Si, Mimnermus uti cenfet, fine amore jocisque Nil est jucundum; vivas in amore jocisque. * Vive, vale. fi quid novisti rectius iftis, Çandidus imperti; fi non, his utere mecum. And SWIFT cry wisely, " Vive la Bagatelle!" The Man that loves and laughs, must sure do well. 130 *Adieu-if this advice appear the worst, E'en take the Counsel which I gave you first: Or better Precepts if you can impart, Why do, I'll follow them with all my heart. HE Reflections of THE Horace, and the Judgments past in his Epistle to Auguftus, seem'd so seasonable to the present Times, that I could not help applying them to the use of my own Country. The Author thought them confiderable enough to address them to his Prince; whom he paints with all the great and good qualities of a Monarch, upon whom the Romans depended for the Encrease of an absolute Empire. But to make the Poem entirely English, I was willing to add one or two of those which contribute to the Happiness of a Free People, Land are more consistent with the Welfare of our Neighbours. This Epistle will shew the learned World to have fallen into Two mistakes: one, that Augustus was a Patron of Poets in general; whereas he not only prohibited all but the Best Writers to name him, but recommended that Care even to the Civil Magistrate: Admonebat Praetores, ne paterentur Nomen Suum obfolefieri, etc. The other, that this Piece was only a general Discourse of Poetry; whereas it was an Apology for the Poets, in order to render Augustus more their Patron. Horace here pleads the Cause of his Cotemporaries, first against the Taste of the Town, whose humour it was to magnify the Authors of the preceding Age; secondly against the Court |