Yet, in this
frugality
of your praises, there are some things which I
cannot omit, without detracting from your character.
cannot omit, without detracting from your character.
Dryden - Complete
Perhaps Dryden remembered Spenser's allegorical description of
the human figure and faculties:
"The frame thereof seemed partly circular,
And part triangular; O, work divine!
These two, the first and last, propitious are;
The one imperfect, mortal feminine,
The other immortal, perfect, masculine;
And 'twixt them both a quadrate was the base,
Proportioned equally by seven and nine;
Nine was the circle set in heaven's place;
All which compacted made a goodly diapase. "
_Fairy Queen_, Book II. canto ix. stanza 22.
]
[Footnote 97: St Cecilia is said to have invented the organ, though it
is not known when or how she came by this credit. Chaucer introduces her
as performing upon that instrument:
"And while that the organes maden melodie,
To God alone thus in her heart sung she. "
The descent of the angel we have already mentioned. She thus announces
this celestial attendant to her husband:
"I have an angel which that loveth me;
That with great love, wher so I wake or slepe,
Is ready aye my body for to kepe. "
_The Second Nonne's Tale. _
]
THE
TEARS OF AMYNTA,
FOR THE
DEATH OF DAMON.
A SONG.
I.
On a bank, beside a willow,
Heaven her covering, earth her pillow,
Sad Amynta sighed alone;
From the cheerless dawn of morning
Till the dews of night returning,
Singing thus, she made her moan:
Hope is banished,
Joys are vanished,
Damon, my beloved, is gone!
II.
Time, I dare thee to discover
Such a youth, and such a lover;
Oh, so true, so kind was he!
Damon was the pride of nature,
Charming in his every feature;
Damon lived alone for me:
Melting kisses,
Murmuring blisses;
Who so lived and loved as we!
III.
Never shall we curse the morning,
Never bless the night returning,
Sweet embraces to restore:
Never shall we both lie dying,
Nature failing, love supplying
All the joys he drained before.
Death, come end me,
To befriend me;
Love and Damon are no more.
A SONG.
I.
Sylvia, the fair, in the bloom of fifteen,
Felt an innocent warmth as she lay on the green;
She had heard of a pleasure, and something she guest
By the towzing, and tumbling, and touching her breast.
She saw the men eager, but was at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close;
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
II.
Ah! she cried, ah, for a languishing maid,
In a country of Christians, to die without aid!
Not a Whig, or a Tory, or Trimmer at least,
Or a Protestant parson, or Catholic priest,
To instruct a young virgin, that is at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close!
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
III.
Cupid, in shape of a swain, did appear,
He saw the sad wound, and in pity drew near;
Then showed her his arrow, and bid her not fear,
For the pain was no more than a maiden may bear.
When the balm was infused, she was not at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close;
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
THE LADY'S SONG.
_The obvious application of this song is to the banishment of King
James, and his beautiful consort Mary of Este. _
I.
A choir of bright beauties in spring did appear,
To chuse a May-lady to govern the year:
All the nymphs were in white, and the shepherds in green,
The garland was given, and Phyllis was queen;
But Phyllis refused it, and sighing did say,
I'll not wear a garland while Pan is away.
II.
While Pan and fair Syrinx are fled from our shore,
The Graces are banished, and Love is no more;
The soft god of pleasure, that warmed our desires,
Has broken his bow, and extinguished his fires,
And vows that himself and his mother will mourn,
Till Pan and fair Syrinx in triumph return.
III.
Forbear your addresses, and court us no more,
For we will perform what the deity swore:
But, if you dare think of deserving our charms,
Away with your sheep hooks, and take to your arms;
Then laurels and myrtles your brows shall adorn,
When Pan, and his son, and fair Syrinx, return.
A SONG.
I.
Fair, sweet, and young, receive a prize
Reserved for your victorious eyes:
From crowds, whom at your feet you see,
O pity, and distinguish me!
As I from thousand beauties more
Distinguish you, and only you adore.
II.
Your face for conquest was designed,
Your every motion charms my mind;
Angels, when you your silence break,
Forget their hymns, to hear you speak;
But when at once they hear and view,
Are loath to mount, and long to stay with you.
III.
No graces can your form improve,
But all are lost, unless you love;
While that sweet passion you disdain,
Your veil and beauty are in vain:
In pity then prevent my fate,
For after dying all reprieve's too late.
A SONG.
High state and honours to others impart,
But give me your heart;
That treasure, that treasure alone,
I beg for my own.
So gentle a love, so fervent a fire,
My soul does inspire;
That treasure, that treasure alone,
I beg for my own.
Your love let me crave;
Give me in possessing
So matchless a blessing;
That empire is all I would have.
Love's my petition,
All my ambition;
If e'er you discover
So faithful a lover,
So real a flame,
I'll die, I'll die,
So give up my game.
RONDELAY.
I.
Chloe found Amyntas lying,
All in tears, upon the plain,
Sighing to himself, and crying,
Wretched I, to love in vain!
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain.
II.
Sighing to himself, and crying,
Wretched I, to love in vain!
Ever scorning, and denying
To reward your faithful swain.
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain.
III.
Ever scorning, and denying
To reward your faithful swain. --
Chloe, laughing at his crying,
Told him, that he loved in vain.
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain,
IV.
Chloe, laughing at his crying,
Told him, that he loved in vain;
But, repenting, and complying,
When he kissed, she kissed again:
Kissed him up before his dying;
Kissed him up, and eased his pain.
A SONG.
I.
Go tell Amynta, gentle swain,
I would not die, nor dare complain:
Thy tuneful voice with numbers join,
Thy words will more prevail than mine.
To souls oppressed, and dumb with grief,
The gods ordain this kind relief,
That music should in sounds convey,
What dying lovers dare not say.
II.
A sigh or tear, perhaps, she'll give,
But love on pity cannot live.
Tell her that hearts for hearts were made,
And love with love is only paid.
Tell her my pains so fast increase,
That soon they will be past redress;
But, ah! the wretch that speechless lies,
Attends but death to close his eyes.
A SONG
TO A
FAIR YOUNG LADY,
GOING OUT OF THE TOWN IN THE SPRING.
I.
Ask not the cause, why sullen spring
So long delays her flowers to bear?
Why warbling birds forget to sing,
And winter storms invert the year?
Chloris is gone, and fate provides
To make it spring where she resides.
II.
Chloris is gone, the cruel fair;
She cast not back a pitying eye;
But left her lover in despair,
To sigh, to languish, and to die.
Ah, how can those fair eyes endure,
To give the wounds they will not cure!
III.
Great god of love, why hast thou made
A face that can all hearts command,
That all religions can invade,
And change the laws of every land?
Where thou hadst placed such power before,
Thou shouldst have made her mercy more.
IV.
When Chloris to the temple comes,
Adoring crowds before her fall;
She can restore the dead from tombs,
And every life but mine recal.
I only am, by love, designed
To be the victim for mankind.
ALEXANDER'S FEAST,
OR
THE POWER OF MUSIC;
AN ODE IN HONOUR OF ST CECILIA'S DAY.
_This celebrated Ode was written for the Saint's Festival in 1697,
when the following stewards officiated: Hugh Colvill, Esq. ; Capt.
Thomas Newman; Orlando Bridgeman, Esq. ; Theophilus Buller, Esq. ;
Leonard Wessell, Esq. ; Paris Slaughter, Esq. ; Jeremiah Clarke,
Gent. ; and Francis Rich, Gent. The merits of this unequalled
effusion of lyrical poetry, are fully discussed in the general
criticism. _
I.
'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won
By Philip's warlike son:
Aloft, in awful state,
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne.
His valiant peers were placed around;
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound:
(So should desert in arms be crowned. )
The lovely Thais, by his side,
Sate like a blooming eastern bride,
In flower of youth and beauty's pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
CHORUS.
_Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair. _
II.
Timotheus, placed on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touched the lyre:
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above,
(Such is the power of mighty love. )
A dragon's fiery form belied the god;
Sublime on radiant spheres he rode,
When he to fair Olympia pressed,
And while he sought her snowy breast;
Then, round her slender waist he curled,
And stamped an image of himself, a sovereign of the world. --
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound,
_A present deity! _ they shout around;
_A present deity! _ the vaulted roofs rebound.
With ravished ears,
The monarch hears;
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
CHORUS.
_With ravished ears,
The monarch hears;
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres. _
III.
The praise of Bacchus, then, the sweet musician sung;
Of Bacchus ever fair, and ever young.
The jolly god in triumph comes;
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums;
Flushed with a purple grace
He shews his honest face:
Now, give the hautboys breath; he comes, he comes.
Bacchus, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain;
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
CHORUS.
_Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldiers pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure after pain. _
IV.
Soothed with the sound, the king grew vain:
Fought all his battles o'er again;
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew the slain. --
The master saw the madness rise,
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And, while he heaven and earth defied,
Changed his hand, and checked his pride.
He chose a mournful muse,
Soft pity to infuse;
He sung Darius great and good,
By too severe a fate,
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen,
Fallen from his high estate,
And weltering in his blood:
Deserted, at his utmost need,
By those his former bounty fed;
On the bare earth exposed he lies,
With not a friend to close his eyes.
With downcast looks the joyless victor sate,
Revolving, in his altered soul,
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow.
CHORUS.
_Revolving, in his altered soul,
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow. _
V.
The mighty master smiled, to see
That love was in the next degree;
'Twas but a kindred-sound to move,
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures,
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures:
War, he sung, is toil and trouble;
Honour, but an empty bubble;
Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying:
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, O think it worth enjoying;
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,
Take the good the gods provide thee--
The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair,
Who caused his care,
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again;
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.
CHORUS.
_The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair,
Who caused his care,
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again;
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast. _
VI.
Now strike the golden lyre again;
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleep asunder,
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark! the horrid sound
Has raised up his head;
As awaked from the dead,
And amazed, he stares around.
Revenge, revenge! Timotheus cries,
See the furies arise;
See the snakes, that they rear,
How they hiss in their hair,
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a ghastly band,
Each a torch in his hand!
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain,
And, unburied, remain
Inglorious on the plain:
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.
Behold how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes,
And glittering temples of their hostile gods. --
The princes applaud, with a furious joy,
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy.
CHORUS.
_And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy. _
VII.
Thus, long ago,
Ere heaving bellows learned to blow,
While organs yet were mute,
Timotheus, to his breathing flute,
And sounding lyre,
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies,
She drew an angel down.
GRAND CHORUS.
_At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies,
She drew an angel down. _
VENI CREATOR SPIRITUS,
PARAPHRASED.
Creator spirit, by whose aid
The world's foundations first were laid,
Come visit every pious mind;
Come pour thy joys on human kind;
From sin and sorrow set us free,
And make thy temples worthy thee.
O source of uncreated light,
The Father's promised Paraclete!
Thrice holy fount, thrice holy fire,
Our hearts with heavenly love inspire;
Come, and thy sacred unction bring
To sanctify us, while we sing.
Plenteous of grace, descend from high,
Rich in thy seven-fold energy!
Thou strength of his Almighty hand,
Whose power does heaven and earth command.
Proceeding spirit, our defence, }
Who do'st the gifts of tongues dispense, }
And crown'st thy gift with eloquence. }
Refine and purge our earthly parts;
But, O, inflame and fire our hearts!
Our frailties help, our vice controul,
Submit the senses to the soul;
And, when rebellious they are grown,
Then lay thy hand, and hold them down.
Chace from our minds the infernal foe;
And peace, the fruit of love, bestow;
And, lest our feet should step astray,
Protect and guide us in the way.
