ing difficult to perform, there yet remains an harder tafk; and 'tis a fecret of which few tranflators have fufficiently thought. I have already hinted a word or two concerning it; that is, the maintaining the character of an author, which diftinguishes him from all others, and makes him appear that individual poet whom you would interpret. For example, not only the thoughts, but the ftyle and verfification of Virgil and Ovid are very different. Yet I fee even in our best poets, who have tranflated fome parts of them, that they have confounded their feveral talents; and by endeavouring only at the fweetnefs and harmony of numbers, have made them both fo much alike, that if I did not know the originals, I fhould never be able to judge by the copies, which was Virgil, and which was Ovid. It was objected against a late noble painter (Sir P. Lely) that he drew many graceful pictures, but few of them were alike. And this happened to him, becaufe he always ftudied himself more than those who fat to him. In fuch tranflators I can easily diftinguish the hand which performed the work, but I cannot diftinguish their poet from another. Suppofe two authors are equally fweet, yet there is a great diftinction to be made in fweetness; as in that of fugar, and in that of honey. I can make the difference more plain, by giving you (if it be worth knowing) my.own me. thod of proceeding in my tranflations out of four feveral poets; Virgil, Theocritus, Lucretius, and Horace. In each of thefe, before I undertook them, I confidered the genius and diftinguishing character of my author. I looked on Virgil as a fuccinct, grave, and majeftic writer; one who weighed, not only every thought, but every word and fyllable; who was ftill aiming to croud his fenfe into as narrow a compafs as poffibly he could; for which reafon he is fo very figurative, that he requires (I may almoft fay) a grammar apart to conftrue him. His verfe is every where founding the very thing in your ears whofe fenfe it bears; yet the numbers are perpetually varied, to encreafe the delight of the reader; fo that the fame founds are never repeated twice toge ther. On the contrary, Ovid and Claudian, though they write in ftyles dif fering from each other, yet have each of them but one fort of mufic in their verfes. All the verification and little variety of Claudian is included within the compafs of four or five lines, and then he begins again in the fame tenour; perpetually clofing his fenfe at the end of a verfe, and verfe commonly which they call golden, or two fubftantives and two adjectives, with a verb betwixt them to keep the peace. Ovid, with all his fweetnefs, has as little variety of numbers and found as he he is always, as it were, upon the hand-gallop, and his verfe runs upon carpetground. He avoids, like the other, all fynalæphas, or cutting off one vowel when it comes before another, in the following word. But to return to Virgil: though he is smooth where smoothnefs is required, yet he is fo far from affecting it, that he feems rather to difdain it; frequently makes ufe of fynalæphas; and concludes his fenfe in the middle of his verfe. He is every where above conceits of epigrammatic wit, and grofs hyperboles: he maintains majefty in the midft of plainnefs; he fhines, but glares not; and is ftately without ambition, which is the vice of Lucan, I drew my definition of poetical wit from my particular confideration of him: for propriety of thoughts and words are only to be found in him; and where they are proper, they will be delightful. Pleafure follows of necefity, as the effect does the caufe; and therefore is not to be put into the definition. This exact propriety of Virgil I particularly regarded as a great part of his character; but must confefs to my fhame, that I have not been able to trandate any part of him fo well, as to make him appear wholly like himself: for where the original is clofe, no verfion can reach it in the fame compass. Hannibal Caro's, in the Italian, is the neareft, the moft poetical, and the most fonorous of any tranflation of the Eneid: yet, though he takes the advantage of blank verfe, he commonly allows two lines for one of Virgil, and does not always hit his fenfe. Taffo tells us, in his letters, that Sperone Speroni, 3 C Speroni, a great Italian wit, who was his contemporary, obferved of Virgil and Tully, that the Latin orator endeavoured to imitate the copioufnefs of Homer, the Greek poet; and that the Latin poet made it his bufinefs to reach the concifenefs of Demofthenes, the Greek orator. Virgil therefore, being fo very fparing of his words, and leaving fo much to be imagined by the reader, can never be tranflated as he ought, in any modern tongue. To make him copious is to alter his character; and to tranflate him line for line is impoffible, because the Latin is naturally a more fuccinct language than either the Italian, Spanish, French, or even than the English, which, by reafon of its monofyllables, is far the most compendious of them. Virgil is much the closest of any Roman poet, and the Latin hexameter has more feet than the English heroic. Dryden. § 100. The Nature of Wit in Writing. eyes the abfent object as perfectly and more delightfully than nature. So then the first happiness of a poet's imagination, is properly invention, or finding of the thought; the fecond is fancy, or the variation, drefling or moulding of that thought, as the judgment reprefents it, proper to the fabject; the third is elocution, or the art of cloathing and adorning that thought, fo found and varied, in apt, fignificant, and founding words: the quicknefs of the imagination is feen in the invention, the fertility in the fancy, and accuracy in the expreflion. For the first of thefe, Ovid is famous amongst the poets; for the latter, Virgil. Ovid images more often the movements and affections of the mind, either combating between two contrary paffions, or extremely dif compofed by one. His