EPILOGUE TO THE SATIRE S. WRITTEN IN MDCCXXXVIII. DIALOGUE II. FR. 'Tis all a Libel-Paxton (Sir) will fay. it may; And for that very cause I print to-day. How NOTES. VER. 1. 'Tis all a Libel] The King of Pruffia obferving from his window, a mob affembled to read a paper fixed on a wall, ordered one of his pages to fee what it contained, who informed him that it was a vile and fevere invective against his Majefty. "Take it down, faid the King, and place it lower on the wall, that it may be more easily and more universally read."—" Rien ne raccourcit plus des grands hommes," fays Montefquieu, "que l' attention qu'ils donnent à de certaines procedés perfonels. J'en connois deux, qui ont été abfolument infenfibles, Cæfar & le Duc d' Orleans regent." The liberty of the Prefs was about this time thought to be in danger; and Milton's noble and nervous difcourfe on this subject, intitled, Areopagitica, was reprinted in an octavo pamphlet, with a preface written by Thomfon, the poet." If we think to regulate printing," fays Milton, "thereby to rectify manners, we must regulate all recreations and pastimes, all that is delightful to man. No mufic must be heard, no fong be fet or fung, but what is grave and Doric.—He who is made judge to fit upon the birth or -death, VOL. IV. Y How should I fret to mangle ev'ry line, Vice with fuch Giant ftrides comes on amain, 5 F. Yet none but you by Name the guilty lafh; 10 Ev'n Guthry faves half Newgate by a Dash. Spare then the Person, and expose the Vice. P. How, Sir! not damn the Sharper, but the Dice? Come NOTES. death of books, whether they may be wafted into this world or not, had need to be a man above the common measure, both ftudious, learned, and judicious.”—“ It seems not more reasonable," fays Johnson, "to leave the right of printing unreftrained, because writers may be afterwards cenfured, than it would be to fleep with doors unbolted, because by our laws we can hang a thief." To which Mr. Hayley answers, "To suffer no book to be published without a licence, is tyranny as abfurd, as it would be to fuffer no traveller to pass along the highway, without producing a certificate that he is not a robber." VER. 1. Paxton] Late folicitor to the Treasury. W. VER. 8. Feign what I will, &c.] The Poet has here introduced an oblique apology for himself with great art. You attack perfonal characters, fay his enemies. No, replies he, I paint merely from my invention; and then, to prevent a likeness, I aggravate the features. But alas! the growth of vice is fo monftrously fudden, that it rifes up to a resemblance before I can get from the prefs. W. VER. 11. Ev'n Guthry] The Ordinary of Newgate, who publifhes the Memoirs of the Malefactors, and is often prevailed upon to be fo tender of their reputation, as to fet down no more than the initials of their name. P. VER. 13. How, Sir! not damn the Sharper, but the Dice?] It is pity that the livelinefs of the reply cannot excufe the bad reasoning: The dice, though they rhyme to vice, can never stand for it; which Come on then, Satire! gen'ral, unconfin'd, 16 Ye Tradefmen, vile, in Army, Court, or Hall! 20 I never nam'd; the Town's enquiring yet. P. See, now I keep the Secret, and not you! NOTES. which his argument requires they should do. For dice are only the inftruments of fraud; but the question is not, whether the inftrument, but whether the ac committed by it, fhould be exposed, inftead of the perfon. W. VER. 21. The Town's enquiring yet.] So true is Swift's observation on personal satire; " I have long observed, that twenty miles from London nobody understands, hints, initial letters, or townfacts and paffages; and in a few years not even those who live in London." See verfe 238 below, for two afterisks, not filled up or known. A mortifying reflection to the writers of fatire, and daily topics of cenfure! VER. 22. F. You mean-P. I don't.] The fame friend is here again introduced making fuch remonftrances as before. And feveral parts of the dialogue here are more rapid and short, and approach nearer to common converfation than any lines he had ever before written; and are examples of that ftyle mentioned by Horace, Must great Offenders, once escap'd the Crown, F. A Dean, Sir? No: his Fortune is not made, You hurt a man that's rifing in the Trade. 30 35 P. If not the Tradefman who fet up to-day, Much lefs the 'Prentice who to-morrow may. Down, down, proud Satire! though a realm be fpoil'd, Arraign no mightier Thief than wretched Wild, Or, NOTES. VER. 29. Like Royal Harts, &c.] Alluding to the old Game laws; when our Kings spent all the time they could fpare from human flaughter, in Woods and Forefts. W. VER. 31. As beafts of Nature may we hunt the Squires?] The expreffion is rough, like the subject, but without reflection: For if beafts of Nature, then not beafts of their own making; a fault too frequently objected to country Squires. However, the Latin is nobler; Fera natura, Things uncivilized and free. Fera, as the Critics fay, being from the Hebrew, Pere, Afinus filveftris. SCRIBL. W. VER. 35. You hurt a man] In a former Edition there was the following note on this line: "For as the reasonable De la Bruyere obferves, Qui ne fait être un Erafme, doit penser à être Eveque." Dr. Warburton omitted it after he got a feat on the Bench. VER. 35. Rising in the Trade.] This was as offensive to some ambitious Ecclefiaftics, as was the late propofal to put a stop to tranflations of Bishops. VER. 39. Wretched Wild ;] Jonathan Wild, a famous Thief, and Thief-Impeacher, who was at laft caught in his own train, and hanged. P. |