Make us eternal truths receive,
And practise all that we believe;
Give us thyself, that we may see
The Father, and the Son, by thee.
Immortal honour, endless fame,
Attend the Almighty Father's name;
The Saviour Son be glorified,
Who for lost man's redemption died;
And equal adoration be,
Eternal Paraclete, to thee.
FABLES.
TALES FROM CHAUCER.
TO
HIS GRACE
THE
DUKE OF ORMOND. [98]
_Anno 1699. _
MY LORD,
Some estates are held, in England, by paying a fine at the change of
every lord. I have enjoyed the patronage of your family, from the time
of your excellent grandfather to this present day. I have dedicated the
translations of the "Lives of Plutarch" to the first duke;[99] and have
celebrated the memory of your heroic father. [100] Though I am very
short of the age of Nestor, yet I have lived to a third generation of
your house; and, by your grace's favour, am admitted still to hold from
you by the same tenure.
I am not vain enough to boast, that I have deserved the value of so
illustrious a line; but my fortune is the greater, that, for three
descents, they have been pleased to distinguish my poems from those of
other men, and have accordingly made me their peculiar care. May it be
permitted me to say, that as your grandfather and father were cherished
and adorned with honours by two successive monarchs, so I have been
esteemed and patronized by the grandfather, the father, and the son,
descended from one of the most ancient, most conspicuous, and most
deserving families in Europe.
It is true, that by delaying the payment of my last fine, when it was
due by your grace's accession to the titles and patrimonies of your
house, I may seem, in rigour of law, to have made a forfeiture of my
claim; yet my heart has always been devoted to your service; and since
you have been graciously pleased, by your permission of this address, to
accept the tender of my duty, it is not yet too late to lay these poems
at your feet.
The world is sensible, that you worthily succeed not only to the honours
of your ancestors, but also to their virtues. The long chain of
magnanimity, courage, easiness of access, and desire of doing good, even
to the prejudice of your fortune, is so far from being broken in your
grace, that the precious metal yet runs pure to the newest link of it;
which I will not call the last, because I hope and pray it may descend
to late posterity; and your flourishing youth, and that of your
excellent duchess, are happy omens of my wish.
It is observed by Livy, and by others, that some of the noblest Roman
families retained a resemblance of their ancestry, not only in their
shapes and features, but also in their manners, their qualities, and the
distinguishing characters of their minds. Some lines were noted for a
stern, rigid virtue; savage, haughty, parsimonious, and unpopular;
others were more sweet and affable, made of a more pliant paste, humble,
courteous, and obliging; studious of doing charitable offices, and
diffusive of the goods which they enjoyed. The last of these is the
proper and indelible character of your grace's family. God Almighty has
endued you with a softness, a beneficence, an attractive behaviour
winning on the hearts of others, and so sensible of their misery, that
the wounds of fortune seem not inflicted on them, but on yourself. [101]
You are so ready to redress, that you almost prevent their wishes, and
always exceed their expectations; as if what was yours was not your own,
and not given you to possess, but to bestow on wanting merit. But this
is a topic which I must cast in shades, lest I offend your modesty;
which is so far from being ostentatious of the good you do, that it
blushes even to have it known; and, therefore, I must leave you to the
satisfaction and testimony of your own conscience, which, though it be a
silent panegyric, is yet the best.
You are so easy of access, that Poplicola[102] was not more, whose doors
were opened on the outside to save the people even the common civility
of asking entrance; where all were equally admitted; where nothing that
was reasonable was denied; where misfortune was a powerful
recommendation; and where, I can scarce forbear saying, that want itself
was a powerful mediator, and was next to merit.
The history of Peru assures us, that their Incas, above all their
titles, esteemed that the highest, which called them _lovers of the
poor_;--a name more glorious than the Felix, Pius, and Augustus, of the
Roman emperors, which were epithets of flattery, deserved by few of
them; and not running in a blood like the perpetual gentleness, and
inherent goodness, of the Ormond family.
Gold, as it is the purest, so it is the softest and most ductile of all
metals. Iron, which is the hardest, gathers rust, corrodes itself, and
is, therefore, subject to corruption. It was never intended for coins
and medals, or to bear the faces and inscriptions of the great. Indeed,
it is fit for armour, to bear off insults, and preserve the wearer in
the day of battle; but, the danger once repelled, it is laid aside by
the brave, as a garment too rough for civil conversation; a necessary
guard in war, but too harsh and cumbersome in peace, and which keeps off
the embraces of a more humane life.
For this reason, my lord, though you have courage in an heroical degree,
yet I ascribe it to you but as your second attribute: mercy,
beneficence, and compassion, claim precedence, as they are first in the
divine nature. An intrepid courage, which is inherent in your grace, is
at best but a holiday-kind of virtue, to be seldom exercised, and never
but in cases of necessity; affability, mildness, tenderness, and a word,
which I would fain bring back to its original signification of virtue, I
mean good-nature, are of daily use. They are the bread of mankind, and
staff of life. Neither sighs, nor tears, nor groans, nor curses of the
vanquished, follow acts of compassion and of charity; but a sincere
pleasure, and serenity of mind, in him who performs an action of mercy,
which cannot suffer the misfortunes of another without redress, lest
they should bring a kind of contagion along with them, and pollute the
happiness which he enjoys.
Yet since the perverse tempers of mankind, since oppression on one side,
and ambition on the other, are sometimes the unavoidable occasions of
war, that courage, that magnanimity, and resolution, which is born with
you, cannot be too much commended: And here it grieves me that I am
scanted in the pleasure of dwelling on many of your actions; but
αιδεομαι Τρωας is an expression which Tully often uses,
when he would do what he dares not, and fears the censure of the Romans.
I have sometimes been forced to amplify on others; but here, where the
subject is so fruitful, that the harvest overcomes the reaper, I am
shortened by my chain, and can only see what is forbidden me to reach;
since it is not permitted me to commend you according to the extent of
my wishes, and much less is it in my power to make my commendations
equal to your merits.
Yet, in this frugality of your praises, there are some things which I
cannot omit, without detracting from your character. You have so formed
your own education, as enables you to pay the debt you owe your
country, or, more properly speaking, both your countries; because you
were born, I may almost say, in purple, at the castle of Dublin, when
your grandfather was lord-lieutenant, and have since been bred in the
court of England.
If this address had been in verse, I might have called you, as Claudian
calls Mercury, _Numen commune, gemino faciens commercia mundo_. The
better to satisfy this double obligation, you have early cultivated the
genius you have to arms, that when the service of Britain or Ireland
shall require your courage and your conduct, you may exert them both to
the benefit of either country. You began in the cabinet what you
afterwards practised in the camp; and thus both Lucullus and Cæsar (to
omit a crowd of shining Romans) formed themselves to the war, by the
study of history, and by the examples of the greatest captains, both of
Greece and Italy, before their time. I name those two commanders in
particular, because they were better read in chronicle than any of the
Roman leaders; and that Lucullus, in particular, having only the theory
of war from books, was thought fit, without practice, to be sent into
the field, against the most formidable enemy of Rome. Tully, indeed, was
called the learned consul in derision; but then he was not born a
soldier; his head was turned another way: when he read the tactics, he
was thinking on the bar, which was his field of battle. The knowledge of
warfare is thrown away on a general, who dares not make use of what he
knows. I commend it only in a man of courage and resolution; in him it
will direct his martial spirit, and teach him the way to the best
victories, which are those that are least bloody, and which, though
achieved by the hand, are managed by the head. Science distinguishes a
man of honour from one of those athletic brutes whom, undeservedly, we
call heroes. Cursed be the poet, who first honoured with that name a
mere Ajax, a man-killing idiot! The Ulysses of Ovid upbraids his
ignorance, that he understood not the shield for which he pleaded; there
was engraven on it plans of cities, and maps of countries, which Ajax
could not comprehend, but looked on them as stupidly as his
fellow-beast, the lion. But, on the other side, your grace has given
yourself the education of his rival; you have studied every spot of
ground in Flanders, which, for these ten years past, has been the scene
of battles, and of sieges. No wonder if you performed your part with
such applause, on a theatre which you understood so well.
If I designed this for a poetical encomium, it were easy to enlarge on
so copious a subject; but, confining myself to the severity of truth,
and to what is becoming me to say, I must not only pass over many
instances of your military skill, but also those of your assiduous
diligence in the war, and of your personal bravery, attended with an
ardent thirst of honour; a long train of generosity; profuseness of
doing good; a soul unsatisfied with all it has done, and an
unextinguished desire of doing more. But all this is matter for your own
historians; I am, as Virgil says, _Spatiis exclusus iniquis_.
Yet, not to be wholly silent of all your charities, I must stay a little
on one action, which preferred the relief of others to the consideration
of yourself. When, in the battle of Landen, your heat of courage (a
fault only pardonable to your youth) had transported you so far before
your friends, that they were unable to follow, much less to succour you;
when you were not only dangerously, but, in all appearance, mortally
wounded; when in that desperate condition you were made prisoner, and
carried to Namur, at that time in possession of the French;[103] then
it was, my lord, that you took a considerable part of what was remitted
to you of your own revenues, and, as a memorable instance of your heroic
charity, put it into the hands of Count Guiscard, who was governor of
the place, to be distributed among your fellow-prisoners. The French
commander, charmed with the greatness of your soul, accordingly
consigned it to the use for which it was intended by the donor; by which
means the lives of so many miserable men were saved, and a comfortable
provision made for their subsistence, who had otherwise perished, had
you not been the companion of their misfortune; or rather sent by
Providence, like another Joseph, to keep out famine from invading those,
whom, in humility, you called your brethren. How happy was it for those
poor creatures, that your grace was made their fellow-sufferer? And how
glorious for you, that you chose to want, rather than not relieve the
wants of others? The heathen poet, in commending the charity of Dido to
the Trojans, spoke like a Christian:
_Non ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco. _
All men, even those of a different interest, and contrary principles,
must praise this action as the most eminent for piety, not only in this
degenerate age, but almost in any of the former; when men were made _de
meliore luto_; when examples of charity were frequent, and when there
were in being,
----_Teucri pulcherrima proles,
Magnanimi heroes, nati melioribus annis. _
No envy can detract from this; it will shine in history, and, like
swans, grow whiter the longer it endures; and the name of Ormond will be
more celebrated in his captivity, than in his greatest triumphs.
But all actions of your grace are of a piece, as waters keep the tenor
of their fountains: your compassion is general, and has the same effect
as well on enemies as friends. It is so much in your nature to do good,
that your life is but one continued act of placing benefits on many; as
the sun is always carrying his light to some part or other of the world.
And were it not that your reason guides you where to give, I might
almost say, that you could not help bestowing more than is consisting
with the fortune of a private man, or with the will of any but an
Alexander.
What wonder is it then, that, being born for a blessing to mankind, your
supposed death in that engagement was so generally lamented through the
nation? The concernment for it was as universal as the loss; and though
the gratitude might be counterfeit in some, yet the tears of all were
real: where every man deplored his private part in that calamity, and
even those who had not tasted of your favours, yet built so much on the
fame of your beneficence, that they bemoaned the loss of their
expectations.
