"THIS piece is the most finished of all his Imitations, and executed in the high manner the Italian painters call con amore. By which they mean, the exertion of that principle, which puts the faculties on the stretch, and produces the supreme degree of excellence. For the Poet had all the warmth of affection for the great Lawyer to whom it is addressed: and, indeed, no man ever more deserved to have a Poet for his friend. In the obtaining of which, as neither vanity, party, nor fear had any share, (which gave birth to the attachments of many of his noble acquaintance,) so he supported his title to it by all the good offices of a generous and true friendship."-WARBURTON. Warburton's expressions seem exaggerated. It is difficult to understand how he can have preferred this piece to the splendid Imitation of the First Epistle of the Second Book, or to the First Satire. Like the next Epistle, it is indeed highly finished, but like that it labours under the disadvantage of being a reproduction of Roman sentiment and philosophy which neither Pope nor any modern writer could treat con amore. "Nil Admirari" was a text on which an easy man of the world in the Court of Augustus could expatiate, in a spirit quite unlike that of the modern cynic who contents himself with the belief that "there's nothing new, nothing true, and it don't signify." What Horace seems to say is that, as everything in the external world appears mutable and uncertain, men should steadily pursue whatever they choose as their end in life, without turning to the right or the left. Whether you prefer to philosophise, he says, to lead a life of active virtue, to make money, to succeed in politics, to indulge in dissipation, or to treat existence as a jest, in any case be "thorough"; adapt your means to your end; above all preserve your equanimity. He does not attempt to set up any standard of right or wrong; as his principles are those of a sceptic his tone is ironic; all these pursuits, so runs his argument, are vanity, but if you only immerse yourself sufficiently in action, you may contrive to keep the unpleasant reflection out of your mind. Such sentiments were as different as possible from Pope's. Though Pope's own standard of morality cannot be said to be definitely Christian, yet he was affected by the established doctrines of religion, and his many solemn protestations of his zeal for virtue, his denunciations of the public corruption, and his praises in other places of such characters as Barnard and the Man of Ross, show the feeling that separated him from the light-headed unconcern of Horace. There is a solemnity of tone in many parts of this Epistle, and though he follows closely the line of Horace's argument, yet when he comes to the passages on gluttony and debauchery, he feels himself obliged to modify the conclusions of the original. The address to Murray is full of fine and poetic feeling. This Imitation was published by Gilliver in 1737. It was registered at Stationers' Hall, 14th Jan., 1737, as follows: "The Sixth Epistle of the First Book of Horace, Imitated by Mr. Pope;" the owner of the copyright being Alexander Pope. THE SIXTH EPISTLE OF THE FIRST BOOK OF HORACE. ΤΟ MR. MURRAY.1 "NoT to admire, is all the art I know, (Plain truth, dear Murray, needs no flowers of speech, This vault of air, this congregated ball, Look through, and trust the Ruler with his skies; 1 William Murray, afterwards the famous Earl of Mansfield, Chief Justice of the King's Bench. He was born 2nd March, 1705, was made Chief Justice in 1756, and died 20th March, 1793. 2 So Milton, Paradise Regained, iv. 362: What makes a nation happy, and keeps it so? 3 Creech published his translation of Horace in 1684. Pope, as he himself says, borrows the two first lines 5 10 |