tiful prefent, which at that time, when I was moft in want of it, came most seasonably and unexpectedly to my relief. That favour, my lord, is of itself sufficient to bind any grateful man to a perpetual acknowledgment, and to all the future fervice, which one of my mean condition can ever be able to perform. May the Almighty God return it for me, both in bleffing you here, and rewarding you hereafter. I must not prefume to defend the cause for which I now fuffer, because your lordship is engaged against it: but the more you are fo, the greater is my obligation to you for your laying afide all the confiderations of factions and parties, to do an action of pure difinterested charity. This is one amongst many of your fhining qualities, which diftinguish you from others of your rank: but let me add a farther truth, that without these ties of gratitude, and abftracting from them all, I have a moft particular inclination to honour you; and, if it were not too bold an expreffion, to fay, I love you. It is no fhame to be a poet, though it is to be a bad one. Auguftus Cæfar of old, and Cardinal Richlieu of late, would willingly have been fuch; and David and Solomon were fuch. You, who without flattery, are the best of the prefent age in England, and would have been fo, had you been born in any other country, will receive more honour in future ages, by that one excellency, than by all those honours to which your birth has intitled you, or your merits have acquired you. Ne, forte, pudori

Sit tibi mufa lyra folers, & cantor Apollo.

I have formerly faid in this epiftle, that I could dif tinguish your writings from thofe of any others: it is now time to clear myself from any imputation of felf-conceit on that fubject. I affume not to myself any particular lights in this difcovery; they are fuch only as are obvious to every man of fenfe and judgment, who loves poetry, and underftands it. Your thoughts are always fo remote from the common way

of thinking, that they are, as I may fay, of another fpecies, than the conceptions of other poets; yet you go not out of nature for any of them: gold is never bred upon the furface of the ground; but lies so hidden, and fo deep, that the mines of it are feldom found; but the force of waters cafts it out from the bowels of mountains, and exposes it amongst the fands of rivers giving us of her bounty, what we could not hope for by our fearch. This fuccefs attends you lordship's thoughts, which would look like chance, if it were not perpetual, and always of the fame tenor. If I grant that there is care in it, it is fuch a care as would be ineffectual and fruitless in other men. It is the curiofa felicitas which Petronius afcribes to Horace in his Odes. We have not wherewithal to imagine fo ftrongly, fo juftly, and fo pleafantly: in fhort, if we have the fame knowledge, we cannot draw out of it the fame quinteffence; we cannot give it fuch a term, fuch a propriety, and fuch a beauty: fomething is deficient in the manner, or the words, but more in the nobleness of our conception. Yet when you have finished all, and it appears in its full luftre, when the diamond is not only found, but the roughness fmoothed, when it is cut into a form, and fet in gold, then we cannot but acknowledge, that it is the perfect work of art and nature and every one will be fo vain, to think he himself could have performed the like, until he attempts it. It is just the defcription that Horace makes of fuch a finished piece: it appears fo eafy, Ut fibi quivis fperet idem; fudet multum, fruftraque laboret, aujus idem. And befides all this, it is your lordship's particular talent to lay your thoughts fo clofe together, that were they clofer they would be crouded, and even a due connexion would be wanting. We are not kept in expectation of two good lines, which are to come after a long parenthefis of twenty bad; which is the Aprilpoetry of other writers; a mixture of rain and funfhine by fits; you are always bright, even almoft to a fault, by reafon of the excess. There is continual

abun-

abundance, a magazine of thought, and yet a perpetual variety of entertainment; which creates fuch an appetite in your reader, that he is not cloyed with any thing, but fatisfied with all. It is that which the Romans call Cena dubia; where there is fuch plenty, yet withal fo much diverfity, and fo good order, that the choice is difficult betwixt one excellency and another; and yet the conclufion, by a due climax, is evermore the best; that is, as a conclufion ought to be, ever the moft proper for its place. See, my lord, whether I have not ftudied your lordship with fome application: and fince you are so modeft, that you will not be judge and party, I appeal to the whole world, if I have not drawn your picture to a great degree of likeness, though it is but in miniature: and that fome of the best features are yet wanting. Yet what I have done is enough to diftinguish you from any other, which is the propofition that I took upon me to demonftrate.