This brought the untimely death of your great father into fresh
remembrance,--as if the same decree had passed on two short successive
generations of the virtuous; and I repeated to myself the same verses
which I had formerly applied to him:
_Ostendunt terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultra
Esse sinent. _
But, to the joy not only of all good men, but mankind in general, the
unhappy omen took not place. You are still living, to enjoy the
blessings and applause of all the good you have performed, the prayers
of multitudes whom you have obliged, for your long prosperity, and that
your power of doing generous and charitable actions may be as extended
as your will; which is by none more zealously desired than by
Your Grace's most humble,
Most obliged, and
Most obedient servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 98: James, second Duke of Ormond, was eldest son of the
gallant Earl of Ossory, and grandson to the great Duke of Ormond, to
whose honours he succeeded in 1688. He was first married to Lady Anne
Hyde, daughter of Lawrence Earl of Rochester; and, upon her death, to
Lady Mary Somerset, second daughter of the Duke of Beaufort. The Duke of
Ormond was favoured by King William, but attained still higher power and
influence during the reign of Queen Anne, especially in her later years,
when he entered into all the views of her Tory administration. Upon the
accession of George I, he was impeached of high treason, and consulted
his safety by flying abroad. He died in Spain in 1746.
The tales which follow, with the various translations marked in the
preface, were first published in 1700 in one volume folio. ]
[Footnote 99: See Vol. XVII. p. 1. ]
[Footnote 100: See the passage in "Absalom and Achitophel," Vol. IX. p.
242. and the notes on that poem, pages 294-301. ]
[Footnote 101: This character of the unfortunate nobleman was not
exaggerated. When the impeachment against him was moved, Hutchinson,
Jekyll, and many others, gave a splendid testimony to his private
virtues. ]
[Footnote 102: P. Valerius Poplicola, the third Roman consul; the same
who caused the fasces, the emblems of consular dignity, to be lowered
before the common people. ]
[Footnote 103: In the bloody battle of Landen, fought on 29th July,
1693, the Duke of Ormond was in that brigade of English horse which King
William led in person to support his right wing of cavalry. The Duke
charged at the head of a squadron of Lumley's regiment, received several
wounds, and had his horse shot under him. He was about to be cut to
pieces, when he was rescued by a gentleman of the gardes-du-corps, and
made prisoner. King William lost the day, after exhibiting prodigies of
conduct and valour. ]
PREFACE
PREFIXED TO
THE FABLES.
It is with a poet, as with a man who designs to build, and is very
exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand; but, generally
speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short in the
expence he first intended. He alters his mind as the work proceeds, and
will have this or that convenience more, of which he had not thought
when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a house, where I
intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a certain nobleman,
who, beginning with a dog-kennel, never lived to finish the palace he
had contrived. [104]
From translating the First of Homer's "Iliads," (which I intended as an
essay to the whole work,) I proceeded to the translation of the Twelfth
Book of Ovid's "Metamorphoses," because it contains, among other things,
the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. Here I ought
in reason to have stopped; but the speeches of Ajax and Ulysses lying
next in my way, I could not balk them. When I had compassed them, I was
so taken with the former part of the Fifteenth Book, which is the
masterpiece of the whole "Metamorphoses," that I enjoined myself the
pleasing task of rendering it into English. And now I found, by the
number of my verses, that they began to swell into a little volume;
which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some beauties of my
author, in his former books: There occurred to me the "Hunting of the
Boar," "Cinyras and Myrrha," the good-natured story of "Baucis and
Philemon," with the rest, which I hope I have translated closely enough,
and given them the same turn of verse which they had in the
original;[105] and this I may say, without vanity, is not the talent of
every poet. He who has arrived the nearest to it, is the ingenious and
learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may properly
call it by that name, which was the former part of this concluding
century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourished in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who saw much farther into
the beauties of our numbers, than those who immediately followed them.
Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and Mr Waller of Fairfax; for we
have our lineal descents and clans as well as other families. Spenser
more than once insinuates, that the soul of Chaucer was transfused into
his body;[106] and that he was begotten by him two hundred years after
his decease. Milton has acknowledged to me, that Spenser was his
original; and many besides myself have heard our famous Waller own, that
he derived the harmony of his numbers from "Godfrey of Bulloigne," which
was turned into English by Mr Fairfax. [107]
But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it came into my
mind, that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things resembled him,
and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern author, as I
shall endeavour to prove when I compare them; and as I am, and always
have been, studious to promote the honour of my native country, so I
soon resolved to put their merits to the trial, by turning some of the
"Canterbury Tales" into our language, as it is now refined; for by this
means, both the poets being set in the same light, and dressed in the
same English habit, story to be compared with story, a certain judgment
may be made betwixt them by the reader, without obtruding my opinion on
him. Or, if I seem partial to my countryman and predecessor in the
laurel, the friends of antiquity are not few; and, besides many of the
learned, Ovid has almost all the beaux, and the whole fair sex, his
declared patrons. Perhaps I have assumed somewhat more to myself than
they allow me, because I have adventured to sum up the evidence; but the
readers are the jury, and their privilege remains entire, to decide
according to the merits of the cause; or, if they please, to bring it to
another hearing before some other court. In the mean time, to follow the
thread of my discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr Hobbes, have
always some connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace,
who was not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies;
wrote novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to
have invented the octave rhyme, or stanza of eight lines, which ever
since has been maintained by the practice of all Italian writers, who
are, or at least assume the title of heroic poets. He and Chaucer, among
other things, had this in common, that they refined their
mother-tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file
their language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who
likewise received no little help from his master Petrarch; but the
reformation of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is
yet the standard of purity in the Italian tongue, though many of his
phrases are become obsolete, as, in process of time, it must needs
happen. Chaucer (as you have formerly been told by our learned Mr
Rymer[108]) first adorned and amplified our barren tongue from the
Provençal, which was then the most polished of all the modern languages;
but this subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who
deserves no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these
reasons of time, and resemblance of genius, in Chaucer and Boccace, I
resolved to join them in my present work; to which I have added some
original papers of my own, which, whether they are equal or inferior to
my other poems, an author is the most improper judge; and therefore I
leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, that
they will not be condemned; but if they should, I have the excuse of an
old gentleman, who, mounting on horseback before some ladies, when I was
present, got up somewhat heavily, but desired of the fair spectators,
that they would count fourscore and eight before they judged him. By the
mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years of his number; a
cripple in my limbs,--but what decays are in my mind the reader must
determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the faculties of my
soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impaired to any great
degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great reason to
complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than diminishes; and
thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast upon me, that my
only difficulty is to chuse or to reject, to run them into verse, or to
give them the other harmony of prose: I have so long studied and
practised both, that they are grown into a habit, and become familiar to
me. In short, though I may lawfully plead some part of the old
gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I have greater
need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of this my present
work, but those which are given of course to human frailty. I will not
trouble my reader with the shortness of time in which I writ it, or the
several intervals of sickness. They who think too well of their own
performances, are apt to boast in their prefaces how little time their
works have cost them, and what other business of more importance
interfered; but the reader will be as apt to ask the question, why they
allowed not a longer time to make their works more perfect? and why they
had so despicable an opinion of their judges, as to thrust their
indigested stuff upon them, as if they deserved no better?
With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part
of this discourse: in the second part, as at a second sitting, though I
alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and
change the dead-colouring of the whole. In general I will only say, that
I have written nothing which savours of immorality or profaneness; at
least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there
happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton,
they are crept into my verses through my inadvertency. If the searchers
find any in the cargo, let them be staved or forfeited, like
counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable for them,
as being but imported merchandize, and not of my own manufacture. On the
other side, I have endeavoured to chuse such fables, both ancient and
modern, as contain in each of them some instructive moral; which I could
prove by induction, but the way is tedious, and they leap foremost into
sight, without the reader's trouble of looking after them. I wish I
could affirm, with a safe conscience, that I had taken the same care in
all my former writings; for it must be owned, that supposing verses are
never so beautiful or pleasing, yet, if they contain any thing which
shocks religion or good manners, they are at best what Horace says of
good numbers without good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugæque canoræ_.
Thus far, I hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other
right of self-defence, where I have been wrongfully accused, and my
sense wire-drawn into blasphemy, or bawdry, as it has often been by a
religious lawyer,[109] in a late pleading against the stage; in which he
mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of
calumniating strongly, that something may remain.
I resume the thread of my discourse with the first of my translations,
which was the first "Ilias" of Homer. [110] If it shall please God to
give me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to translate
the whole "Ilias;" provided still that I meet with those encouragements
from the public, which may enable me to proceed in my undertaking with
some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world beforehand, that I
have found, by trial, Homer a more pleasing task than Virgil, though I
say not the translation will be less laborious; for the Grecian is more
according to my genius than the Latin poet. In the works of the two
authors we may read their manners, and natural inclinations, which are
wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, sedate temper; Homer was
violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The chief talent of Virgil was
propriety of thoughts, and ornament of words: Homer was rapid in his
thoughts, and took all the liberties, both of numbers and of
expressions, which his language, and the age in which he lived, allowed
him. Homer's invention was more copious, Virgil's more confined; so that
if Homer had not led the way, it was not in Virgil to have begun heroic
poetry; for nothing can be more evident, than that the Roman poem is but
the second part of the "Ilias;" a continuation of the same story, and
the persons already formed. The manners of Æneas are those of Hector,
superadded to those which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in
the "Odysses," are imitated in the first Six Books of Virgil's "Æneis;"
and though the accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him
of a servile copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas
were the same in which both the heroes wandered; and Dido cannot be
denied to be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter Books of
Virgil's poem are the four-and-twenty "Iliads" contracted; a quarrel
occasioned by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town
besieged. I say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I
contradict any thing which I have formerly said in his just praise; for
his episodes are almost wholly of his own invention, and the form which
he has given to the telling makes the tale his own, even though the
original story had been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer
taught Virgil to design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic
poet, then the Latin poem can only be allowed the second place. Mr
Hobbes, in the preface to his own bald translation of the "Ilias,"
(studying poetry as he did mathematics, when it was too late,) Mr
Hobbes,[111] I say, begins the praise of Homer where he should have
ended it. He tells us, that the first beauty of an epic poem consists in
diction; that is, in the choice of words, and harmony of numbers. Now
the words are the colouring of the work, which, in the order of nature,
is last to be considered; the design, the disposition, the manners, and
the thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or
imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human life,
which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like glaring
colours, are the first beauties that arise, and strike the sight; but,
if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, the manners
obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, then the finest
colours are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful monster at the
best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of the former
beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman poet is at
least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere: supplying the
poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his diligence.
But to return. Our two great poets being so different in their tempers,
one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and melancholic; that
which makes them excel in their several ways is, that each of them has
followed his own natural inclination, as well in forming the design, as
in the execution of it. The very heroes show their authors: Achilles is
hot, impatient, revengeful,
_Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer, &c. _
Æneas patient, considerate, careful of his people, and merciful to his
enemies; ever submissive to the will of heaven:
----_quò fata trahunt retrahuntque, sequamur. _
I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forced to
defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said, I will only draw this
inference, that the action of Homer, being more full of vigour than
that of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence
more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees; the other sets
you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. It is the same
difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in
Demosthenes and Tully; one persuades, the other commands. You never cool
while you read Homer, even not in the Second Book (a graceful flattery
to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and concludes not
that book till he has made you amends by the violent playing of a new
machine. From thence he hurries on his action with variety of events,
and ends it in less compass than two months. This vehemence of his, I
confess, is more suitable to my temper; and, therefore, I have
translated his First Book with greater pleasure than any part of Virgil;
but it was not a pleasure without pains. The continual agitations of the
spirits must needs be a weakening of any constitution, especially in
age; and many pauses are required for refreshment betwixt the heats; the
"Ilias," of itself, being a third part longer than all Virgil's works
together.
This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I proceed
to Ovid and Chaucer; considering the former only in relation to the
latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; from Chaucer
the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of the poets were
not unlike. Both of them were well-bred, well-natured, amorous, and
libertine, at least in their writings; it may be, also in their lives.
