SATIRA PRIM A.

HORATIUS.

TREBATIUS.

HORATIUS.

SUNT quibus in Satira videar nimis acer, et ultra Legem tendere opus; 'fine nervis altera, quidquid

Compofui, pars effe putat, fimilefque meorum
Mille die verfus deduci poffe. Trebatî,

с

Quid faciam? præscribe.

NOTES.

T. Quief

VER. 1. There are,] "When I had a fever one winter in town," faid Pope to Mr. Spence, " that confined me to my room for five or fix days, Lord Bolingbroke came to see me, happened to take up a Horace that lay on the table, and, in turning it over, dipt on the firft fatire of the fecond book. He obferved how well that would fuit my cafe, if I were to imitate it in English. After he was gone, I read it over, tranflated it in a morning or two, and fent it to prefs in a week or fortnight after. And this was the occafion of my imitating fome other of the Satires and Epiftles.” "To how cafual a beginning," adds Spence, "we are obliged for the most delightful things in our language! When I was faying to him, that he had already imitated near a third part of Horace's fatires and epiftles, and how much it was to be wished that he would go on with them, he could not believe that he had gone fo far; but, upon computing it, it appeared to be above a third. He seemed on this not difinclined to carry it farther; but his laft illness was then growing upon him, and robbed us of him, and of all hopes of that kind, in a few months."

Tranfcribed from Spence's Anecdotes; 1754.

No parts of our Author's Works have been more admired than thofe Imitations. The aptnefs of the allufions, and the happinefs of many of the parallels, give a pleasure that is always no

P. THE

SATIRE I.

TO MR. FORTESCUE.

'HERE are, (I fcarce can think it, but am told,) There are, to whom my Satire seems too bold:

a

Scarce to wife Peter complaifant enough,

b

And fomething faid of Chartres much to rough.
The lines are weak, another's pleas'd to fay,
Lord Fanny fpins a thousand fuch a day.
Tim'rous by nature, of the Rich in awe,

I come to Council learned in the Law:
You'll give me, like a friend both fage and free,
Advice; and (as you use) without a Fee.

NOTES.

5

10

F. I'd

fmall one to the mind of a reader-the pleafure of comparison. He that has the least acquaintance with thefe pieces of Horace, which resemble the Old Comedy, immediately perceives, indeed, that our Author has affumed a higher tone, and frequently has deserted the free colloquial air, the infinuating Socratic manner of his original: and that he clearly resembles in his ftyle, as he did in his natural temper, the fevere and serious Juvenal more than the fmiling and fportive Horace. Let us select fome paffages in which he may be thought to have equalled, excelled, or fallen fhort of the original; the latter of which cannot be deemed a difgrace to our Poet, or to any other writer, if we confider the extreme difficulty of transfufing into another language the fubtle beauties of Horace's dignified familiarity, and the uncommon union of fo much facility and force.

VER. 10. Advice; and, as you use,] Horace, with much seem ing seriousness, applies for advice to the celebrated Roman lawyer C. Trebatius Tefta, an intimate friend of Julius Cæfar, and of

Tully

Omnino verfus ?

с

T. Quiefcas.

H. Ne faciam, inquis,

T. Aio.

H. Peream, male, fi non

Optimum erat: verum nequeo dormire.

T. Ter uncti

Tranfnanto, Tiberim, fomno quibus eft opus alto ; Irriguumve mero fub noctem corpus habento.

NOTES.

Auf,

Tully, as appears from many of his epiftles to Atticus; the gravity and felf-importance of whofe character is admirably fupported throughout this little drama. His anfwers are short, authoritative, and decifive. "Quiefcas, aio." And, as he was known to be a great drinker and swimmer, his two abfurd pieces of advice have infinite pleasantry. All these circumstances of humour are dropt in the copy. The lettuce and cowflip-wine are infipid and unmeaning prescriptions, and have nothing to do with Mr. Fortefcue's character. The third, fourth, and ninth lines of this Imitation are flat and languid. We must also observe, from the old commentators, that the verbs tranfnanto and habento are in the very style of the Roman law: "Vide ut directis jurifconfultorum verbis utitur ad Trebatium jurifconfultum."

There are many excellent remarks in Acro and Porphyrio; from whom, as well as from Cruquius, Dacier has borrowed much, without owning it. Dacier's translation of Horace is not equal to his Aristotle's Poetics. In the former, he is perpetually ftriving to discover new meanings in his author, which Boileau. called, The Revelations of Dacier.