words therefore are the least part of his care; for he pictures nature in diforder, with which the study and choice of words is inconfiftent. This is the proper wit of dialogue or difcourfe, and confequently of the drama, where all that is faid is to be fuppofed the effect of fudden thought; which though it excludes not the quicknefs of wit in repartees, yet admits not a too curious election of words, too frequent allufions, or ufe of tropes, or, in fine, any thing that fhews remoteness of thought or labour in the writer. On the other fide,Virgil fpeaks not fo often to us in the perfon of another, like Ovid, but in his own: he relates almost all things. as from himself, and thereby gains more liberty than the other to exprefs his thoughts with all the graces of elocution, to write more figuratively, and to confefs as well the labour as the force The compofition of all poems is, or ought to be, of wit; and wit in poetry, or wit-writing (if you will give me leave to use a school-diftinction) is no other than the faculty of imagination in the writer, which, like a nimble spaniel, beats over and ranges through the field of memory, till it fprings the quarry it hunted after; or, without a metaphor, which fearches over all the memory for the fpecies or ideas of thofe things which it defigns to reprefent. Wit written is that which is well defined, the happy refult of thought, or product of imagination. But to proceed from wit, in the general notion of it, to the proper wit of an heroic or hiftorical poem; I judge it chiefly to confift in the delightful imagination of perfons, actions, paffions, or things. 'Tis not the jerk or fting of an epigram, nor the feeming contradiction of a poor antithefis (the delight of an ill-judging audience in a play of rhyme) nor the jingle of a more poor paranomafia; neither is it fo much the morality of a grave fentence, affected by Lucan, but more fparingly ufed by Virgil; but it is fome lively and apt defcription, dreffed in fuch colours of fpeech that it fets before your of his imagination. Though he defcribes his Dido well and naturally, in the violence of her paffions, yet he mut yield in that to the Myrrha, the Biblis, the Althæa, of Ovid; for as great an admirer of him as I am, I must acknowledge, that if I fee not more of their fouls than I fee of Dido's, at least I have a greater concernment for them: and that convinces me, that Ovid has touched thofe tender ftrokes more delicately than Virgil could. But when actions or perfons are to be defcribed, when any fuch image is to be fet before us, ( 755 ) us, how bold, how masterly are the ftrokes of Virgil! We fee the objects he prefents us with in their native figures, in their proper motions; but fo we fee them, as our own eyes could never have beheld them fo beautiful in themselves. We fee the foul of the poet, like that univerfal one of which he fpeaks, informing and moving through all his pictures: -Totamque infufa per artus Mens agitat molem, & magno fe corpore mifcet. We behold him embellishing his images, as he makes Venus breathing beauty upon her fon Æneas. -lumenque juventæ Purpureum, & lætos oculis affârat honores : Quale manus addunt ebori decus, aut ubi flavo Argentum Pariufve lapis circumdatur auro. are fufficiently underfood without raif- whether he has ideas in his mind or not. See his tempeft, his funeral fports, his his Georgics, which I efteem the divin- to the Pifos: Dixeris egregiè notum fi callida verbum Dryden. § 101. Examples that Words may affect without raifing Images. I find it very hard to perfuade feveral that their paffions are affected by words from whence they have no ideas; and yet harder to convince them, that in the ordinary courfe of converfation we Mr. Blacklock, a poet blind from his 3C 2 Saunderfon, profeffor of mathematics in the university of Cambridge. This learned man had acquired great knowledge in natural philofophy, in aftronomy, and whatever fciences depend upon mathematical skill. What was the moft extraordinary, and the moft to my purpose, he gave excellent lectures upon light and colours; and this man taught others the theory of thofe ideas which they had, and which he himself undoubtedly had not. But the truth is, that the words red, blue, green, anfwered to him as well as the ideas of the colours themfelves; for the ideas of greater or leffer degrees of refrangibility being applied to thefe words, and the blind man being inftructed in what other refpects they were found to agree or to difagree, it was as eafy for him to reafon upon the words, as if he had been fully mafter of the ideas. Indeed it must be owned he could make no new discoveries in the way of experiment. He did nothing but what we do every day in common difcourfe. When I wrote this laft fentence, and ufed the words every day and common difcourfe, I had no images in my mind of any fucceffion of time; nor of men in conference with each other; nor do I imagine that the reader will have any fuch ideas on reading it. Neither when I fpoke of red, blue, and green, as well as of refrangibility, had I these feveral colours, or the rays of light paffing into a different medium, and there diverted from their courfe, painted before me in the way of images. I know very well that the mind poffeffes a faculty of raifing fuch images at pleafure; but then an act of the will is neceffary to this; and in ordinary converfation or reading it is very rarely that any image at all is excited in the mind. If I fay," I fhall go to Italy next fummer," I am well underfood. Yet I believe nobody has by this painted in his imagination the exact Egure of the speaker paling by land or by water, or both; fometimes on horfeback, fometimes in a carriage; with all the particulars of the journey. Still lefs has he any idea of Italy, the country to which I propofed to go; or of the greennefs of the fields, the ripening of the fruits, and the warmth of the air, with the change to this from a