Their studies were the same,--philosophy and philology. Both of them
were knowing in astronomy; of which Ovid's "Books of the Roman Feasts,"
and Chaucer's "Treatise of the Astrolabe," are sufficient witnesses. But
Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, Horace, Persius,
and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and clearness; neither
were great inventors: for Ovid only copied the Grecian fables, and most
of Chaucer's stories were taken from his Italian contemporaries, or
their predecessors. Boccace his "Decameron" was first published; and
from thence our Englishman has borrowed many of his "Canterbury Tales. "
Yet that of "Palamon and Arcite" was written, in all probability, by
some Italian wit, in a former age as I shall prove hereafter. The tale
of "Grisilde" was the invention of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace,
from whom it came to Chaucer. [112] "Troilus and Cressida" was also
written by a Lombard author,[113] but much amplified by our English
translator, as well as beautified; the genius of our countrymen in
general, being rather to improve an invention than to invent themselves,
as is evident not only in our poetry, but in many of our
manufactures. --I find I have anticipated already, and taken up from
Boccace before I come to him: but there is so much less behind; and I am
of the temper of most kings, who love to be in debt, are all for present
money, no matter how they pay it afterwards: besides, the nature of a
preface is rambling, never wholly out of the way, nor in it. This I have
learned from the practice of honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure
to Ovid and Chaucer, of whom I have little more to say.
Both of them built on the inventions of other men; yet since Chaucer had
something of his own, as "The Wife of Bath's Tale," "The Cock and the
Fox,"[114] which I have translated, and some others, I may justly give
our countryman the precedence in that part; since I can remember nothing
of Ovid which was wholly his. Both of them understood the manners; under
which name I comprehend the passions, and, in a larger sense, the
descriptions of persons, and their very habits. For an example, I see
Baucis and Philemon as perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter
had drawn them; and all the Pilgrims in the "Canterbury Tales," their
humours, their features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had
supped with them at the Tabard[115] in Southwark. Yet even there, too,
the figures of Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light;
which though I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and
am sure he will clear me from partiality. --The thoughts and words remain
to be considered, in the comparison of the two poets, and I have saved
myself one half of that labour, by owning that Ovid lived when the Roman
tongue was in its meridian; Chaucer, in the dawning of our language:
therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, any
more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our present
English. The words are given up, as a post not to be defended in our
poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The thoughts
remain to be considered; and they are to be measured only by their
propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from the persons
described, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, which are nine
parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and jingles wit, who see
Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether without them, will think me
little less than mad for preferring the Englishman to the Roman. Yet,
with their leave, I must presume to say, that the things they admire
are only glittering trifles, and so far from being witty, that in a
serious poem they are nauseous, because they are unnatural. Would any
man, who is ready to die for love, describe his passion like Narcissus?
Would he think of _inopem me copia fecit_, and a dozen more of such
expressions, poured on the neck of one another, and signifying all the
same thing? If this were wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor
wretch was in the agony of death? This is just John Littlewit, in
"Bartholomew Fair," who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his
misery; a miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should
endeavour to raise pity; but, instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to
laugh. Virgil never made use of such machines when he was moving you to
commiserate the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was
building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the
pursuit of it; yet, when he came to die, he made him think more
reasonably: he repents not of his love, for that had altered his
character; but acknowledges the injustice of his proceedings, and
resigns Emilia to Palamon. What would Ovid have done on this occasion?
He would certainly have made Arcite witty on his death-bed;--he had
complained he was farther off from possession, by being so near, and a
thousand such boyisms, which Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of
the subject. They who think otherwise, would, by the same reason, prefer
Lucan and Ovid to Homer and Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As
for the turn of words, in which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they
are sometimes a fault, and sometimes a beauty, as they are used properly
or improperly; but in strong passions always to be shunned, because
passions are serious, and will admit no playing. The French have a high
value for them; and, I confess, they are often what they call delicate,
when they are introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more
simplicity, and followed nature more closely than to use them. [116] I
have thus far, to the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge
betwixt the parties in competition, not meddling with the design nor the
disposition of it; because the design was not their own; and in the
disposing of it they were equal. --It remains that I say somewhat of
Chaucer in particular.
In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold him
in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, or the
Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense; learned in all
sciences; and, therefore, speaks properly on all subjects. As he knew
what to say, so he knows also when to leave off; a continence which is
practised by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, excepting
Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[117] is sunk in his
reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which came in his
way; but swept, like a drag-net, great and small. There was plenty
enough, but the dishes were ill sorted; whole pyramids of sweet-meats
for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. All this proceeded
not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment. Neither did he want
that in discerning the beauties and faults of other poets, but only
indulged himself in the luxury of writing; and perhaps knew it was a
fault, but hoped the reader would not find it. For this reason, though
he must always be thought a great poet, he is no longer esteemed a good
writer; and for ten impressions, which his works have had in so many
successive years, yet at present a hundred books are scarcely purchased
once a twelvemonth; for, as my last Lord Rochester said, though somewhat
profanely, "Not being of God, he could not stand. "
Chaucer followed nature every where, but was never so bold to go beyond
her; and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _nimis poeta_,
if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest behaviour and
affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not harmonious to us;
but it is like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus commends, it was
_auribus istius temporis accommodata_. They who lived with him, and some
time after him, thought it musical; and it continues so, even in our
judgment, if compared with the numbers of Lidgate and Gower, his
contemporaries:--there is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune in it,
which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect. It is true, I cannot
go so far as he[118] who published the last edition of him; for he would
make us believe the fault is in our ears, and that there were really
ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine: but this opinion is not
worth confuting; it is so gross and obvious an error, that common sense
(which is a rule in every thing but matters of faith and revelation)
must convince the reader, that equality of numbers, in every verse which
we call heroic, was either not known, or not always practised, in
Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to produce some thousands of his
verses, which are lame for want of half a foot, and sometimes a whole
one, and which no pronunciation can make otherwise. We can only say,
that he lived in the infancy of our poetry, and that nothing is brought
to perfection at the first. We must be children before we grow men.
There was an Ennius, and in process of time a Lucilius, and a Lucretius,
before Virgil and Horace; even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a
Harrington, a Fairfax, before Waller and Denham were in being; and our
numbers were in their nonage till these last appeared. I need say little
of his parentage, life, and fortunes; they are to be found at large in
all the editions of his Works. He was employed abroad, and favoured, by
Edward III. , Richard II. , and Henry IV. , and was poet, as I suppose, to
all three of them. [119] In Richard's time, I doubt, he was a little dipt
in the rebellion of the Commons;[120] and being brother-in-law to John
of Gaunt, it was no wonder if he followed the fortunes of that family;
and was well with Henry IV. when he had deposed his predecessor. Neither
is it to be admired, that Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant
prince, who claimed by succession, and was sensible that his title was
not sound, but was rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of
York; it was not to be admired, I say, if that great politician should
be pleased to have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and
to be the trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by
the advice of Mæcenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose
praises helped to make him popular while he was alive, and after his
death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of our
poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of
Wickliffe, after John of Gaunt his patron; somewhat of which appears in
the tale of "Pierce Plowman:"[121] yet I cannot blame him for inveighing
so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age: their pride,
their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest,
deserved the lashes which he gave them, both in that, and in most of his
"Canterbury Tales. " Neither has his contemporary Boccace spared them:
Yet both those poets lived in much esteem with good and holy men in
orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests' reflects
not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and his Friar,
took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical poet is the
check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take care, that we
involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same condemnation. The
good cannot be too much honoured, nor the bad too coarsely used; for the
corruption of the best becomes the worst. When a clergyman is whipped,
his gown is first taken off, by which the dignity of his order is
secured. [122] If he be wrongfully accused, he has his action of
slander; and it is at the poet's peril if he transgress the law. But
they will tell us, that all kind of satire, though never so well
deserved by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into
contempt. Is then the peerage of England any thing dishonoured when a
peer suffers for his treason? If he be libelled, or any way defamed, he
has his _scandulum magnatum_ to punish the offender. They who use this
kind of argument, seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat which
has deserved the poet's lash, and are less concerned for their public
capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the bottom
of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to be judged
among themselves, they are all in some sort parties; for, since they say
the honour of their order is concerned in every member of it, how can we
be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far I may be allowed to
speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I am sure a dispute of
this nature caused mischief in abundance betwixt a king of England and
an archbishop of Canterbury;[123] one standing up for the laws of his
land, and the other for the honour, as he called it, of God's church;
which ended in the murder of the prelate, and in the whipping of his
majesty from post to pillar for his penance. The learned and ingenious
Dr Drake[124] has saved me the labour of enquiring into the esteem and
reverence which the priests have had of old; and I would rather extend
than diminish any part of it: yet I must needs say, that when a priest
provokes me without any occasion given him, I have no reason, unless it
be the charity of a Christian, to forgive him: _prior læsit_ is
justification sufficient in the civil law. If I answer him in his own
language, self-defence, I am sure, must be allowed me; and if I carry it
farther, even to a sharp recrimination, somewhat may be indulged to
human frailty. Yet my resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have
followed Chaucer in his character of a holy man, and have enlarged on
that subject with some pleasure; reserving to myself the right, if I
shall think fit hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as
are more easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the
last blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to
their doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time.
the human figure and faculties:
"The frame thereof seemed partly circular,
And part triangular; O, work divine!
These two, the first and last, propitious are;
The one imperfect, mortal feminine,
The other immortal, perfect, masculine;
And 'twixt them both a quadrate was the base,
Proportioned equally by seven and nine;
Nine was the circle set in heaven's place;
All which compacted made a goodly diapase. "
_Fairy Queen_, Book II. canto ix. stanza 22.
]
[Footnote 97: St Cecilia is said to have invented the organ, though it
is not known when or how she came by this credit. Chaucer introduces her
as performing upon that instrument:
"And while that the organes maden melodie,
To God alone thus in her heart sung she. "
The descent of the angel we have already mentioned. She thus announces
this celestial attendant to her husband:
"I have an angel which that loveth me;
That with great love, wher so I wake or slepe,
Is ready aye my body for to kepe. "
_The Second Nonne's Tale. _
]
THE
TEARS OF AMYNTA,
FOR THE
DEATH OF DAMON.
A SONG.
I.
On a bank, beside a willow,
Heaven her covering, earth her pillow,
Sad Amynta sighed alone;
From the cheerless dawn of morning
Till the dews of night returning,
Singing thus, she made her moan:
Hope is banished,
Joys are vanished,
Damon, my beloved, is gone!
II.
Time, I dare thee to discover
Such a youth, and such a lover;
Oh, so true, so kind was he!
Damon was the pride of nature,
Charming in his every feature;
Damon lived alone for me:
Melting kisses,
Murmuring blisses;
Who so lived and loved as we!
III.
Never shall we curse the morning,
Never bless the night returning,
Sweet embraces to restore:
Never shall we both lie dying,
Nature failing, love supplying
All the joys he drained before.
Death, come end me,
To befriend me;
Love and Damon are no more.
A SONG.
I.
Sylvia, the fair, in the bloom of fifteen,
Felt an innocent warmth as she lay on the green;
She had heard of a pleasure, and something she guest
By the towzing, and tumbling, and touching her breast.
She saw the men eager, but was at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close;
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
II.
Ah! she cried, ah, for a languishing maid,
In a country of Christians, to die without aid!
Not a Whig, or a Tory, or Trimmer at least,
Or a Protestant parson, or Catholic priest,
To instruct a young virgin, that is at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close!
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
III.
Cupid, in shape of a swain, did appear,
He saw the sad wound, and in pity drew near;
Then showed her his arrow, and bid her not fear,
For the pain was no more than a maiden may bear.
