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Poor Shakspeare fuffers by his pen each day, While Grub-freet alleys own his lawful fway. Now turn, my mufe, thy quick, poetic eyes, And view gay fcenes and opening profpects rife. Hark how his ruftic numbers charm around, While groves to groves, and hills to hills refound! The liftening beafts ftand fearless as he fings, And birds attentive clofe their ufelefs wings. -The fwains and fatyrs trip it o'er the plain, And think old Spenfer is reviv'd again. But when once more the godlike man begun In words smooth flowing from his tuneful tongue, Ravish'd they gaze, and ftruck with wonder fay, Sure Spenfer's felf ne'er fung fo sweet a lay: Sure once again Eliza glads the ifle, That the kind muses thus propitious smile

(From the proud epic, down to these that shade The gentler brow of the foft Lesbian maid) Go to the good and just, an awful train, Thy foul's delight, and glory of the fane: While through the earth thy dear remembrance flies,

"Sweet to the world, and grateful to the skies." SIMON HARCOURT.

TO MR. POPE,

BY MR. HARTE.

To move the fprings of nature as we please;

Why gaze ye thus? Why all this wonder, fwains?-To think with fpirit, but to write with cafe;

'Tis Pope that fings, and Carolina reigns.

But hold, my mufe! whofe awkward verse betrays Thy want of fkill, nor fhews the poet's praise; Ceafe then, and leave fome fitter bard to tell How Pope in every ftrain can write, in every ftrain excel.

TO MR. POPE,

ON THE PUBLISHING HIS WORKS.

He comes, he comes! bid every bard prepare
The fong of triumph, and attend his car.
Great Sheffield's mufe the long proceffion heads,
And throws a luftre o'er the pomp fhe leads;
Firft gives the palm fhe fir'd him to obtain,
Crowns his gay brow, and fhews him how to reign.
Thus young Alcides, by old Chiron taught,
Was form'd for all the miracles he wrought:
Thus Chiron did the youth he taught applaud,
Pleas'd to behold the earnest of a God.

But hark! what fhouts, what gathering crowds
rejoice!

Unftain'd their praife by any venial voice,
Such as th' ambitious vainly think their due,
When proftitutes, or needy flatterers fuc.
And fee the chief! before him laurels borne ;
Trophies from undeferving temples torn :
Here Rage enchain'd reluctant raves; and there
Pale Envy dumb, and fick'ning with defpair,
Prone to the earth fhe bends her lothing eye,
Weak to fupport the blaze of majesty.

But what are they that turn the facred page?
Three lovely virgins, and of equal age;
Intent they read, and all enamour'd feem,
As he that met his likenefs in the ftream:
The Graces thefe; and fee how they contend,
Who most shall praife, who beft fhall recommend.
The chariot now the painful fleep afcends,
The Paans ceafe; thy glorious labour ends.
Here fix'd, the bright eternal temple ftands,
Its profpect an unbounded view commands:
Say, wondrous youth, what column wilt thou
choose,

What laurel'd arch for thy triumphant mufe? Though each great ancient court thee to his fhrine, Though every laurel through the dome be thine,

With living words to warm the confcious heart, | Or please the foul with nicer charms of art; For this the Grecian foar'd in epic strains, And fofter Maro left the Mantuan plains: Melodious Spenfer felt the lover's fire, And awful Milton frung his heavenly lyre.

