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SATIRA PRIMA.

HORATIUS. TREBATIUS.

HORATIUS.

'SUNT quibus in Satirâ videar nimis acer, et ultra Legem tendere opus. Sine nervis altera, quid

quid

Composui, pars esse putat; similesque meorum Mille die versus deduci posse. Trebatî,

Quid faciam? præscribe.

NOTES.

с

Ver. 1. There are,] "When I had a fever one winter in town," said Pope to Mr. Spence, "that confined me to my room for five or six days, Lord Bolingbroke came to see me, happened to take up a Horace that lay on the table, and in turning it over, dipped on the first satire of the second book. He observed how well that would suit my case, if I were to imitate it in English. After he was gone, I read it over, translated it in a morning or two, and sent it to press in a week or a fortnight after. And this was the occasion of my imitating some other of the Satires and Epistles." "To how casual a beginning," adds Spence, "we are obliged for the most delightful things in our language! When I was saying to him that he had already imitated near a third part of Horace's satires and epistles, and how much it was to be wished that he would go on with them, he could not believe that he had gone so far; but, upon computing it, it appeared to be above a third. He seemed on this not disinclined to carry it farther; but his last illness was then growing upon him, and robbed us of him, and of all hopes of that kind, in a few months."

Transcribed from Spence's Anecdotes, 1754.

No parts of our author's works have been more admired than those Imitations. The aptness of the allusions, and the happiness of many of the parallels, give a pleasure that is always no

small

SATIRE I.

TO MR. FORTESCUE.

P.THERE
HERE are, (I scarce can think it, but am told),
*There are, to whom my satire seems too bold :
Scarce to wise Peter complaisant enough,

And something said of Chartres much too rough.

b

The lines are weak, another's pleased to say;

Lord Fanny spins a thousand such a day.
Timorous by nature, of the rich in awe,

I come to counsel learned in the law:

You'll give me, like a friend both sage and free, Advice; and (as you use) without a fee.

NOTES.

5

10

small one to the mind of a reader-the pleasure of comparison. He that has the least acquaintance with these pieces of Horace, which resemble the Old Comedy, immediately perceives, indeed, that our author has assumed a higher tone, and frequently has deserted the free colloquial air, the insinuating Socratic manner of his original and that he clearly resembles in his style, as he did in his natural temper, the severe and serious Juvenal, more than the smiling and sportive Horace. Let us select some passages in which he may be thought to have equalled, excelled, or fallen short of the original; the latter of which cannot be deemed a disgrace to our poet, or to any other writer, if we consider the extreme difficulty of transfusing into another language the subtle beauties of Horace's dignified familiarity, and the uncommon union of so much facility and force. Warton:

Ver. 10. Advice; and (as you use)] Horace, with much seeming seriousness, applies for advice to the celebrated Roman lawyer, C. Trebatius Testa, an intimate friend of Julius Cæsar and of Tully,

VOL. VI.

H

Omnino versus ?

T. Quiescas.

H. Ne faciam, inquis,

T. Aio.

H. Peream malè, si non

Optimum erat: verùm nequeo dormire.
T. 'Ter uncti

Transnanto Tiberim, somno quibus est opus alto;
Irriguumque mero sub noctem corpus habento.

NOTES.

Tully, as appears from many of his epistles to Atticus; the gravity and self-importance of whose character is admirably supported throughout this little drama. His answers are short, authoritative, and decisive. "Quiescas; aio." And, as he was known to be a great drinker and swimmer, his two absurd pieces of advice have infinite pleasantry. All these circumstances of humour are dropped in the copy. The lettuce and cowslip-wine are insipid and unmeaning prescriptions, and have nothing to do with Mr. Fortescue'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 transnanto and habento are in the very style of the Roman law: "Vide ut directis jurisconsultorum verbis utitur ad Trebatium jurisconsultum."

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 striving 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, speaking of his accompanying Cæsar in his expedition to Britain, "I hear there is neither silver nor gold in that island." On which Middleton finely observes, "From their railleries of this kind, on the barbarity and misery of our island, one cannot help reflecting on the surprizing fate and revolutions of kingdoms: how Rome, once the mistress

of

F. I'd write no more.

P. Not write? but then I think,
*And for my soul I cannot sleep a wink.
I nod in company, I wake at night,
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 seem tedious-take a wife : 'Or rather truly, if your point be rest,

20

Lettuce and cowslip wine; Probatum est.
But talk with Celsus; Celsus will advise
Hartshorn, or something that shall close your eyes.

NOTES.

of the world, the seat of arts, empire, and glory, now lies sunk in sloth, ignorance, and poverty; enslaved to the most cruel, as well as to the most contemptible of tyrants, superstition and religious imposture while this remote country, anciently the jest and contempt of the polite Romans, is become the happy seat of liberty, plenty, and letters; flourishing in all the arts and refinements of civil life; yet running, perhaps, the same course which Rome itself had run before it; from virtuous industry to wealth; from wealth to luxury; from luxury to an impatience of discipline 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 some hardy oppressor, and with the loss of liberty losing every thing else that is valuable, sinks gradually again into its original barbarism." Warton.

Ver. 11. Not write? &c.] He has omitted the most humorous part of the answer :

Peream malè, si non

Optimum erat:

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

verum nequeo dormire.

For conciseness, when it is clear, (as in this place,) gives the highest grace to elegance of expression. But what follows is as much above the original, as this falls short of it. Warburton.

Aut, si tantus amor scribendi te rapit, aude
CESARIS invicti res dicere, "multa laborum
Præmia laturus.

H. Cupidum, pater optime, vires
Deficiunt: neque enim quivis horrentia pilis
Agmina, nec fractâ pereuntes cuspide Gallos,
Aut labentis equo describat vulnera Parthi.
T. Attamen et justum poteras et scribere for-
tem;

Scipiadam ut sapiens Lucilius.

H. Haud mihi deero,

NOTES.

Ver. 23. What? like Sir Richard, &c.] Mr. Molyneux, a great mathematician and philosopher, had a high opinion of Sir Richard Blackmore's poetic vein. All our English poets, except Milton, (says he, in a letter to Mr. Locke,) have been mere ballad-makers in comparison of him. And Mr. Locke, in answer to this observation, replies: I find, with pleasure; a strange harmony throughout, between your thoughts and mine. Just so, a Roman lawyer, and a Greek historian, thought of the poetry of Cicero. But these being judgments made by men out of their own profession, are little regarded. And Pope and Juvenal will make Blackmore and Tully pass for poetasters to the world's end. Warburton.

Pope has turned the compliment to Augustus into a severe sarcasm. All the wits seem to have leagued against 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 Tonson has printed, except the Ode to the Sun; unless you will take it in, because I writ it; which I am freer to own, that Mat. Prior may not suffer in his reputation by having it ascribed to him. My humble service to Mr. Sacheverell,

and

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