Command old words that long have flept, to wake, Words, that wife Bacon, or brave Raleigh spake; NOTES. Or the latter Author (who was in that point equally judicious and fagacious) very little to do, or next to nothing. "Some few of Dryden's revived words I have prefumed to continue; of which take the following inftances: as, gridéline, filamet, and carmine, (with reference to colours and mixture of colours,) eymar, eygre, trine, EYPHKA, paraclete, panoply, rood, dorp, eglantine, orifons, afpirations, &c. I mention this left any one should be angry with me, or pleased with me in particular places, where I discover neither boldness nor invention.-I owe also to Fenton the participle meander'd; and to Sir W. Davenant the Latinism of funeral ILICET. "As to compound-epithets, those ambitiofa ornamenta of modern poetry, Dryden has devised a few of them, with equal diffidence and caution; but thofe few are exquifitely beautiful. Mr. Pope seized on them as famíly diamonds, and added thereto an equal number, dug from his own mines, and heightened by his own polifhing. "Compound-epithets first came into their great vogue about the year 1598. Shakspeare and Ben Jonfon both ridiculed the oftentatious and immoderate use of them, in their prologues to Troilus and Creffida, and to Every Man in his Humour. By the abovenamed prologues it appears that bombaft grew fashionable about the fame æra. Now in both instances an affected taste is the fame as a falfe tafte. The author of Hieronimo (who, I may venture to affure the reader, was one John Smith*) first led up the dance. Then came the bold and self-sufficient translator of Du Bartas †, who broke down all the flood-gates of the true ftream of eloquence, (which formerly preserved the river clear, within due bounds, and full to its banks,) and, like the rat in the low country dikes, mifchievously or wantonly deluged the whole land. "Of innovated phrases and words, of words revived, of compound-epithets, &c. I may one day or other fay more, in a dif tinet Criticism on Dryden's Poetry. It fhall therefore only fuffice * John Smith writ also the Hector of Germany. to Vehemens et liquidus, puroque fimillimus amni, Levabit cultu, virtute carentia tollet: NOTES. Ludentis to observe here, that our two great poetical Masters never thought that the interpofition of an hyphen, without just grounds and reasons, made a compound-epithet. On the contrary, it was their opinion, (and to this opinion their practice was conformable,) that fuch union fhould only be made between TWO NOUNS, as patriot-king, ideot-laugh, &c. or between an ADJECTIVE and NOUN, or NOUN and ADJECTIVE, vice versa, or an ADJECTIVE and PARTICIPLE, as laughter-loving, cloud-compelling, rofy-fingered, &c. As alfo by an Adverb used as part of an ADJECTIVE, as you may fee in the words well-concocted, well-digefted, &c. But NEVER by a full real ADVERB and ADJECTIVE, as inly-pining, fadly-mufing, and, to make free with myself, (though I only did it by way of irony,) my expreffion of fimply-marry'd, Epithets, p. 163. of which fort of novelties modern poetry chiefly confifts. Nor fhould fuch compound-epithets be looked upon as the Poet's making; for they owe their existence to the compofitor of the prefs, and the intcrvention of an hyphen." Much of the fame analogy by which Dryden and Pope guided themselves, in the prefent cafe, may be seen in the purer Greek and Roman languages; but all the hyphens in the world (fuppofing hyphens had then been known) would not have truly joined together the dulce ridentem or dulce loquentem, of Horace. In a word, fome few precautions of the prefent kind are not unneceffary: English poetry begins to grow capricious, fantastical, and affectedly luxuriant; and these therefore (as Auguftus faid of Haterius) "Sufflaminari paululùm debet.” Horace, it is faid, gave but two new words, and Virgil only one, to the Latin tongue. Old words to wake, is taken from Bacon, to awake all antiquity. VER. 168. Brave Raleigh fpake;] The conclufion of his Hiftory of the World, is written with uncommon energy and elegance. Among other particulars, Aubrey, in his manuscript notes, re lates, Or bid the new be English, ages hence, (For Use will father what's begot by Sense,) 170 Pour the full tide of eloquence along, Serenely pure, and yet divinely strong, Rich with the treasures of each foreign tongue; 175 Then But fhow no mercy to an empty line: NOTES. lates, that he was accuftomed to fpeak, though fo great a mafter of style, in a broad Devonshire dialect. His voice was small. And he adds a remarkable anecdote, that, at a confultation held at Whitehall, among feveral confiderable perfonages, just after Queen Elizabeth's death, Raleigh declared his opinion, that it was the wifest way for them to keep the staff in their own hands, and fet up a commonwealth, and not to be fubject to a needy, beggarly nation. This fecret declaration of Raleigh