When the balm was infused, she was not at a loss,
What they meant by their sighing, and kissing so close;
By their praying and whining,
And clasping and twining,
And panting and wishing,
And sighing and kissing,
And sighing and kissing so close.
THE LADY'S SONG.
_The obvious application of this song is to the banishment of King
James, and his beautiful consort Mary of Este. _
I.
A choir of bright beauties in spring did appear,
To chuse a May-lady to govern the year:
All the nymphs were in white, and the shepherds in green,
The garland was given, and Phyllis was queen;
But Phyllis refused it, and sighing did say,
I'll not wear a garland while Pan is away.
II.
While Pan and fair Syrinx are fled from our shore,
The Graces are banished, and Love is no more;
The soft god of pleasure, that warmed our desires,
Has broken his bow, and extinguished his fires,
And vows that himself and his mother will mourn,
Till Pan and fair Syrinx in triumph return.
III.
Forbear your addresses, and court us no more,
For we will perform what the deity swore:
But, if you dare think of deserving our charms,
Away with your sheep hooks, and take to your arms;
Then laurels and myrtles your brows shall adorn,
When Pan, and his son, and fair Syrinx, return.
A SONG.
I.
Fair, sweet, and young, receive a prize
Reserved for your victorious eyes:
From crowds, whom at your feet you see,
O pity, and distinguish me!
As I from thousand beauties more
Distinguish you, and only you adore.
II.
Your face for conquest was designed,
Your every motion charms my mind;
Angels, when you your silence break,
Forget their hymns, to hear you speak;
But when at once they hear and view,
Are loath to mount, and long to stay with you.
III.
No graces can your form improve,
But all are lost, unless you love;
While that sweet passion you disdain,
Your veil and beauty are in vain:
In pity then prevent my fate,
For after dying all reprieve's too late.
A SONG.
High state and honours to others impart,
But give me your heart;
That treasure, that treasure alone,
I beg for my own.
So gentle a love, so fervent a fire,
My soul does inspire;
That treasure, that treasure alone,
I beg for my own.
Your love let me crave;
Give me in possessing
So matchless a blessing;
That empire is all I would have.
Love's my petition,
All my ambition;
If e'er you discover
So faithful a lover,
So real a flame,
I'll die, I'll die,
So give up my game.
RONDELAY.
I.
Chloe found Amyntas lying,
All in tears, upon the plain,
Sighing to himself, and crying,
Wretched I, to love in vain!
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain.
II.
Sighing to himself, and crying,
Wretched I, to love in vain!
Ever scorning, and denying
To reward your faithful swain.
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain.
III.
Ever scorning, and denying
To reward your faithful swain. --
Chloe, laughing at his crying,
Told him, that he loved in vain.
Kiss me, dear, before my dying;
Kiss me once, and ease my pain,
IV.
Chloe, laughing at his crying,
Told him, that he loved in vain;
But, repenting, and complying,
When he kissed, she kissed again:
Kissed him up before his dying;
Kissed him up, and eased his pain.
A SONG.
I.
Go tell Amynta, gentle swain,
I would not die, nor dare complain:
Thy tuneful voice with numbers join,
Thy words will more prevail than mine.
To souls oppressed, and dumb with grief,
The gods ordain this kind relief,
That music should in sounds convey,
What dying lovers dare not say.
II.
A sigh or tear, perhaps, she'll give,
But love on pity cannot live.
Tell her that hearts for hearts were made,
And love with love is only paid.
Tell her my pains so fast increase,
That soon they will be past redress;
But, ah! the wretch that speechless lies,
Attends but death to close his eyes.
A SONG
TO A
FAIR YOUNG LADY,
GOING OUT OF THE TOWN IN THE SPRING.
I.
Ask not the cause, why sullen spring
So long delays her flowers to bear?
Why warbling birds forget to sing,
And winter storms invert the year?
Chloris is gone, and fate provides
To make it spring where she resides.
II.
Chloris is gone, the cruel fair;
She cast not back a pitying eye;
But left her lover in despair,
To sigh, to languish, and to die.
Ah, how can those fair eyes endure,
To give the wounds they will not cure!
III.
Great god of love, why hast thou made
A face that can all hearts command,
That all religions can invade,
And change the laws of every land?
Where thou hadst placed such power before,
Thou shouldst have made her mercy more.
IV.
When Chloris to the temple comes,
Adoring crowds before her fall;
She can restore the dead from tombs,
And every life but mine recal.
I only am, by love, designed
To be the victim for mankind.
ALEXANDER'S FEAST,
OR
THE POWER OF MUSIC;
AN ODE IN HONOUR OF ST CECILIA'S DAY.
_This celebrated Ode was written for the Saint's Festival in 1697,
when the following stewards officiated: Hugh Colvill, Esq. ; Capt.
Thomas Newman; Orlando Bridgeman, Esq. ; Theophilus Buller, Esq. ;
Leonard Wessell, Esq. ; Paris Slaughter, Esq. ; Jeremiah Clarke,
Gent. ; and Francis Rich, Gent. The merits of this unequalled
effusion of lyrical poetry, are fully discussed in the general
criticism. _
I.
'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won
By Philip's warlike son:
Aloft, in awful state,
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne.
His valiant peers were placed around;
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound:
(So should desert in arms be crowned. )
The lovely Thais, by his side,
Sate like a blooming eastern bride,
In flower of youth and beauty's pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
CHORUS.
_Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair. _
II.
Timotheus, placed on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touched the lyre:
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above,
(Such is the power of mighty love. )
A dragon's fiery form belied the god;
Sublime on radiant spheres he rode,
When he to fair Olympia pressed,
And while he sought her snowy breast;
Then, round her slender waist he curled,
And stamped an image of himself, a sovereign of the world. --
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound,
_A present deity! _ they shout around;
_A present deity! _ the vaulted roofs rebound.
With ravished ears,
The monarch hears;
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
CHORUS.
_With ravished ears,
The monarch hears;
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres. _
III.
The praise of Bacchus, then, the sweet musician sung;
Of Bacchus ever fair, and ever young.
The jolly god in triumph comes;
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums;
Flushed with a purple grace
He shews his honest face:
Now, give the hautboys breath; he comes, he comes.
Bacchus, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain;
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
CHORUS.
_Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldiers pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure after pain. _
IV.
Soothed with the sound, the king grew vain:
Fought all his battles o'er again;
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew the slain. --
The master saw the madness rise,
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And, while he heaven and earth defied,
Changed his hand, and checked his pride.
He chose a mournful muse,
Soft pity to infuse;
He sung Darius great and good,
By too severe a fate,
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen,
Fallen from his high estate,
And weltering in his blood:
Deserted, at his utmost need,
By those his former bounty fed;
On the bare earth exposed he lies,
With not a friend to close his eyes.
With downcast looks the joyless victor sate,
Revolving, in his altered soul,
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow.
CHORUS.
_Revolving, in his altered soul,
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow. _
V.
The mighty master smiled, to see
That love was in the next degree;
'Twas but a kindred-sound to move,
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures,
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures:
War, he sung, is toil and trouble;
Honour, but an empty bubble;
Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying:
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, O think it worth enjoying;
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,
Take the good the gods provide thee--
The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair,
Who caused his care,
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again;
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.
CHORUS.
_The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair,
Who caused his care,
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again;
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast. _
VI.
Now strike the golden lyre again;
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleep asunder,
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark! the horrid sound
Has raised up his head;
As awaked from the dead,
And amazed, he stares around.
Revenge, revenge! Timotheus cries,
See the furies arise;
See the snakes, that they rear,
How they hiss in their hair,
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a ghastly band,
Each a torch in his hand!
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain,
And, unburied, remain
Inglorious on the plain:
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.
Behold how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes,
And glittering temples of their hostile gods. --
The princes applaud, with a furious joy,
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy.
CHORUS.
_And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy. _
VII.
Thus, long ago,
Ere heaving bellows learned to blow,
While organs yet were mute,
Timotheus, to his breathing flute,
And sounding lyre,
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies,
She drew an angel down.
GRAND CHORUS.
_At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies,
She drew an angel down. _
VENI CREATOR SPIRITUS,
PARAPHRASED.
Creator spirit, by whose aid
The world's foundations first were laid,
Come visit every pious mind;
Come pour thy joys on human kind;
From sin and sorrow set us free,
And make thy temples worthy thee.
O source of uncreated light,
The Father's promised Paraclete!
Thrice holy fount, thrice holy fire,
Our hearts with heavenly love inspire;
Come, and thy sacred unction bring
To sanctify us, while we sing.
Plenteous of grace, descend from high,
Rich in thy seven-fold energy!
Thou strength of his Almighty hand,
Whose power does heaven and earth command.
Proceeding spirit, our defence, }
Who do'st the gifts of tongues dispense, }
And crown'st thy gift with eloquence. }
Refine and purge our earthly parts;
But, O, inflame and fire our hearts!
Our frailties help, our vice controul,
Submit the senses to the soul;
And, when rebellious they are grown,
Then lay thy hand, and hold them down.
Chace from our minds the infernal foe;
And peace, the fruit of love, bestow;
And, lest our feet should step astray,
Protect and guide us in the way.
Make us eternal truths receive,
And practise all that we believe;
Give us thyself, that we may see
The Father, and the Son, by thee.
Immortal honour, endless fame,
Attend the Almighty Father's name;
The Saviour Son be glorified,
Who for lost man's redemption died;
And equal adoration be,
Eternal Paraclete, to thee.
FABLES.
TALES FROM CHAUCER.
TO
HIS GRACE
THE
DUKE OF ORMOND. [98]
_Anno 1699. _
MY LORD,
Some estates are held, in England, by paying a fine at the change of
every lord. I have enjoyed the patronage of your family, from the time
of your excellent grandfather to this present day. I have dedicated the
translations of the "Lives of Plutarch" to the first duke;[99] and have
celebrated the memory of your heroic father. [100] Though I am very
short of the age of Nestor, yet I have lived to a third generation of
your house; and, by your grace's favour, am admitted still to hold from
you by the same tenure.
I am not vain enough to boast, that I have deserved the value of so
illustrious a line; but my fortune is the greater, that, for three
descents, they have been pleased to distinguish my poems from those of
other men, and have accordingly made me their peculiar care. May it be
permitted me to say, that as your grandfather and father were cherished
and adorned with honours by two successive monarchs, so I have been
esteemed and patronized by the grandfather, the father, and the son,
descended from one of the most ancient, most conspicuous, and most
deserving families in Europe.
It is true, that by delaying the payment of my last fine, when it was
due by your grace's accession to the titles and patrimonies of your
house, I may seem, in rigour of law, to have made a forfeiture of my
claim; yet my heart has always been devoted to your service; and since
you have been graciously pleased, by your permission of this address, to
accept the tender of my duty, it is not yet too late to lay these poems
at your feet.
The world is sensible, that you worthily succeed not only to the honours
of your ancestors, but also to their virtues. The long chain of
magnanimity, courage, easiness of access, and desire of doing good, even
to the prejudice of your fortune, is so far from being broken in your
grace, that the precious metal yet runs pure to the newest link of it;
which I will not call the last, because I hope and pray it may descend
to late posterity; and your flourishing youth, and that of your
excellent duchess, are happy omens of my wish.