'Tis yours, like thefe, with curious toil to trace
The powers of language, harmony, and grace;
How Nature's felf with living luftre fhines,
How judgment ftrengthens, and how art refines;
How to grow bold with confcious fenfe of fame,
And force a pleasure which we dare not blame;
To charm us more through negligence than pains,
And give ev'n life and action to the strains:
Led by fome law, whofe powerful impulse guides
Each happy ftroke, and in the foul prefides;
Some fairer image of perfection given
T' infpire mankind, itfelf deriv'd from heaven.
O ever worthy, ever crown'd with praise,
Bleft in thy life, and bleft in all thy lays!
Add that the Sifters every thought refine,
Or ev'n thy life be faultlefs as thy line;
Yet Envy ftill with fiercer rage pursues,
Obfcures the virtue, and defames the mufe.
A foul like thine, in pains, in grief refign'd,
Views with vain fcorn the malice of mankind :
Not critics, but their planets, prove unjust;
And are they blam'd who fin because they muft?
Yet fure not fo muft all perufe thy lays:

I cannot rival-and yet dare to praife.
A thoufand charms at once my thoughts engage;
Sappho's foft fweetnefs, Pindar's warmer rage,
Statius' free vigour, Virgil's ftudious care,
And Homer's force, and Ovid's easier air.

So feems fome picture, where exact defign, And curious pains, and ftrength, and sweetness join; Where the free thought its pleafing grace bestowe, And each warm ftroke with living colour glows; Soft without weaknefs, without labour fair, Wrought up at once with happiness and care!

How bleft the man that fron the world removes, To joys that Merdaunt, or his Pope, approves; Whofe tafte exact each author can explore, And live the present and past ages o'er ; Who, free from pride, from penitence, or ftrife, Moves calmly forward to the verge of life;

Earl of Peterborough.

Such be my days, and such my fortunes be,
To live by reafon, and to write by thee!

Nor deem this verse, though humble, a disgrace:
All are not born the glory of their race:
Yet all are born t' adore the great man's name,
And trace his footsteps in the paths to fame.
The mufe, who now this early homage pays,
First learn'd from thee to animate her lays:
A mufe as yet unhonour'd, but unstain'd,
Who prais'd no vices, no preferment gain'd;
Unbiafs'd or to cenfure or commend,

Who knows no envy, and who grieves no friend; Perhaps too fond to make those virtues known, And fix her fame immortal on thy own.

THE TRIUMVIRATE OF POETS,

BY MRS. TOLLET.

BRITAIN with Greece and Rome contended long
For lofty genius and poetic fong,

Till this Auguftan age with Three was bleft
To fix the prize, and finish the contest.
In Addison, immortal Virgil reigns;
So pure his numbers, fo refin'd his ftrains :
Of nature full, with more impetuous heat,
In Prior Horace fhines, fublimely great.
Thy country, Homer! we dispute no more,
For Pope has fix'd it to his native shore.
A iiij

PREFACE.

I think a good deal may be faid to extenuate the fault of bad Poets. What we call a Genius, is hard to be diftinguished, by a man himself, from a strong inclination: and if his genius be ever so great, he cannot at firft difcover it any other way, than by giving way to that prevalent propensity which renders him the more liable to be mistaken. The only method he has is to make the experiment by writing, and appealing to the judgment of others now, if he happens to write ill(which is certainly no fin in itself), he is immediately made an object of ridicule. I wish we had the huma

I AM inclined to think, that both the writers of books and the readers of them, are generally not a little unreasonable in their expectations. The firft feem to fancy that the world muft approve of whatever they produce, and the latter to imagine that authors are obliged to plcafe them at any rate. Methinks, as, on the one hand, no fingle man is born with a right of controuling the opinions of all the reft; fo, on the other, the world has no title to demand, that the whole care and time of any particular perfon should be facrificed to its entertainnient. Therefore, I cannot but believe that writers and readers are under equal obliga-nity to reflect, that even the worst authors might, tions, for as much fame, or pleasure, as each affords the other.

