the governments of Greece and Rome are the subject of every conversation, so that every man is under a necessity of perusing such authors as treat of them, how disagreeable soever it may be to him; and this study leads naturally to that of polite literature. Mankind in general speak well in their respective professions. What is the reason why our magistrates, our lawyers, our physicians, and a great number of the clergy, are abler scholars, have a finer taste, and more wit, than persons of all other professions? The reason is, because their condition of life requires a cultivated and enlightened mind, in the same manner as a merchant is obliged to be acquainted with his traffic. Not long since an English nobleman, who was very young, came to see me at Paris on his return from Italy. He had written a poetical description of that country, which, for delicacy and politeness, may vie with anything we meet with in the Earl of Rochester, or in our Chaulieu, our Sarrasin, or Chapelle. The translation I have given of it is so inexpressive of the strength and delicate humour of the original, that I am obliged seriously to ask pardon of the author and of all who understand English. However, as this is the only method I have to make his lordship's verses known, I shall here present you with them in our tongue :

"Qu'ay je donc vû dans l'Italie ?
Orgueil, astuce, et pauvreté,

Grands complimens, peu de bonté

Et beaucoup de ceremonie

"L'extravagante comedie
Que souvent l'Inquisition
Veut qu'on nomme religion
Mais qu'ici nous nommons folie.

"La Nature en vain bienfaisante
Veut enricher ses lieux charmans,
Des prêtres la main desolante
Etouffe ses plus beaux présens.

"Les monsignors, soy disant Grands,
Seuls dans leurs palais magnifiques
Y sont d'illustres faineants,
Sans argent, et sans domestiques.

66 Pour les petits, sans liberté,
Martyrs du joug qui les domine,
Ils ont fait vou de pauvreté,
Priant Dieu par oisiveté

Et toujours jeunant par famine.

"Ces beaux lieux du Pape benis
Semblent habitez par les diables;
Et les habitans miserables
Sont damnes dans le Paradis."

LETTER XXI

ON THE EARL OF ROCHESTER AND MR. WALLER

THE Earl of Rochester's name is universally known. Mr. de St. Evremont has made very frequent mention of him, but then he has represented this famous nobleman in no other light than as the man of pleasure, as one who was the idol of the fair; but, with regard to myself, I would willingly describe in him the man of genius, the great poet. Among other pieces which display the shining imagination his lordship only could boast, he wrote some satires on the same subjects as those our celebrated Boileau made choice of. I do not know any better method of improving the taste than to compare the productions of such great geniuses as have exercised their talent on the same subject. Boileau declaims as follows against human reason in his Satire on Man:"

Cependant à le voir plein de vapeurs légeres,
Soi-même se bercer de ses propres chimeres,
Lui seul de la nature est la baze et l'appui,
Et le dixieme ciel ne tourne que pour lui.
De tous les animaux il est ici le maître ;
Qui pourroit le nier, poursuis tu? Moi peut-être
Ce mâitre prétendu qui leur donne des loix,
Ce roi des animaux, combien a-t'il de rois?

"Yet, pleased with idle whimsies of his brain,
And puffed with pride, this haughty thing would fain
Be think himself the only stay and prop

That holds the mighty frame of Nature up.
The skies and stars his properties must seem,

This boasted monarch of the world who awes
The creatures here, and with his nod gives laws
This self-named king, who thus pretends to be
The lord of all, how many lords has he?"
OLDHAM, a little altered.

The Lord Rochester expresses himself, in his "Satire against Man," in pretty near the following manner. But I must first desire you always to remember that the versions I give you from the English poets are written with freedom and latitude, and that the restraint of our versification, and the delicacies of the French tongue, will not allow a translator to convey into it the licentious impetuosity and fire of the English numbers:

"Cet esprit que je hais, cet esprit plein d'erreur,
Ce n'est pas ma raison, c'est la tienne, docteur
C'est la raison frivôle, inquiete, orgueilleuse
Des sages animaux, rivale dédaigneuse,
Qui croit entr'eux et l'Ange, occuper le milieu,
Et pense être ici bas l'image de son Dieu.
Vil atôme imparfait, qui croit, doute, dispute
Rampe, s'élève, tombe, et nie encore sa chûte,
Qui nous dit je suis libre, en nous montrant ses fers,
Et dont l'œil trouble et faux, croit percer l'univers.
Allez, reverends fous, bienheureux fanatiques,

Compilez bien l'amas de vos riens scholastiques,
Pères de visions, et d'enigmes sacres,
Auteurs du labirinthe, où vous vous égarez.
Allez obscurement éclaircir vos mistères,
Et courez dans l'école adorer vos chimères.
Il est d'autres erreurs, il est de ces dévots
Condamné par eux mêmes à l'ennui du repos.
Ce mystique encloîtré, fier de son indolence

Tranquille, au sein de Dieu. Que peut il faire? Il pense.
Non, tu ne penses point, misérable, tu dors:
Inutile à la terre, et mis au rang des morts.

Ton esprit énervé croupit dans la molesse.

Reveille toi, sois homme, et sors de ton ivresse.

L'homme est né pour agir, et tu pretens penser?" &c.

The original runs thus:

"Hold mighty man, I cry all this we know,

And 'tis this very reason I despise,

This supernatural gift that makes a mite
Think he's the image of the Infinite;
Comparing his short life, void of all rest,
To the eternal and the ever blest.

This busy, puzzling stirrer up of doubt,
That frames deep mysteries, then finds them out,
Filling, with frantic crowds of thinking fools,
Those reverend bedlams, colleges, and schools;
Borne on whose wings each heavy sot can pierce
The limits of the boundless universe.

So charming ointments make an old witch fly,
And bear a crippled carcass through the sky.
'Tis this exalted power, whose business lies
In nonsense and impossibilities.

This made a whimsical philosopher

Before the spacious world his tub prefer;

And we have modern cloistered coxcombs, who
Retire to think, 'cause they have naught to do.
But thoughts are given for action's government,
Where action ceases, thought's impertinent."

Whether these ideas are true or false, it is certain they are expressed with an energy and fire which form the poet. I shall be very far from attempting to examine philosophically into these verses, to lay down the pencil, and take up the rule and compass on this occasion; my only design in this letter being to display the genius of the English poets, and therefore I shall continue in the same view.

The celebrated Mr. Waller has been very much talked