It is observed by Livy, and by others, that some of the noblest Roman
families retained a resemblance of their ancestry, not only in their
shapes and features, but also in their manners, their qualities, and the
distinguishing characters of their minds. Some lines were noted for a
stern, rigid virtue; savage, haughty, parsimonious, and unpopular;
others were more sweet and affable, made of a more pliant paste, humble,
courteous, and obliging; studious of doing charitable offices, and
diffusive of the goods which they enjoyed. The last of these is the
proper and indelible character of your grace's family. God Almighty has
endued you with a softness, a beneficence, an attractive behaviour
winning on the hearts of others, and so sensible of their misery, that
the wounds of fortune seem not inflicted on them, but on yourself. [101]
You are so ready to redress, that you almost prevent their wishes, and
always exceed their expectations; as if what was yours was not your own,
and not given you to possess, but to bestow on wanting merit. But this
is a topic which I must cast in shades, lest I offend your modesty;
which is so far from being ostentatious of the good you do, that it
blushes even to have it known; and, therefore, I must leave you to the
satisfaction and testimony of your own conscience, which, though it be a
silent panegyric, is yet the best.
You are so easy of access, that Poplicola[102] was not more, whose doors
were opened on the outside to save the people even the common civility
of asking entrance; where all were equally admitted; where nothing that
was reasonable was denied; where misfortune was a powerful
recommendation; and where, I can scarce forbear saying, that want itself
was a powerful mediator, and was next to merit.
The history of Peru assures us, that their Incas, above all their
titles, esteemed that the highest, which called them _lovers of the
poor_;--a name more glorious than the Felix, Pius, and Augustus, of the
Roman emperors, which were epithets of flattery, deserved by few of
them; and not running in a blood like the perpetual gentleness, and
inherent goodness, of the Ormond family.
Gold, as it is the purest, so it is the softest and most ductile of all
metals. Iron, which is the hardest, gathers rust, corrodes itself, and
is, therefore, subject to corruption. It was never intended for coins
and medals, or to bear the faces and inscriptions of the great. Indeed,
it is fit for armour, to bear off insults, and preserve the wearer in
the day of battle; but, the danger once repelled, it is laid aside by
the brave, as a garment too rough for civil conversation; a necessary
guard in war, but too harsh and cumbersome in peace, and which keeps off
the embraces of a more humane life.
For this reason, my lord, though you have courage in an heroical degree,
yet I ascribe it to you but as your second attribute: mercy,
beneficence, and compassion, claim precedence, as they are first in the
divine nature. An intrepid courage, which is inherent in your grace, is
at best but a holiday-kind of virtue, to be seldom exercised, and never
but in cases of necessity; affability, mildness, tenderness, and a word,
which I would fain bring back to its original signification of virtue, I
mean good-nature, are of daily use. They are the bread of mankind, and
staff of life. Neither sighs, nor tears, nor groans, nor curses of the
vanquished, follow acts of compassion and of charity; but a sincere
pleasure, and serenity of mind, in him who performs an action of mercy,
which cannot suffer the misfortunes of another without redress, lest
they should bring a kind of contagion along with them, and pollute the
happiness which he enjoys.
Yet since the perverse tempers of mankind, since oppression on one side,
and ambition on the other, are sometimes the unavoidable occasions of
war, that courage, that magnanimity, and resolution, which is born with
you, cannot be too much commended: And here it grieves me that I am
scanted in the pleasure of dwelling on many of your actions; but
αιδεομαι Τρωας is an expression which Tully often uses,
when he would do what he dares not, and fears the censure of the Romans.
I have sometimes been forced to amplify on others; but here, where the
subject is so fruitful, that the harvest overcomes the reaper, I am
shortened by my chain, and can only see what is forbidden me to reach;
since it is not permitted me to commend you according to the extent of
my wishes, and much less is it in my power to make my commendations
equal to your merits.
Yet, in this frugality of your praises, there are some things which I
cannot omit, without detracting from your character. You have so formed
your own education, as enables you to pay the debt you owe your
country, or, more properly speaking, both your countries; because you
were born, I may almost say, in purple, at the castle of Dublin, when
your grandfather was lord-lieutenant, and have since been bred in the
court of England.
If this address had been in verse, I might have called you, as Claudian
calls Mercury, _Numen commune, gemino faciens commercia mundo_. The
better to satisfy this double obligation, you have early cultivated the
genius you have to arms, that when the service of Britain or Ireland
shall require your courage and your conduct, you may exert them both to
the benefit of either country. You began in the cabinet what you
afterwards practised in the camp; and thus both Lucullus and Cæsar (to
omit a crowd of shining Romans) formed themselves to the war, by the
study of history, and by the examples of the greatest captains, both of
Greece and Italy, before their time. I name those two commanders in
particular, because they were better read in chronicle than any of the
Roman leaders; and that Lucullus, in particular, having only the theory
of war from books, was thought fit, without practice, to be sent into
the field, against the most formidable enemy of Rome. Tully, indeed, was
called the learned consul in derision; but then he was not born a
soldier; his head was turned another way: when he read the tactics, he
was thinking on the bar, which was his field of battle. The knowledge of
warfare is thrown away on a general, who dares not make use of what he
knows. I commend it only in a man of courage and resolution; in him it
will direct his martial spirit, and teach him the way to the best
victories, which are those that are least bloody, and which, though
achieved by the hand, are managed by the head. Science distinguishes a
man of honour from one of those athletic brutes whom, undeservedly, we
call heroes. Cursed be the poet, who first honoured with that name a
mere Ajax, a man-killing idiot! The Ulysses of Ovid upbraids his
ignorance, that he understood not the shield for which he pleaded; there
was engraven on it plans of cities, and maps of countries, which Ajax
could not comprehend, but looked on them as stupidly as his
fellow-beast, the lion. But, on the other side, your grace has given
yourself the education of his rival; you have studied every spot of
ground in Flanders, which, for these ten years past, has been the scene
of battles, and of sieges. No wonder if you performed your part with
such applause, on a theatre which you understood so well.
If I designed this for a poetical encomium, it were easy to enlarge on
so copious a subject; but, confining myself to the severity of truth,
and to what is becoming me to say, I must not only pass over many
instances of your military skill, but also those of your assiduous
diligence in the war, and of your personal bravery, attended with an
ardent thirst of honour; a long train of generosity; profuseness of
doing good; a soul unsatisfied with all it has done, and an
unextinguished desire of doing more. But all this is matter for your own
historians; I am, as Virgil says, _Spatiis exclusus iniquis_.
Yet, not to be wholly silent of all your charities, I must stay a little
on one action, which preferred the relief of others to the consideration
of yourself. When, in the battle of Landen, your heat of courage (a
fault only pardonable to your youth) had transported you so far before
your friends, that they were unable to follow, much less to succour you;
when you were not only dangerously, but, in all appearance, mortally
wounded; when in that desperate condition you were made prisoner, and
carried to Namur, at that time in possession of the French;[103] then
it was, my lord, that you took a considerable part of what was remitted
to you of your own revenues, and, as a memorable instance of your heroic
charity, put it into the hands of Count Guiscard, who was governor of
the place, to be distributed among your fellow-prisoners. The French
commander, charmed with the greatness of your soul, accordingly
consigned it to the use for which it was intended by the donor; by which
means the lives of so many miserable men were saved, and a comfortable
provision made for their subsistence, who had otherwise perished, had
you not been the companion of their misfortune; or rather sent by
Providence, like another Joseph, to keep out famine from invading those,
whom, in humility, you called your brethren. How happy was it for those
poor creatures, that your grace was made their fellow-sufferer? And how
glorious for you, that you chose to want, rather than not relieve the
wants of others? The heathen poet, in commending the charity of Dido to
the Trojans, spoke like a Christian:
_Non ignara mali, miseris succurrere disco. _
All men, even those of a different interest, and contrary principles,
must praise this action as the most eminent for piety, not only in this
degenerate age, but almost in any of the former; when men were made _de
meliore luto_; when examples of charity were frequent, and when there
were in being,
----_Teucri pulcherrima proles,
Magnanimi heroes, nati melioribus annis. _
No envy can detract from this; it will shine in history, and, like
swans, grow whiter the longer it endures; and the name of Ormond will be
more celebrated in his captivity, than in his greatest triumphs.
But all actions of your grace are of a piece, as waters keep the tenor
of their fountains: your compassion is general, and has the same effect
as well on enemies as friends. It is so much in your nature to do good,
that your life is but one continued act of placing benefits on many; as
the sun is always carrying his light to some part or other of the world.
And were it not that your reason guides you where to give, I might
almost say, that you could not help bestowing more than is consisting
with the fortune of a private man, or with the will of any but an
Alexander.
What wonder is it then, that, being born for a blessing to mankind, your
supposed death in that engagement was so generally lamented through the
nation? The concernment for it was as universal as the loss; and though
the gratitude might be counterfeit in some, yet the tears of all were
real: where every man deplored his private part in that calamity, and
even those who had not tasted of your favours, yet built so much on the
fame of your beneficence, that they bemoaned the loss of their
expectations.
This brought the untimely death of your great father into fresh
remembrance,--as if the same decree had passed on two short successive
generations of the virtuous; and I repeated to myself the same verses
which I had formerly applied to him:
_Ostendunt terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultra
Esse sinent. _
But, to the joy not only of all good men, but mankind in general, the
unhappy omen took not place. You are still living, to enjoy the
blessings and applause of all the good you have performed, the prayers
of multitudes whom you have obliged, for your long prosperity, and that
your power of doing generous and charitable actions may be as extended
as your will; which is by none more zealously desired than by
Your Grace's most humble,
Most obliged, and
Most obedient servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 98: James, second Duke of Ormond, was eldest son of the
gallant Earl of Ossory, and grandson to the great Duke of Ormond, to
whose honours he succeeded in 1688. He was first married to Lady Anne
Hyde, daughter of Lawrence Earl of Rochester; and, upon her death, to
Lady Mary Somerset, second daughter of the Duke of Beaufort. The Duke of
Ormond was favoured by King William, but attained still higher power and
influence during the reign of Queen Anne, especially in her later years,
when he entered into all the views of her Tory administration. Upon the
accession of George I, he was impeached of high treason, and consulted
his safety by flying abroad. He died in Spain in 1746.
The tales which follow, with the various translations marked in the
preface, were first published in 1700 in one volume folio. ]
[Footnote 99: See Vol. XVII. p. 1. ]
[Footnote 100: See the passage in "Absalom and Achitophel," Vol. IX. p.
242. and the notes on that poem, pages 294-301. ]
[Footnote 101: This character of the unfortunate nobleman was not
exaggerated. When the impeachment against him was moved, Hutchinson,
Jekyll, and many others, gave a splendid testimony to his private
virtues. ]
[Footnote 102: P. Valerius Poplicola, the third Roman consul; the same
who caused the fasces, the emblems of consular dignity, to be lowered
before the common people. ]
[Footnote 103: In the bloody battle of Landen, fought on 29th July,
1693, the Duke of Ormond was in that brigade of English horse which King
William led in person to support his right wing of cavalry. The Duke
charged at the head of a squadron of Lumley's regiment, received several
wounds, and had his horse shot under him. He was about to be cut to
pieces, when he was rescued by a gentleman of the gardes-du-corps, and
made prisoner. King William lost the day, after exhibiting prodigies of
conduct and valour. ]
PREFACE
PREFIXED TO
THE FABLES.