Every one acknowledges, it would be a wild notion to expect perfection in any work of man : and yet one would think the contrary was taken for granted, by the judgment commonly paffed upon poems. A critic fuppofes he has done his part, if he proves a writer to have failed in an expreffion, or erred in any particular point and can it then be wondered at, if the Poets, in general, feem refolved not to own themselves in any error? For, as long as one fide will make no allowances, the other will be brought to no acknowledgments*.

in their endeavour to please us, deserve something at our hands. We have no cause to quarrel with them but for their obstinacy in perfifting to write; and this too may admit of alleviating circumftances. Their particular friends may be either ignorant or infincere; and the reft of the world in general is too well-bred to fhock them with a truth, which generally their bookfellers are the firft that inform them of. This happens not till they have spent too much of their time, to apply to any profeffion which might better fit their ta lents; and till fuch talents as they have are fo far difcredited as to be but of small service to them. For (what is the hardeft cafe imaginable) the reI am afraid this extreme zeal on both fides is ill-putation of a man generally depends upon the first placed; Poetry and Criticism being by no means the univerfal concern of the world, but only the affair of idle men who write in their closets, and of idle men who read there.

Yet fure, upon the whole, a bad author deferves better ufage than a bad critic: for a writer's endeavour, for the most part, is to please his readers, and he fails merely through the misfortune of an ill judgment; but fuch a critic's is to put them out of humour; a defign he could never go upon without both that and an ill temper.

fteps he makes in the world; and people will establish their opinion of us, from what we do at that feafon, when we have least judgment to direct us.

On the other hand, a good poet no fooner communicates his works with the fame defire of information, but it is imagined he is a vain young creature given up to the ambition of fame; when perhaps the poor man is all the while trembling with the fear of being ridiculous. If he is made to hope he may please the world, he falls under very unlucky circumstances: for, from the moIn the former editions it was thus" For as ment he prints, he must expect to hear no more a long as one fide defpifes a well-meant endeavour, the truth, than if he were a prince, or a beauty. If "other will not be fatisfied with a moderate approba- he has not very good fenfe (and indeed there are "tion."-out the Author altered it, as these words twenty men of wit for one man of sense), his lievere rather a confequence from the conclufion be would ving thus in a course of flattery may put him in aw, than the conclufion itself, which be has now inferted.no imall danger of becoming a coxcomb: if he

has, he will confequently have so much diffidence as not to reap any great fatisfaction from his praife; fince, if it be given to his face, it can fcarce be diftinguifhed from flattery, and if in his abfence, it is hard to be certain of it. Were he fure to be commended by the best and most knowing, he is as fure of being envied by the worft and moft ignorant, which are the majority; for it is with a fine genius, as with a fine fashion, all those are difpleafed at it who are not able to follow it and it is to be feared that esteem will feldom do any man fo much good, as ill-will does him harm Then there is a third clafs of people who make the largest part of mankind, thofe of ordinary or indifferent capacities; and thefe (to a man) will hate or fufpect him: a hundred honeft gentlemen will dread him as a wit, and a hundred innocent women as a fatirift. In a word, whatever be his fate in poetry, it is ten to one but he muft give up all the reasonable aims of life for it. There are indeed fome advantages accruing from a ge nius to poetry, and they are all I can think of: the agreeable power of felf-amufement when a man is idle or alone; the privilege of being admitted into the beft company; and the freedom of faying as many careless things as other people, without being fo feverely remarked upon.

I believe, if any one, early in his life, fhould contemplate the dangerous fate of authors, he would fcarce be of their number on any confideration. The life of a wit is a warfare upon earth; and the prefent fpirit of the learned world is fuch, that to attempt to ferve it (any way) one must have the conftancy of a martyr, and a refolution to fuffer for its fake. I could with people would believe, what I am pretty certain they will not, that I have been much lefs concerned about fame than I durft declare till this occafion, when methinks I fhould find more credit than I could heretofore, fince my writings have had their fate already, and it is too late to think of prepoffeffing the reader in their favour. I would plead it as fome merit in me, that the world has never been prepared for thefe trifles by prefaces, biaffed by recommendations, dazzled with the names of great patrons, wheedled with fine reafons and pretences, or troubled with excuses. I confess it was want of confideration that made me an author: I writ because it amufed me; I corrected because it was as pleasant to me to correct as to write; and I published because I was told I might please such as it was a credit to pleafe. To what degree I have done this, I am really ignorant; I had too much fondness for my productions to judge of them at first, and too much judgment to be pleased with them at laft. But I have reafon to think they can have no reputation which will continue long, or which deferves to do fo; for they have always fallen fhort not only of what I read of others, but even of my own ideas of poetry.

