495 The waggoner grows weary of my stay; 499 You to your own Aquinum fhall repair, And add new venom, when you write of Rome. Ver. 498. of Juvenal. Aquinum] Aquinum was the birth-place Ver. 503. And add new venom, &c.] In 1738, London, an imitation of this fatire, was published by Dr. Johnson, which, from the fpirit and ftrength with which it was written, by the poignancy of its invectives, and correctness of its style, and very dextrous accommodation of ancient fentiments and images to modern, was read with univerfal avidity and applause, especially by all thofe perfons who were in oppofition to government, who, at that time, were fome of the ableft men in the kingdom. It inftantly excited the curiofity, and perhaps the jealoufy, of Pope; for impartial criticifm must confefs, that it is equal to his Imitations of Horace. As his Two Dialogues and London were publifhed in the fame week, they were frequently compared, and, as I was informed by a contemporary, many readers gave the preference to Johnfon. It was with difficulty he could find a purchafer for the copy, tili Dodley, who had more taste and fenfe than ufually falls to the lot of his brethren, generously pur. chafed it. It may be amufing to compare a few paffages with the original. Give to St. David's one true Briton more. Unum civem donare Sibyllæ. Here malice, rapine, accident confpire, The lawyer is most happily added. And here a female atheist talks you dead. This is inferior to the original; for after enumerating the variety of evils that infeft the city, he adds, with much pleasantry, as the most grievous and tormenting of all, Augufto recitantes menfe poetas. The atheist is too ferious an example, and out of place. is improved from But nothing can be more happily touched than the character of the voluble obfequious Frenchman, ready to undertake all offices, trades, and employments. omnia novit Græculus efuriens, in cælum jufferis ibit. He has improved the following lines, optima Soræ Aut Fabrateriæ domus, aut Frufinone paratur, by a stroke of fatire on houfes of men of rank forfaken by their Owners: Then mightft thon find fome elegant retreat, Some hireling fenator's deferted feat. But the keenest stroke of Johnson's fatire was his application of the following lines: ut timeas ne Vomer deficiat, ne marræ et farcula defint, from the quantity of iron ufed in fetters for felons, which, with a moft fevere farcafm on the frequent vifits to Hanover, he renders thus, Left ropes be wanting in the tempting Spring, To rig another convoy for the King. Dr. Johnson was frequently urged to give a complete tranflation of Juvenal; a work for which he feemed peculiarly quali fed, from the nature and turn of his genius, and his love of fplendid and pompous diction. Dr. J. WARTON. THE SIXTH SATIRE OF JUVENAL. THE ARGUMENT. This fatire, of almost double length to any of the rest, is a bitter invective against the fair fex. 'Tis indeed, a common-place, from whence all the moderns have notoriously ftolen their sharpest railleries. In his other fatires, the poet has only glanced on fome particular women, and generally scourged the men. But this he referved wholly for the ladies. How they had offended him I know not: but upon the whole matter he is not to be excufed for imputing to all, the vices of fome few amongst them. Neither was it generously done of him, to attack the weakest as well as the fairest part of the creation: neither do I know what moral he could reasonably draw from it. It could not be to avoid the whole fex, if all had been true which he alledges against them: for that had been to put an end to human kind. And to bid us beware of their artifices, is a kind of filent acknowledgment, that they have more wit than men which turns the fatire upon us, and particularly upon the poet; who thereby makes a compliment, where he meant a libel. If he intended only to exercife his wit, he has forfeited his judgment, by making the one half of his readers his mortal enemies; and amongst the men, all the happy lovers, by their own experience, will difprove his accufations. The whole world must allow this to be the wittiest of his fatires; and truly he had need of all his parts, to maintain, with so much violence, fo unjust a charge. I am fatisfied he will bring but few over to his opinion: and on that confideration chiefly I ventured to tranflate him. Though there wanted not another reafon, which was, that no one else would undertake it: at least, Sir C. S. who could have done more right to the author, after a long delay, at length absolutely refused fo ungrateful an employment; and every one will grant, that the work must have been imperfect and lame, if it had appeared without one of the principal members belonging to it. Let the poet therefore bear the blame of his own invention; and let me fatisfy the world, that I am not of his opinion. Whatever his Roman ladies were, the English are free from all his imputations. They will read with wonder and abhorrence the vices of an age, which was the most infamous of any on record. They will bless themselves when they behold those examples, related of Domitian's time: they will give back to antiquity thofe monsters it produced; and believe with reafon, that the fpecies of those women is extinguished, or at least that they were never here propagated. I may fafely therefore proceed |