It is with a poet, as with a man who designs to build, and is very
exact, as he supposes, in casting up the cost beforehand; but, generally
speaking, he is mistaken in his account, and reckons short in the
expence he first intended. He alters his mind as the work proceeds, and
will have this or that convenience more, of which he had not thought
when he began. So has it happened to me; I have built a house, where I
intended but a lodge; yet with better success than a certain nobleman,
who, beginning with a dog-kennel, never lived to finish the palace he
had contrived. [104]
From translating the First of Homer's "Iliads," (which I intended as an
essay to the whole work,) I proceeded to the translation of the Twelfth
Book of Ovid's "Metamorphoses," because it contains, among other things,
the causes, the beginning, and ending, of the Trojan war. Here I ought
in reason to have stopped; but the speeches of Ajax and Ulysses lying
next in my way, I could not balk them. When I had compassed them, I was
so taken with the former part of the Fifteenth Book, which is the
masterpiece of the whole "Metamorphoses," that I enjoined myself the
pleasing task of rendering it into English. And now I found, by the
number of my verses, that they began to swell into a little volume;
which gave me an occasion of looking backward on some beauties of my
author, in his former books: There occurred to me the "Hunting of the
Boar," "Cinyras and Myrrha," the good-natured story of "Baucis and
Philemon," with the rest, which I hope I have translated closely enough,
and given them the same turn of verse which they had in the
original;[105] and this I may say, without vanity, is not the talent of
every poet. He who has arrived the nearest to it, is the ingenious and
learned Sandys, the best versifier of the former age; if I may properly
call it by that name, which was the former part of this concluding
century. For Spenser and Fairfax both flourished in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth; great masters in our language, and who saw much farther into
the beauties of our numbers, than those who immediately followed them.
Milton was the poetical son of Spenser, and Mr Waller of Fairfax; for we
have our lineal descents and clans as well as other families. Spenser
more than once insinuates, that the soul of Chaucer was transfused into
his body;[106] and that he was begotten by him two hundred years after
his decease. Milton has acknowledged to me, that Spenser was his
original; and many besides myself have heard our famous Waller own, that
he derived the harmony of his numbers from "Godfrey of Bulloigne," which
was turned into English by Mr Fairfax. [107]
But to return. Having done with Ovid for this time, it came into my
mind, that our old English poet, Chaucer, in many things resembled him,
and that with no disadvantage on the side of the modern author, as I
shall endeavour to prove when I compare them; and as I am, and always
have been, studious to promote the honour of my native country, so I
soon resolved to put their merits to the trial, by turning some of the
"Canterbury Tales" into our language, as it is now refined; for by this
means, both the poets being set in the same light, and dressed in the
same English habit, story to be compared with story, a certain judgment
may be made betwixt them by the reader, without obtruding my opinion on
him. Or, if I seem partial to my countryman and predecessor in the
laurel, the friends of antiquity are not few; and, besides many of the
learned, Ovid has almost all the beaux, and the whole fair sex, his
declared patrons. Perhaps I have assumed somewhat more to myself than
they allow me, because I have adventured to sum up the evidence; but the
readers are the jury, and their privilege remains entire, to decide
according to the merits of the cause; or, if they please, to bring it to
another hearing before some other court. In the mean time, to follow the
thread of my discourse, (as thoughts, according to Mr Hobbes, have
always some connection,) so from Chaucer I was led to think on Boccace,
who was not only his contemporary, but also pursued the same studies;
wrote novels in prose, and many works in verse; particularly is said to
have invented the octave rhyme, or stanza of eight lines, which ever
since has been maintained by the practice of all Italian writers, who
are, or at least assume the title of heroic poets. He and Chaucer, among
other things, had this in common, that they refined their
mother-tongues; but with this difference, that Dante had begun to file
their language, at least in verse, before the time of Boccace, who
likewise received no little help from his master Petrarch; but the
reformation of their prose was wholly owing to Boccace himself, who is
yet the standard of purity in the Italian tongue, though many of his
phrases are become obsolete, as, in process of time, it must needs
happen. Chaucer (as you have formerly been told by our learned Mr
Rymer[108]) first adorned and amplified our barren tongue from the
Provençal, which was then the most polished of all the modern languages;
but this subject has been copiously treated by that great critic, who
deserves no little commendation from us his countrymen. For these
reasons of time, and resemblance of genius, in Chaucer and Boccace, I
resolved to join them in my present work; to which I have added some
original papers of my own, which, whether they are equal or inferior to
my other poems, an author is the most improper judge; and therefore I
leave them wholly to the mercy of the reader. I will hope the best, that
they will not be condemned; but if they should, I have the excuse of an
old gentleman, who, mounting on horseback before some ladies, when I was
present, got up somewhat heavily, but desired of the fair spectators,
that they would count fourscore and eight before they judged him. By the
mercy of God, I am already come within twenty years of his number; a
cripple in my limbs,--but what decays are in my mind the reader must
determine. I think myself as vigorous as ever in the faculties of my
soul, excepting only my memory, which is not impaired to any great
degree; and if I lose not more of it, I have no great reason to
complain. What judgment I had, increases rather than diminishes; and
thoughts, such as they are, come crowding in so fast upon me, that my
only difficulty is to chuse or to reject, to run them into verse, or to
give them the other harmony of prose: I have so long studied and
practised both, that they are grown into a habit, and become familiar to
me. In short, though I may lawfully plead some part of the old
gentleman's excuse, yet I will reserve it till I think I have greater
need, and ask no grains of allowance for the faults of this my present
work, but those which are given of course to human frailty. I will not
trouble my reader with the shortness of time in which I writ it, or the
several intervals of sickness. They who think too well of their own
performances, are apt to boast in their prefaces how little time their
works have cost them, and what other business of more importance
interfered; but the reader will be as apt to ask the question, why they
allowed not a longer time to make their works more perfect? and why they
had so despicable an opinion of their judges, as to thrust their
indigested stuff upon them, as if they deserved no better?
With this account of my present undertaking, I conclude the first part
of this discourse: in the second part, as at a second sitting, though I
alter not the draught, I must touch the same features over again, and
change the dead-colouring of the whole. In general I will only say, that
I have written nothing which savours of immorality or profaneness; at
least, I am not conscious to myself of any such intention. If there
happen to be found an irreverent expression, or a thought too wanton,
they are crept into my verses through my inadvertency. If the searchers
find any in the cargo, let them be staved or forfeited, like
counterbanded goods; at least, let their authors be answerable for them,
as being but imported merchandize, and not of my own manufacture. On the
other side, I have endeavoured to chuse such fables, both ancient and
modern, as contain in each of them some instructive moral; which I could
prove by induction, but the way is tedious, and they leap foremost into
sight, without the reader's trouble of looking after them. I wish I
could affirm, with a safe conscience, that I had taken the same care in
all my former writings; for it must be owned, that supposing verses are
never so beautiful or pleasing, yet, if they contain any thing which
shocks religion or good manners, they are at best what Horace says of
good numbers without good sense, _Versus inopes rerum, nugæque canoræ_.
Thus far, I hope, I am right in court, without renouncing to my other
right of self-defence, where I have been wrongfully accused, and my
sense wire-drawn into blasphemy, or bawdry, as it has often been by a
religious lawyer,[109] in a late pleading against the stage; in which he
mixes truth with falsehood, and has not forgotten the old rule of
calumniating strongly, that something may remain.
I resume the thread of my discourse with the first of my translations,
which was the first "Ilias" of Homer. [110] If it shall please God to
give me longer life, and moderate health, my intentions are to translate
the whole "Ilias;" provided still that I meet with those encouragements
from the public, which may enable me to proceed in my undertaking with
some cheerfulness. And this I dare assure the world beforehand, that I
have found, by trial, Homer a more pleasing task than Virgil, though I
say not the translation will be less laborious; for the Grecian is more
according to my genius than the Latin poet. In the works of the two
authors we may read their manners, and natural inclinations, which are
wholly different. Virgil was of a quiet, sedate temper; Homer was
violent, impetuous, and full of fire. The chief talent of Virgil was
propriety of thoughts, and ornament of words: Homer was rapid in his
thoughts, and took all the liberties, both of numbers and of
expressions, which his language, and the age in which he lived, allowed
him. Homer's invention was more copious, Virgil's more confined; so that
if Homer had not led the way, it was not in Virgil to have begun heroic
poetry; for nothing can be more evident, than that the Roman poem is but
the second part of the "Ilias;" a continuation of the same story, and
the persons already formed. The manners of Æneas are those of Hector,
superadded to those which Homer gave him. The adventures of Ulysses in
the "Odysses," are imitated in the first Six Books of Virgil's "Æneis;"
and though the accidents are not the same, (which would have argued him
of a servile copying, and total barrenness of invention,) yet the seas
were the same in which both the heroes wandered; and Dido cannot be
denied to be the poetical daughter of Calypso. The six latter Books of
Virgil's poem are the four-and-twenty "Iliads" contracted; a quarrel
occasioned by a lady, a single combat, battles fought, and a town
besieged. I say not this in derogation to Virgil, neither do I
contradict any thing which I have formerly said in his just praise; for
his episodes are almost wholly of his own invention, and the form which
he has given to the telling makes the tale his own, even though the
original story had been the same. But this proves, however, that Homer
taught Virgil to design; and if invention be the first virtue of an epic
poet, then the Latin poem can only be allowed the second place. Mr
Hobbes, in the preface to his own bald translation of the "Ilias,"
(studying poetry as he did mathematics, when it was too late,) Mr
Hobbes,[111] I say, begins the praise of Homer where he should have
ended it. He tells us, that the first beauty of an epic poem consists in
diction; that is, in the choice of words, and harmony of numbers. Now
the words are the colouring of the work, which, in the order of nature,
is last to be considered; the design, the disposition, the manners, and
the thoughts, are all before it: where any of those are wanting or
imperfect, so much wants or is imperfect in the imitation of human life,
which is in the very definition of a poem. Words, indeed, like glaring
colours, are the first beauties that arise, and strike the sight; but,
if the draught be false or lame, the figures ill disposed, the manners
obscure or inconsistent, or the thoughts unnatural, then the finest
colours are but daubing, and the piece is a beautiful monster at the
best. Neither Virgil nor Homer were deficient in any of the former
beauties; but in this last, which is expression, the Roman poet is at
least equal to the Grecian, as I have said elsewhere: supplying the
poverty of his language by his musical ear, and by his diligence.
But to return. Our two great poets being so different in their tempers,
one choleric and sanguine, the other phlegmatic and melancholic; that
which makes them excel in their several ways is, that each of them has
followed his own natural inclination, as well in forming the design, as
in the execution of it. The very heroes show their authors: Achilles is
hot, impatient, revengeful,
_Impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis, acer, &c. _
Æneas patient, considerate, careful of his people, and merciful to his
enemies; ever submissive to the will of heaven:
----_quò fata trahunt retrahuntque, sequamur. _
I could please myself with enlarging on this subject, but am forced to
defer it to a fitter time. From all I have said, I will only draw this
inference, that the action of Homer, being more full of vigour than
that of Virgil, according to the temper of the writer, is of consequence
more pleasing to the reader. One warms you by degrees; the other sets
you on fire all at once, and never intermits his heat. It is the same
difference which Longinus makes betwixt the effects of eloquence in
Demosthenes and Tully; one persuades, the other commands. You never cool
while you read Homer, even not in the Second Book (a graceful flattery
to his countrymen); but he hastens from the ships, and concludes not
that book till he has made you amends by the violent playing of a new
machine. From thence he hurries on his action with variety of events,
and ends it in less compass than two months. This vehemence of his, I
confess, is more suitable to my temper; and, therefore, I have
translated his First Book with greater pleasure than any part of Virgil;
but it was not a pleasure without pains. The continual agitations of the
spirits must needs be a weakening of any constitution, especially in
age; and many pauses are required for refreshment betwixt the heats; the
"Ilias," of itself, being a third part longer than all Virgil's works
together.
This is what I thought needful in this place to say of Homer. I proceed
to Ovid and Chaucer; considering the former only in relation to the
latter. With Ovid ended the golden age of the Roman tongue; from Chaucer
the purity of the English tongue began. The manners of the poets were
not unlike. Both of them were well-bred, well-natured, amorous, and
libertine, at least in their writings; it may be, also in their lives.