If any one fhould imagine I am not in earnest, I defire him to reflect, that the Ancients (to fay the haft of them) had as much genius as we; and that to take more pains, and employ more time, cannot fal to produce more complete pieces. They con

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ftantly applied themselves not only to that art, but to that fingle branch of an art, to which their talent was most powerfully bent; and it was the bufinefs of their lives to correct and finish their works for pofterity. If we can pretend to have used the fame induftry, let us expect the fame immortality: Though, if we took the fame care, we fhould fill lie under a further misfortune: they writ in languages that became universal and everlasting, while ours are extremely limited both in extent and in duration: A mighty foundation for our pride when the utmoft we can hope is but to be read in one ifland, and to be thrown afide at the end of one age.

All that is left us is to recommend our produc tions by the imitation of the Ancients; and it will be found true, that, in every age, the higheft character for fenfe and learning has been obtained by those who have been moft indebted to them. For, to fay truth, whatever is very good fenfe, must have been common fenfe in all times, and what we call Learning, is but the knowledge of the fense of our predeceffors Therefore they who fay our thoughts are not our own, because they refemble the Ancients, may as well fay our faces are not our own, because they are like our Fathers: And indeed it is very unreasonable, that people fhould expect us to be fcholars, and yet be angry to find us fo.

I fairly confefs that I have ferved myfelf all I could by reading; that I made ufe of the judgment of authors dead and living; that I omitted no means in my power to be informed of my errors, both by my friends and enemies: But the true reafon these pieces are not more correct, is owing to the confideration how fhort a time they and I have to live: One may be afhamed to confume half one's days in bringing fenfe and rhyme together; and what critic can be fo unreafonable, as not to leave a man time enough for any more ferious employment, or more agreeable amufement?

The only plea I fhall ufe for the favour of the public, is, that I have as great a refpect for it, as moft authors have for themselves; and that I have facrificed much of my own felf-love for its fake, in preventing not only many mean things from seeing the light, but many which I thought tolerable. I would not be like those authors, who forgive themfelves fome particular lines for the fake of a whole poem and vice verfa a whole poem for the fake of fome particular lines. I believe, no one qualifi cation is so likely to make a good writer, as the power of rejecting his own thoughts; and it must be this (if any thing) that can give me a chance to be one. For what I have published, I can only hope to be pardoned; but for what I have burned, I deferve to be praifed. On this account the world is under fome obligation to me, and owes me the juftice in return, to look upon no verfes as mine that are not inferted in this collection. And perhaps nothing could make it worth my while to own what are really fo, but to avoid the imputation of fo many dull and immoral things, as partly by malice, and partly by ignorance, have been afcribed to me. I must further acquit myself of the prefumption of having at my name to re

commend any mifcellanies, or works of other men; a thing I never thought becoming a perfon who has hardly credit enough to answer for his own. In this office of collecting my pieces, I am altogether uncertain, whether to look upon myself as a man building a monument, or burying the dead. If time fhall make it the former, may thefe poems (as long as they laft) remain as a teftimony that their author never made his talents fubfervient to the mean and unworthy ends of party or felf-intereft; the gratification of public prejudices or private paffions; the flattery of the undeferving, or the infult of the unfortunate. If I have written well, let it be confidered that it is what no man can do without good fenfe; a quality that not only renders one capable of being a good writer, but a good man. And if I have made any acquifition in the opinion of any one under the notion of the former, let it be continued to me under no other title than that of the latter.