And now, my lord, to apply what I have faid to my present bufinefs; the fatires of Juvenal and Perfius appearing in this new English drefs, cannot fo properly be infcribed to any man as to your lordship, who are the firft of the age in that way of writing. Your lordship, amongst many other favours, has given me your permiffion for this address; and you have particularly encouraged me by your perufal and approbation of the fixth and tenth fatires of Juvenal, as I have tranflated them. My fellow-labourers have likewife commiffioned me, to perform in their behalf this office of a dedication to you; and will acknowledge with all poffible refpect and gratitude, your acceptance of their work. Some of them have the honour to be known to your lordship already; and they who have not yet that happiness, defire it now. Be pleased to receive our common endeavours with your wonted candour, without intitling you to the protection of our common failings, in fo difficult an undertaking. And allow me your patience, if it be not already tired with this long epiftle, to give you,

from

from the best authors, the origin, the antiquity, the growth, the change, and the compleatment of fatire among the Romans. To defcribe, if not define, the nature of that poem, with its feveral qualifications and virtues, together with the feveral forts of it. To compare the excellencies of Horace, Perfius, and Juvenal, and fhew the particular manners of their fatires. And lastly, to give an account of this new way of verfion which is attempted in our performance. All which, according to the weakness of my ability, and the beft lights which I can get from others, fhall be the fubject of my following difcourfe.

The most perfect work of poetry, fays our mafter Ariftotle, is tragedy. His reafon is, because it is the most united; being more feverely confined within the rules of action, time, and place. The action is entire, of a piece, and one, without epifodes: the time limited to a natural day; and the place circumfcribed at leaft within the compafs of one town, or city. Being exactly proportioned thus, and uniform. in all its parts, the mind is more capable of comprehending the whole beauty of it without distraction.

But after all thefe advantages, an heroick poem, is certainly the greatest work of human nature. The beauties and perfections of the other are but mechanical; thofe of the epick are more noble. Though Homer has limited his place to Troy, and the fields about it; his action to forty-eight natural days, whereof twelve are holidays, or ceffation from bufinefs, during the funerals of Patroclus. To proceed, the action of the epick is greater: the extention of time enlarges the pleafure of the reader, and the epifodes give it more ornament, and more variety: The inftruction is equal; but in the first is only inftructive, the latter forms a hero, and a prince.

If it fignifies any thing which of them is of the more ancient family, the best and most abfolute heroick poem was written by Homer long before tragedy was invented: but if we confider the natural endowments, and acquired parts, which are neceffary

te

to make an accomplished writer in either kind, tragedy requires a lefs and more confined knowledge: moderate learning, and obfervation of the rules is fufficient, if a genius be not wanting. But in an epick poet, one who is worthy of that name, befides an univerfal genius, is required univerfal learning, together with all thofe qualities and acquifitions which I have named above, and as many more as I have through hafte or negligence omitted. And after all, he must have exactly ftudied Homer and Virgil, as his patterns, Ariftotle and Horace, as his guides, and Vida and Boffu, as their commentators, with many others both Italian and French critics, which I want leifure here to recommend.

In a word, what I have to say in relation to this fubject, which does not particularly concern fatire, is, that the greatnefs of an heroick poem, beyond that of a tragedy, may eafily be difcovered, by obferving how few have attempted that work, in comparifon of those who have written drama's; and of thofe few, how small a number have fucceeded. But leaving the critics on either fide, to contend about the preference due to this or that fort of poetry; I will haften to my prefent bufinefs, which is the antiquity and origin of fatire, according to thofe informations which I have received from the learned Cafaubon, Heinfius, Rigaltius, Dacier, and the Dauphin's Juvenal; to which I fhall add fome obfervations of my own.

There has been a long difpute among the modern critics, whether the Romans derived their fatire from the Grecians, or firft invented it themselves. Julius Scaliger, and Heinfius, are of the firft opinion; Cafaubon, Rigaltius, Dacier, and the publisher of the Dauphin's Juvenal, maintain the latter. If we take fatire in the general fignification of the word, as it is used in all modern languages for an invective, it is certain that it is almoft as old as verfe; and though hymns, which are praifes of God, may be allowed to have been before it, yet the defamation

of