Translations and Imitations. ADVERTISEMENT. THE following Translations were selected from many others done by the Author in his youth; for the most part indeed but a sort of Exercises, while he was improving himself in the languages, and carried by his early bent to Poetry to perform them rather in verse than prose. Mr. Dryden's Fables came out by that time, which occasioned the Translations from Chaucer. They were first separately printed in Miscellanies by J. Tonson and B. Lintot, and afterwards collected in the quarto edition of 1717. The Imitations of English Authors, which are added to the end, were done as early, some of them at fourteen or fifteen years old; but having also got into Miscellanies, we have put them here together to complete this Juvenile volume. [Dryden's Fables were published in 1699, when Pope was only eleven years of age. The earliest of Pope's translations appears to have been that of the first book of Statius, part of which, as he states, was done when he was fourteen, but when republishing it he affixed to it the date 1703, when he was in his fifteenth year. We know also from his correspondence with Cromwell that about 140 lines of his translation of Statius were not added until 1709. Indeed, most of these dates are loosely given and are often contradictory of one another. That the young poet was not insensible to the faults of Statius-his vicious inflated style and want of nature-we learn from his correspondence. His fancy had been captivated by the bold figures and swelling numbers of the Roman poet; and Statius had another recommendation-he had been less poached upon by the crowd of translators and imitators who then filled the shelves of Tonson and Lintot. These gentlemen made Ovid chiefly their victim; and in Tonson's third Miscellany we find no less than six translations from Ovid's Love Elegies "done into English" by Henry Cromwell. Statius had, therefore, to a certain extent, the charm of novelty, though greatly inferior as a poet. "One cannot forbear reflecting," observes Warton, "on the short duration of a true taste in poetry among the Romans. From the time of Lucretius to that of Statius was no more than about 147 years; and, if I might venture to pronounce so rigorous a sentence, I would say that the Romans can boast of but eight poets who are unexceptionably excellent: namely, Terence, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, Phædrus. These only can be called legitimate models of just thinking and writing. Succeeding authors, as it happens in all countries, resolving to be original and new, and to avoid the imputation of copying, become distorted and unnatural. By endeavouring to open an unbeaten path they desert simplicity and truth; weary of common and obvious beauties they must needs hunt for remote and artificial decorations. Thus was it that the age of Demetrius Phalerus succeeded that of Demosthenes, and the false relish of Tiberius's court the chaste one of Augustus." The faults here enumerated by Warton are concentrated in the Thebaid of Statius; for his subject relating to funeral obsequies and games, so conspicuous in Homer and Virgil, he was compelled, in order to be original, to invent novel circumstances and adopt a different style.] THE FIRST BOOK OF STATIUS'S THEBAIS. TRANSLATED IN THE YEAR MDCCIII. ARGUMENT. EDIPUS, king of Thebes, having by mistake slain his father Laius, and married his mother Jocasta, put out his own eyes, and resigned his realm to his sons, Eteocles and Polynices. Being neglected by them, he makes his prayer to the fury Tisiphone, to sow debate betwixt the brothers. They agree at last to reign singly, each a year by turns, and the first lot is obtained by Eteocles. Jupiter, in a council of the gods, declares his resolution of punishing the Thebans, and Argives also, by means of a marriage betwixt Polynices and one of the daughters of Adrastus, king of Argos. Juno opposes, but to no effect; and Mercury is sent on a message to the Shades, to the ghost of Laius, who is to appear to Eteocles, and provoke him to break the agreement. Polynices in the mean time departs from Thebes by night, is overtaken by a storm, and arrives at Argos; where he meets with Tydeus, who had fled from Calydon, having killed his brother. Adrastus entertains them, having received an oracle from Apollo that his daughters should be married to a boar and a lion, which he understands to be meant of these strangers, by whom the hides of those beasts were worn, and who arrived at the time when he kept an annual feast in honour of that god. The rise of this solemnity he relates to his guests, the loves of Phoebus and Psamathe, and the story of Chorobus. He inquires and is made acquainted with their descent and quality: The sacrifice is renewed, and the book concludes with a hymn to Apollo. The translator hopes he need not apologise for his choice of this piece, which was made almost in his childhood. But finding the version better than he expected, he gave it some correction a few years afterwards. RATERNAL rage, the guilty Thebes' alarms, FRATER The alternate reign destroyed by impious arms, Demand our song; a sacred fury fires My ravish'd breast, and all the Muse inspires. O Goddess, say, shall I deduce my rhymes And Cadmus searching round the spacious sea? 5 10 Or how from joining stones the city sprung? Sprung from the rocks and plunged into the main. At Edipus-from his disasters trace 15 And fix, O Muse! the barrier of thy song 20 Nor yet attempt to stretch thy bolder wing, And mighty Cæsar's conquering eagles sing; How twice he tamed proud Ister's rapid flood, 25 25 While Dacian mountains stream'd with barbarous blood; Twice taught the Rhine beneath his laws to roll, In youthful arms to assert the cause of Jove. 30 And thou, great heir of all thy father's fame, What though the stars contract their heavenly space, 35 40 To part his throne and share his heaven with thee: O'er the wide earth, and o'er the watery main ; The time will come, when a diviner flame 45 50 And funeral flames, that parting wide in air 55 When Dirce's fountain blushed with Grecian blood, And Thetis, near Ismenos' swelling flood, Or how the youth with every grace adorn'd,1 Now wretched Edipus, deprived of sight, 60 65 70 In frightful views, and makes it day within; 75 Whose wounds, yet fresh, with bloody hands he strook, 80 "Ye gods! that o'er the gloomy regions reign, Where guilty spirits feel eternal pain; Thou, sable Styx! whose livid streams are roll'd Assist, if Edipus deserve thy care! If you received me from Jocasta's womb, And nursed the hope of mischiefs yet to come: If leaving Polybus, I took my way 85 To Cyrrha's temple, on that fatal day, 90 90 When by the son the trembling father died, Where the three roads the Phocian fields divide : 1 Parthenopeus. |