with my writings, or with this apology for them. I am fenfible how difficult it is to speak of one's felf with decency: but when a man muft fpeak of himself, the best way is to speak truth of himself, or, he may depend upon it, others will do it for him. I'll therefore make this Preface a general confeffion of all my thoughts of my own poetry, refolving with the fame freedom to expofe myfelf, as it is in the power of any other to expose them. In the first place, I thank God and nature, that I was born with a love to poetry; for nothing more conduces to fill up all the intervals of our time, or, if rightly used, to make the whole course of life entertaining: "Cantantes licet ufque (minus via lædet)." It is a vast happiness to poffefs the pleafures of the head, the only pleasures in which a man is fufficient to himself, and the only part of him which, to his fatisfaction, he can employ all day long. The Mufes are "amicæ omnium horarum;" and, like our gay acquaintance, the best company in the world, as long as one expects no real fervice from them. I confefs there was a time when I was in love with myself, and my firft productions were the children of self-love upon innocence. I had made an Epic Poem, and Panegyrics on all the princes in Europe, and thought myself the greateft genius that ever was. I cannot but regret thofe delightful visions of my childhood, which, like the fine colours we fee when our eyes are faut, are vanished for ever. Many trials, and fad experience, have fo undeceived me by degrees, that I am utterly at a lofs at what rate to value myself. As for fame, I shall be glad of any I can get, and not repine at any I mifs; and, as for vanity, I have enough to keep me from hanging myfelf, or even from wishing thofe hanged who would take it away. It was this that made me write. The fenfe of my faults made me correct; besides, that it was as pleasant to me to correct as to write.

But if this publication be only a more folemn funeral of my remains, I defire it to be known that I die in charity, and in my fenfes; without any murmurs against the justice of this age, or any mad appeals to pofterity. I declare I fhall think the world in the right, and quietly fubmit to every truth which time thall difcover to the prejudice of these writings; not fo much as wishing fo irrational a thing, as that every body should be deceived merely for my credit. However, I defire it may be then confidered, That there are very few things in this collection which were not written under the age of five-and-twenty; fo that my youth may be made (as it never fails to be in executions) a cafe of compaffion: That I was never fo concerned about my works as to vindicate them in print, believing, if any thing was good, it would defend itfelf, and what was bad could never be defended: That I ufed no artifice to raise or continue a reputation, depreciated no dead author I was obliged to, bribed no living At p. 9. c. 2. 1. 26. In the first place, I own that one with unjust praife, infulted no adverfary with I have ufed my beft endeavours to the finishing ill language; or, when I could not attack a rival's these pieces: That I made what advantage I works, encouraged reports against his morals.could of the judgment of authors dead and living; 'Fo conclude, if this volume perish, let it serve as a warning to the critics, not to take too much pains for the future to deftroy fuch things as will die of themselves; and a memento mori to fome of my vain contemporaries the Poets, to teach them that, when real merit is wanting, it avails nothing to have been encouraged by the great, commended by the nent, and favoured by the public in general. Nov. 10. 1716.

and that I omitted no means in my power to be informed of my errors by my friends and my enemies: And that I expect no favour on account of my youth, bulinefs, want of health, or any fuch idle excufes. But the true reafon they are not yet more correct, is owing to the confideration emi-how fhort a time they, and I, have to live. A man that can expect but fixty years, may be afhamed to employ thirty in meafuring fyllables, and bringing fenfe and rhyme together. We fpend our youth in purfuit of riches or fame, in hopes to enjoy them when we are old; and when we are old, we find it too late to enjoy any thing. I therefore hope the Wits will pardon me, if I referve fome of my time to fave my foul; and that fome wife men will be of my opinion, even if I fhould think a part of it better spent in the enjoyments of life, than in pleafing the critics.

VARIATIONS in the Author's Manufcript Preface.

AFTER page 9. c. 1. 1. 27. it followed thus: For my part, I confefs, had I feen things in this view, at first, the public had never been troubled either

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