Foe to loud praife, and friend to learned cafe, Thank'd heaven that he had liv'd, and that he dy'd. The first couplet of this epitaph is borrowed from Crafhaw. The four next lines contain a fpecies of praise peculiar, original, and juft. Here, therefore, the infcription fhould have ended, the latter part containing nothing but what is common to every man who is wife and good. The character of Fenton was fo aimable, that I cannot forbear to wifh for fome poet or biographer to difplay it more fully for the advantage of pofterity. If he did not ftand in the first rank of genius, he may claim a place in the fecond; and, whatever criticifm may object to his writings, cenfure could find very little to blame in his life. XI. On Mr. GAY. In Weminfer-Abbey, 1732, Of mannets gentle, of affections mild; With native humour tempering virtuous rage, 1 Aa 155 As Gay was the favourite of our author, this epitaph was probably written with an uncommon degree of attention; yet it is not more fuccefsfully executed than the reft, for it will not always happen that the fuccefs of a poet is proportionate to his labour. The fame obfervation may be extended to all works of imagination, which are often influenced by caufes wholly out of the performer's power, by hints of which he perceives not the origin, by fudden elevations of mind which he cannot produce in himself, and which fometimes rife when he expects them least. The two parts of the first line are only echoes of each other; gentle manners and mild affections, if they mean any thing, muft mean the same. That Gay was a man in wit is a very frigid commendation; to have the wit of a man is not much for a poet. The wit of man, and the fimplicity of a child, make a poor and vulgar contrast, and raise no ideas of excellence, either intellectual or moral. In the next couplet rage is lefs properly introduced after the mention of mildness and gentleness, which are made the conftituents of his character; for a man fo mild and gentle to temper his rage, was not difficult. The next line is unharmonious in its found, and mean in its conception; the oppofition is obvious, and the word lafh ufed abfolutely, and without any modification, is grofs and improper. To be above temptation in poverty and free from corruption among the Great, is indeed fuch a peculiarity as deferved notice. But to be a fafe companion is praise merely negative, arifing not from the poffeffion of virtue, but the abfence of vice, and that one of the moft odious. As As little can be added to his character, by afferting that he was lamented in his end. Every man that dies is, at leaft by the writer of his epitaph, fuppofed to be lamented, and therefore this general lamentation does no honour to Gay. The first eight lines have no grammar; the adjectives are without any fubftantive, and the epithets without a fubject. The thought in the laft line, that Gay is buried in the bofoms of the worthy and the good, who are diftinguished only to lengthen the line, is fo dark that few understand it; and fo harfh, when it is explained, that ftill fewer approve. XII. Intended for Sir ISAAC NEWTON. ISAACUS NEWTONIUS: Hoc marmor fatetur. Nature, and Nature's laws, lay hid in night: Of this epitaph, fhort as it is, the faults feem not to be very few. Why part fhould be Latin and part English, it is not eafy to difcover. In the Latin, the oppofition of Immortalis and Mortalis, is a mere found, or a mere quibble; he is not immortal in any fenfe contrary to that in which he is mortal. In the verfes the thought is obvious, and the words night and light are too nearly allied. XIII. On EDMUND Duke of BUCKINGHAM, who died in the If modeft youth, with cool reflection crown'd, This epitaph Mr. Warburton prefers to the reft, but I know not for what reafon. To crown with reflection is furely a mode of fpeech approaching to nonfenfe. Opening virtues blooming round, is fomething like tautology; the fix following lines are poor and profaick. Art is in another couplet ufed for arts, that a rhyme may be had to beart. The fix laft lines are the beft, but not excellent. The rest of his fepulchral performances hardly deserve the notice of criticifm. The contemptible Dialogue between HE and SHE fhould have been fuppreffed for the author's fake. In his laft epitaph on himfelf, in which he attempts to be jocular upon one of the few things that make wife men serious, he confounds the living man with the dead: Under Under this ftone, or under this fill, Or under this turf, &c. When a man is once buried, the queftion, under what he is buried, is eafily decided. He forgot that though he wrote the epitaph in a state of uncertainty, yet it could not be laid over him till his grave was made. Such is the folly of wit when it is ill employed. The world has but little new; even this wretchednefs feems to have been borrowed from the following tunelefs lines: Ludovici Areofti humantur offa Sub hoc marmore, vel fub hac humo, feu Quæ inferibi voluit fuo fepulchro Olim fiquod haberetis fepulchrum. Surely Ariofto did not venture to expect that his trifle would have ever had fuch an illuftrious imitator. PITT. |