was conveyed by one of the Cabal to King James, who never forgave Raleigh for uttering it. VER. 174. Prune the luxuriant, &c.] Our Poet, at fifteen, got acquainted with Walsh, whose candour and judgment he has celebrated in his Essay on Criticifm. Walth encouraged him greatly; and used to tell him, there was one road still open for diftinction, in which he might excel the rest of his countrymen; and that was correctness; in which the English poets had been remarkably defective. For though we have had feveral great geniufes, yet not one of them knew how to prune his luxuriancies. This therefore, as he had talents that seemed capable of things worthy to be improved, should be his principal ftudy. Our young Author followed his advice, till habit made correcting the moft agreeable, as well as useful, of all his poetical exercises: and the delight he took in it, produced the effect he speaks of, in the following lines: "Then polish all with so much life and ease, "You think 'tis nature, and a knack to pleafe." We are not commonly taught to expect this effect from correction; and it has been obferved oftener to produce a heavy stiffness; which, by another image, the Ancients called fmelling of the lamp. And without doubt, moft an end, this will be the confequence, when Ludentis fpeciem dabit, et torquebitur, ut qui NOTES. In when it is performed with pain, as it will be when it is discharged as a task. But when it becomes, by habit, an exercise of amusement, the judgment, lying no harder on the fancy than to direct its fallies, will preserve the life; and the fancy lightening the judgment, will produce the eafe here fpoken of. W. VER. 176. Then polifb all, &c.] M. Voltaire, fpeaking, as I remember, of Mr. Pope, fays," L'art d'être eloquent en vers eft de tous les arts le plus difficile et le plus rare. On trouvera mille Genies qui sçauront aranger un ouvrage, et le versifier d'une maniere commune; mais le traiter en vrai Poete, c'est un talent qui eft donné à trois ou quatre hommes fur la terre." W. We are informed by his ingenious Biographer, that it was not Gray's method to fketch his general defign in careless verse; he always finished as he proceeded; this, though it made his execution flow, made his compofitions more perfect. VER. 177. You think 'tis nature,] Inferior to the example Horace has here used for executing a difficulty with feeming ease, taken from a pantomime, who reprefents the rude and awkward and distorted geftures of a Cyclops, with apparent facility and grace, though thefe geftures cannot be performed without much real labour and previous difcipline. The cyclops of Euripides is alluded to; the only fatyric drama that has remained of the ancients. VER. 178. But cafe in writing, &c.] That fpecies of Writers, which Mr. Pope elsewhere calls "The mob of Gentlemen who wrote with ease," understood this quality of a poem to belong only to fuch as (a certain Wit fays) were eafily written; whereas our Poet supposes it to be the laft, and hardly attained perfection of a laboured work. But the Gentleman-writing, laughed at in the line above, and its oppofite, which he fometimes calls profe run mad, are the two Then polish all, with fo much life and ease, You think 'tis nature, and a knack to please: "But ease in writing flows from Art, not chance; If fuch the plague and pains to write by rule, NOTES. 181 185 Who, two extremes of that perfect ftyle, the idea of which he has here fo well defcribed from his own writings. As eafe was the mode of the laft age, which took Suckling for its pattern; fo the imitation of Milton has introduced a pompous hardness into the affected writings of the prefent. Which laft character, Quintilian describes very juftly, and accounts as well for its fuccefs,-" Evenit nonnunquam ut aliquid grande inveniat, qui femper quærit quod nimium eft; verum et raro evenit, et cætera vitia non penfat." I remember once on reading a poem of this kind with Mr. Pope, called Night Thoughts, where the Poet was always on the ftrain, and labouring for expreffion, he faid pleasantly: This is a strange man; he feems to think with the Apothecaries, that Album Grecum is better than an ordinary fool. He himself was never swelling or pompous and if ever he inclined to hardness, it was not from attempting to say a common thing with magnificence, but from including a great deal in a little room. W. In point of correctnefs, of perfpicuity of ftyle, and propriety of fentiment, there cannot be, on the whole, any comparison betwixt Pope and Young. But the ftrokes of the true fublime in the Night Thoughts, the fallies of wit in the Univerfal Paffion, and the ftrong character of Zanga in the Revenge, are fufficient to preferve Young from the contempt flung upon him in this note of Dr. Warburton. VER. 184. There liv'd in primo] Much of the grace and propriety of this ftory of the Madman at Argos is loft, by transferring the |