different feafon, which are the ideas for which the word fummer is fubftituted; but leaft of all has he any image from the word next; for this word ftands for the idea of many fummers, with the exclufion of, all but one: and furely the man who fays next fummer, has no images of fuch a fucceffion, and fuch an exclufion. In fhort, it is not only thofe ideas which are commonly called abstract, and of which no image at all can be found, but even of particular real beings, that we converfe without having any idea of them excited in the imagination; as will certainly appear on a diligent exa mination of our own minds. Burke on the Sublime. $ 102. The real Characteristics of the Whig and Tory Parties. When we compare the parties of Whig and Tory to thofe of Roundhead and Cavalier, the most obvious difference which appears betwixt them, confifts in the principles of paffive obedience and indefeasible right, which were but little heard of among the Cavaliers, but became the univerfal doctrine, and were esteemed the true characteristic of a Tory. Were these principles pushed into their most obvious confequences, they imply a formal renunciation of all our liberties, and an avowal of abfolute monarchy; fince nothing can be a greater abfurdity than a limited power which must be refifted, even when it exceeds, its limitations. But as the moft rational principles are often but a weak counterpoife to paffion, 'tis no wonder that thefe abfurd principles, fufficient, according to a celebrated author, to fhock the common fenfe of a Hottentot or Samoiede, were found too weak for that effect. The Tories, as men, were enemies to oppreffion; and alfo, as Englishmen, they were enemies to defpotic power. Their zeal for liberty was, perhaps, lefs fervent than that of their antagonists, but was fufficient to make them forget all their general principles, when they faw themfelves openly threatened with a fubverfion of the ancient government. From these fentiments arofe the Re volution; $103. Painting disagreeable in Women. volution; an event of mighty confequence, and the firmeft foundation of British liberty. The conduct of the Tories, during that event and after it, will afford us a true infight into the nature of that party. In the firit place, they appear to have had the fentiments of a True Briton in them in their affection to liberty, and in their determined refolution not to facrifice it to any abftract principles whatfoever, or to any imaginary rights of princes. This part of their character might justly have been doubted of before the Revolution, from the obvious tendency of their avowed principles, and from their almost unbounded compliances with a court, which made lit tle fecret of its arbitrary defigns. The Revolution fhewed them to have been in this refpect nothing but a genuine court party, fuch as might be expected in a British government; that is, lovers of liberty, but greater lovers of monarchy. It must, however, be confeft, that they carried their monarchical principles farther, even in practice, but more fo in theory, than was, in any degree, confiftent with a limited go vernment. Secondly, Neither their principles nor affections concurred, entirely or heartily, with the fettlement made at the Revolution, or with that which has fince taken place. This part of their character may feem contradictory to the former, fince any other fettlement, in thofe circumstances of the nation, muft probably have been dangerous, if not fatal to liberty. But the heart of man is made to reconcile contradictions; and this contradiction is not greater than that betwixt paffive obedience, and the refitance employed at the Revolution. A Tory, therefore, fince the Revolution, may be defined in a few words to be a lover of monarchy, though without abandoning liberty, and a partizan of the family of Stuart; as a Whig may be defined to be a lover of liberty, though without renouncing monarchy; and a friend to the fettlement in the proteftant line. Hume's Effays. A lady's face, like the coat in the Tale of a Tub, if left alone, will wear well; but if you offer to load it with foreign ornaments, you destroy the original ground. my Among other matter of wonder on first coming to town, I was much furprised at the general appearance of youth among the ladies. At prefent there is no diftin&tion in their complexions between a beauty in her teens and a lady in her grand climacteric; yet at the fame time I could not but take notice of the wonderful variety in the face of the fame lady. I have known an olive beauty on Monday grow very ruddy and blooming on Tuefday; turn pale on Wednesday; come round to the olive hue again on Thurfday; and in a word, change her complexion as often as her gown. I was amazed to find no old aunts in this town, except a few unfashionable people, whom no body knows; the reit ftill continuing in the zenith of their youth and health, and falling off, like timely fruit, without any previous decay. All this was a myftery that I could not unriddle, till on being introduced to fome ladies, I unluckily improved the hue of my lips at the expence of a fair one, who unthinkingly had turned her cheek; and found that my kiffes were given (as is obferved in the epigram), like thofe of Pyramus, through a wall. I then dif covered, that this furprifing youth and beauty was all counterfeit, and that (as Hamlet fays) "God had given them one face, and they had made themselves another." I have mentioned the accident of my carrying off half a lady's face by a fa lute, that your courtly dames may learn to put on their faces a little tighter; but as for my own daughters, while fuch fafhions prevail, they fhall ftill remain in Yorkshire. There, I think, they are pretty fafe; for this unnatural fashion will hardly make its way into the country, as this vamped complexion would not ftand against the rays of the fun, and would inevitably melt away in a country-dance. The ladies have, indeed, been 3C 3 |