Cicero, as appears from many of his letters, had a great regard for this Trebatius, to whom he says, fpeaking of his accompanying Cæfar in his expedition to Britain, "I hear there is neither filver nor gold in that ifland." On which Middleton finely obferves, "From their railleries of this kind, on the barbarity and mifery of our island, one cannot help reflecting on the surprising fate and revolutions of kingdoms: how Rome, once the mistress of the world, the feat of arts, empire, and glory, now lies funk

in

F. I'd write no more.

P. Not write? but then I think, And for my foul I cannot fleep a wink. I nod in company, I wake at night,

с

Fools rush into my head, and so I write.

14

F. You could not do a worse thing for your life. Why, if the nights feem tedious-take a Wife: 'Or rather truly, if your point be rest, Lettuce and cowflip wine; Probatum eft. But talk with Celfus, Celfus will advise

Hartshorn, or something that shall close your eyes.

NOTES.

19

Or,

in floth, ignorance, and poverty; enslaved to the most cruel, as well as to the moft contemptible of tyrants, fuperftition and religious impofture: while this remote country, antiently the jeft and contempt of the polite Romans, is become the happy feat of liberty, plenty, and letters; flourishing in all the arts and refinements of civil life; yet running, perhaps, the fame course which Rome itself had run before it; from virtuous industry to wealth; from wealth to luxury; from luxury to an impatience of difcipline and corruption of morals; till, by a total degeneracy and loss of virtue, being grown ripe for destruction, it falls a prey at last to fome hardy oppreffor, and, with the lofs of liberty lofing every thing else that is valuable, finks gradually again into its original barbarifm."

VER. II. Not write? &c.] He has omitted the most humorous part of the answer,

Peream male, fi non

Optimum erat:

and has loft the grace, by not imitating the conciseness, of

verum nequeo dormire.

For conciseness, when it is clear, (as in this place,) gives the higheft grace to elegance of expreffion.-But what follows is as much above the Original, as this falls fhort of it.

W.

VER. 12. Sleep a wink.] The rhyme conceals the vulgarity of the expreffion, sleep a wink. Rhyme has often this effect. But familiarity was perhaps intended.

h

Aut, fi tantus amor fcribendi te rapit, aude CÆSARIS invecti res dicere, multa laborum Pramia laturus.

H. Cupidum, pater optime, vires Deficiunt: neque enim quivis horrentia pilis Agmina, nec fracta pereuntes cufpide Gallos,

Aut labentis equo defcribat vulnera Parthi.

k

T. Attamen et justum poteras et fcribere fortem, Scipiadem ut fapiens Lucilius.

H. Haud mihi deero,

Cum res ipfa feret: 'nifi dextro tempore, Flacci

NOTES.

Verba

VER. 23. What? like Sir Richard, &c.] Mr. Molyneux, a great Mathematician and Philofopher, had a high opinion of Sir Richard Blackmore's poetic vein. All our English poets, except Milton, (fays he, in a Letter to Mr. Locke,) have been mere balladmakers in comparifon of him. And Mr. Locke, in anfwer to this obfervation, replies, I find, with pleafure, a frange harmony throughout, between your thoughts and mine. Juft fo, a Roman Lawyer, and a Greek Hiftorian, thought of the poetry of Cicero. But thefe being judgments made by men out of their own profeffion, are little regarded. And Pope and Juvenal will make Blackmore and Tully pass for Poetasters to the world's end.

W.

Pope has turned the compliment to Auguftus into a fevere farcafm. All the wits feem to have leagued againft Sir Richard Blackmore. In a letter now lying before me from Elijah Fenton to my father, dated Jan. 24, 1707, he says, "I am glad to hear Mr. Phillips will publish his Pomona : Who prints it? I shall be mightily obliged to you if you could get me a copy of his verses against Blackmore." As the letter contains one or two literary particulars, I will transcribe the rest. As "to what you write about making a collection, I can only advise you to buy what poems you can, that Tonfon has printed, except the Ode to the Sun; unless you will take it in, becaufe I writ it; which I am freer to own, that Mat. Prior may not fuffer in his reputation by having it afcribed to him. My humble fervice to Mr. Sacheverell,

and