Their studies were the same,--philosophy and philology. Both of them
were knowing in astronomy; of which Ovid's "Books of the Roman Feasts,"
and Chaucer's "Treatise of the Astrolabe," are sufficient witnesses. But
Chaucer was likewise an astrologer, as were Virgil, Horace, Persius,
and Manilius. Both writ with wonderful facility and clearness; neither
were great inventors: for Ovid only copied the Grecian fables, and most
of Chaucer's stories were taken from his Italian contemporaries, or
their predecessors. Boccace his "Decameron" was first published; and
from thence our Englishman has borrowed many of his "Canterbury Tales. "
Yet that of "Palamon and Arcite" was written, in all probability, by
some Italian wit, in a former age as I shall prove hereafter. The tale
of "Grisilde" was the invention of Petrarch; by him sent to Boccace,
from whom it came to Chaucer. [112] "Troilus and Cressida" was also
written by a Lombard author,[113] but much amplified by our English
translator, as well as beautified; the genius of our countrymen in
general, being rather to improve an invention than to invent themselves,
as is evident not only in our poetry, but in many of our
manufactures. --I find I have anticipated already, and taken up from
Boccace before I come to him: but there is so much less behind; and I am
of the temper of most kings, who love to be in debt, are all for present
money, no matter how they pay it afterwards: besides, the nature of a
preface is rambling, never wholly out of the way, nor in it. This I have
learned from the practice of honest Montaigne, and return at my pleasure
to Ovid and Chaucer, of whom I have little more to say.
Both of them built on the inventions of other men; yet since Chaucer had
something of his own, as "The Wife of Bath's Tale," "The Cock and the
Fox,"[114] which I have translated, and some others, I may justly give
our countryman the precedence in that part; since I can remember nothing
of Ovid which was wholly his. Both of them understood the manners; under
which name I comprehend the passions, and, in a larger sense, the
descriptions of persons, and their very habits. For an example, I see
Baucis and Philemon as perfectly before me, as if some ancient painter
had drawn them; and all the Pilgrims in the "Canterbury Tales," their
humours, their features, and the very dress, as distinctly as if I had
supped with them at the Tabard[115] in Southwark. Yet even there, too,
the figures of Chaucer are much more lively, and set in a better light;
which though I have not time to prove, yet I appeal to the reader, and
am sure he will clear me from partiality. --The thoughts and words remain
to be considered, in the comparison of the two poets, and I have saved
myself one half of that labour, by owning that Ovid lived when the Roman
tongue was in its meridian; Chaucer, in the dawning of our language:
therefore that part of the comparison stands not on an equal foot, any
more than the diction of Ennius and Ovid, or of Chaucer and our present
English. The words are given up, as a post not to be defended in our
poet, because he wanted the modern art of fortifying. The thoughts
remain to be considered; and they are to be measured only by their
propriety; that is, as they flow more or less naturally from the persons
described, on such and such occasions. The vulgar judges, which are nine
parts in ten of all nations, who call conceits and jingles wit, who see
Ovid full of them, and Chaucer altogether without them, will think me
little less than mad for preferring the Englishman to the Roman. Yet,
with their leave, I must presume to say, that the things they admire
are only glittering trifles, and so far from being witty, that in a
serious poem they are nauseous, because they are unnatural. Would any
man, who is ready to die for love, describe his passion like Narcissus?
Would he think of _inopem me copia fecit_, and a dozen more of such
expressions, poured on the neck of one another, and signifying all the
same thing? If this were wit, was this a time to be witty, when the poor
wretch was in the agony of death? This is just John Littlewit, in
"Bartholomew Fair," who had a conceit (as he tells you) left him in his
misery; a miserable conceit. On these occasions the poet should
endeavour to raise pity; but, instead of this, Ovid is tickling you to
laugh. Virgil never made use of such machines when he was moving you to
commiserate the death of Dido: he would not destroy what he was
building. Chaucer makes Arcite violent in his love, and unjust in the
pursuit of it; yet, when he came to die, he made him think more
reasonably: he repents not of his love, for that had altered his
character; but acknowledges the injustice of his proceedings, and
resigns Emilia to Palamon. What would Ovid have done on this occasion?
He would certainly have made Arcite witty on his death-bed;--he had
complained he was farther off from possession, by being so near, and a
thousand such boyisms, which Chaucer rejected as below the dignity of
the subject. They who think otherwise, would, by the same reason, prefer
Lucan and Ovid to Homer and Virgil, and Martial to all four of them. As
for the turn of words, in which Ovid particularly excels all poets, they
are sometimes a fault, and sometimes a beauty, as they are used properly
or improperly; but in strong passions always to be shunned, because
passions are serious, and will admit no playing. The French have a high
value for them; and, I confess, they are often what they call delicate,
when they are introduced with judgment; but Chaucer writ with more
simplicity, and followed nature more closely than to use them. [116] I
have thus far, to the best of my knowledge, been an upright judge
betwixt the parties in competition, not meddling with the design nor the
disposition of it; because the design was not their own; and in the
disposing of it they were equal. --It remains that I say somewhat of
Chaucer in particular.
In the first place, as he is the father of English poetry, so I hold him
in the same degree of veneration as the Grecians held Homer, or the
Romans Virgil. He is a perpetual fountain of good sense; learned in all
sciences; and, therefore, speaks properly on all subjects. As he knew
what to say, so he knows also when to leave off; a continence which is
practised by few writers, and scarcely by any of the ancients, excepting
Virgil and Horace. One of our late great poets[117] is sunk in his
reputation, because he could never forgive any conceit which came in his
way; but swept, like a drag-net, great and small. There was plenty
enough, but the dishes were ill sorted; whole pyramids of sweet-meats
for boys and women, but little of solid meat for men. All this proceeded
not from any want of knowledge, but of judgment. Neither did he want
that in discerning the beauties and faults of other poets, but only
indulged himself in the luxury of writing; and perhaps knew it was a
fault, but hoped the reader would not find it. For this reason, though
he must always be thought a great poet, he is no longer esteemed a good
writer; and for ten impressions, which his works have had in so many
successive years, yet at present a hundred books are scarcely purchased
once a twelvemonth; for, as my last Lord Rochester said, though somewhat
profanely, "Not being of God, he could not stand. "
Chaucer followed nature every where, but was never so bold to go beyond
her; and there is a great difference of being _poeta_ and _nimis poeta_,
if we may believe Catullus, as much as betwixt a modest behaviour and
affectation. The verse of Chaucer, I confess, is not harmonious to us;
but it is like the eloquence of one whom Tacitus commends, it was
_auribus istius temporis accommodata_. They who lived with him, and some
time after him, thought it musical; and it continues so, even in our
judgment, if compared with the numbers of Lidgate and Gower, his
contemporaries:--there is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune in it,
which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect. It is true, I cannot
go so far as he[118] who published the last edition of him; for he would
make us believe the fault is in our ears, and that there were really
ten syllables in a verse where we find but nine: but this opinion is not
worth confuting; it is so gross and obvious an error, that common sense
(which is a rule in every thing but matters of faith and revelation)
must convince the reader, that equality of numbers, in every verse which
we call heroic, was either not known, or not always practised, in
Chaucer's age. It were an easy matter to produce some thousands of his
verses, which are lame for want of half a foot, and sometimes a whole
one, and which no pronunciation can make otherwise. We can only say,
that he lived in the infancy of our poetry, and that nothing is brought
to perfection at the first. We must be children before we grow men.
There was an Ennius, and in process of time a Lucilius, and a Lucretius,
before Virgil and Horace; even after Chaucer there was a Spenser, a
Harrington, a Fairfax, before Waller and Denham were in being; and our
numbers were in their nonage till these last appeared. I need say little
of his parentage, life, and fortunes; they are to be found at large in
all the editions of his Works. He was employed abroad, and favoured, by
Edward III. , Richard II. , and Henry IV. , and was poet, as I suppose, to
all three of them. [119] In Richard's time, I doubt, he was a little dipt
in the rebellion of the Commons;[120] and being brother-in-law to John
of Gaunt, it was no wonder if he followed the fortunes of that family;
and was well with Henry IV. when he had deposed his predecessor. Neither
is it to be admired, that Henry, who was a wise as well as a valiant
prince, who claimed by succession, and was sensible that his title was
not sound, but was rightfully in Mortimer, who had married the heir of
York; it was not to be admired, I say, if that great politician should
be pleased to have the greatest wit of those times in his interests, and
to be the trumpet of his praises. Augustus had given him the example, by
the advice of Mæcenas, who recommended Virgil and Horace to him; whose
praises helped to make him popular while he was alive, and after his
death have made him precious to posterity. As for the religion of our
poet, he seems to have some little bias towards the opinions of
Wickliffe, after John of Gaunt his patron; somewhat of which appears in
the tale of "Pierce Plowman:"[121] yet I cannot blame him for inveighing
so sharply against the vices of the clergy in his age: their pride,
their ambition, their pomp, their avarice, their worldly interest,
deserved the lashes which he gave them, both in that, and in most of his
"Canterbury Tales. " Neither has his contemporary Boccace spared them:
Yet both those poets lived in much esteem with good and holy men in
orders; for the scandal which is given by particular priests' reflects
not on the sacred function. Chaucer's Monk, his Canon, and his Friar,
took not from the character of his Good Parson. A satirical poet is the
check of the laymen on bad priests. We are only to take care, that we
involve not the innocent with the guilty in the same condemnation. The
good cannot be too much honoured, nor the bad too coarsely used; for the
corruption of the best becomes the worst. When a clergyman is whipped,
his gown is first taken off, by which the dignity of his order is
secured. [122] If he be wrongfully accused, he has his action of
slander; and it is at the poet's peril if he transgress the law. But
they will tell us, that all kind of satire, though never so well
deserved by particular priests, yet brings the whole order into
contempt. Is then the peerage of England any thing dishonoured when a
peer suffers for his treason? If he be libelled, or any way defamed, he
has his _scandulum magnatum_ to punish the offender. They who use this
kind of argument, seem to be conscious to themselves of somewhat which
has deserved the poet's lash, and are less concerned for their public
capacity than for their private; at least there is pride at the bottom
of their reasoning. If the faults of men in orders are only to be judged
among themselves, they are all in some sort parties; for, since they say
the honour of their order is concerned in every member of it, how can we
be sure that they will be impartial judges? How far I may be allowed to
speak my opinion in this case, I know not; but I am sure a dispute of
this nature caused mischief in abundance betwixt a king of England and
an archbishop of Canterbury;[123] one standing up for the laws of his
land, and the other for the honour, as he called it, of God's church;
which ended in the murder of the prelate, and in the whipping of his
majesty from post to pillar for his penance. The learned and ingenious
Dr Drake[124] has saved me the labour of enquiring into the esteem and
reverence which the priests have had of old; and I would rather extend
than diminish any part of it: yet I must needs say, that when a priest
provokes me without any occasion given him, I have no reason, unless it
be the charity of a Christian, to forgive him: _prior læsit_ is
justification sufficient in the civil law. If I answer him in his own
language, self-defence, I am sure, must be allowed me; and if I carry it
farther, even to a sharp recrimination, somewhat may be indulged to
human frailty. Yet my resentment has not wrought so far, but that I have
followed Chaucer in his character of a holy man, and have enlarged on
that subject with some pleasure; reserving to myself the right, if I
shall think fit hereafter, to describe another sort of priests, such as
are more easily to be found than the Good Parson; such as have given the
last blow to Christianity in this age, by a practice so contrary to
their doctrine. But this will keep cold till another time.
