It may be doubted whether Waller and Denham could have 222 over-borne the prejudices which had long prevailed, and which even then were sheltered by the protection of Cowley1. The new versification, as it was called, may be considered as owing its establishment to Dryden2; from whose time it is apparent that English poetry has had no tendency to relapse to its former savageness. The affluence and comprehension of our language is very 223 illustriously displayed in our poetical translations of ancient writers: a work which the French seem to relinquish in despair 3, and which we were long unable to perform with dexterity". Ben Jonson thought it necessary to copy Horace almost word by words; Feltham, his contemporary and adversary, considers it as indispensably requisite in a translation to give line for line. It is said that Sandys, whom Dryden calls the best versifier of the last age, has struggled hard to comprise every book of his 2 Post, DRYDEN, 343. Postscript to Virgil, speaking of the English language and poetry, Dryden says:-'Somewhat (give me leave to say) I have added to both of them in the choice of words and harmony of numbers, which were wanting (especially the last) in all our poets.' Works, xv. 187. ... 'Dryden first gave the English tongue regular harmony. It was his pen that formed the Congreves, the Priors, and the Addisons who succeeded him.' GOLDSMITH, Works, iii. 127. 'To Dryden and Pope the honour of having perfected our versification is commonly attributed; it is true only with respect to the couplet, the best example of which is assuredly to be found in Dryden.' SOUTHEY, Specimens, &c., Preface, p. 29. 'Milton's character of Dryden was, that he was a good rhymist, but no poet.' Ante, MILTON, 164. 3 Let the French and Italians value themselves on their regularity; strength and elevation are our standard. I said before, and I repeat it, that the affected purity of the French has unsinewed their heroic verse. The language of an epic poem is almost wholly figurative; yet they Jonson's Works, 1756, vii. 175. Owen Felltham wrote An Answer Felltham's Lusoria, 1661, p. 17. 224 225 English Metamorphoses in the same number of verses with the original. Holyday had nothing in view but to shew that he understood his author, with so little regard to the grandeur of his diction, or the volubility of his numbers, that his metres can hardly be called verses; they cannot be read without reluctance, nor will the labour always be rewarded by understanding them'. Cowley saw that such copyers' were a 'servile race'; he asserted his liberty, and spread his wings so boldly that he left his authors. It was reserved for Dryden to fix the limits of poetical liberty, and give us just rules and examples of translation 3. When languages are formed upon different principles, it is impossible that the same modes of expression should always be elegant in both. While they run on together the closest translation may be considered as the best; but when they divaricate each must take its natural course. Where correspondence cannot be obtained it is necessary to be content with something equivalent. Translation therefore,' says Dryden, 'is not so loose as paraphrase, nor so close as metaphrase ".' 4 All polished languages have different styles: the concise, the diffuse, the lofty, and the humble. In the proper choice of style COWLEY, 125. 'The copier is that servile imitator to whom Horace gives no better a name than that of animal.' DRYDEN, Works, xiv. 187. 'O imitatores, servum pecus!' HORACE, Epis. i. 19. 19. Works, xii. 16, 284; xiii. 119; xiv. 218; post, DRYDEN, 356. 3 4 Boswell wrote of his father:'We divaricate so much, as Dr. Johnson said.' Boswell's Johnson, ii. 382 n. 5 The way I have taken is not so strait as metaphrase nor so loose as paraphrase.' Works, xiv. 219. Metaphrase he defines as 'turning an author word by word, and line by line, from one language into another'; and paraphrase as 'translation with latitude, where the author is kept in view by the translator, so as never to be lost, but his words are not so strictly followed as his sense; and that too is admitted to be amplified, but not altered.' Ib. xii. 16. consists the resemblance which Dryden principally exacts from the translator. He is to exhibit his author's thoughts in such a dress of diction as the author would have given them, had his language been English: rugged magnificence is not to be softened; hyperbolical ostentation is not to be repressed, nor sententious affectation to have its points blunted. A translator is to be like his author: it is not his business to excel him. The reasonableness of these rules seems sufficient for their 226 vindication; and the effects produced by observing them were so happy that I know not whether they were ever opposed but by Sir Edward Sherburne, a man whose learning was greater than his powers of poetry, and who, being better qualified to give the meaning than the spirit of Seneca, has introduced his version of three tragedies by a defence of close translation. The authority of Horace 3, which the new translators cited in defence of their practice, he has, by a judicious explanation, taken fairly from them; but reason wants not Horace to support it. It seldom happens that all the necessary causes concur to any 227 great effect: will is wanting to power, or power to will, or both are impeded by external obstructions. The exigences in which Dryden was condemned to pass his life are reasonably supposed to have blasted his genius, to have driven out his works in a state of immaturity, and to have intercepted the full-blown elegance which longer growth would have supplied*. Poverty, like other rigid powers, is sometimes too hastily 228 accused. If the excellence of Dryden's works was lessened by his indigence, their number was increased; and I know not how it will be proved that if he had written less he would have written better 5; or that indeed he would have undergone the toil 'I have endeavoured to make Virgil speak such English as he would himself have spoken, if he had been born in England and in this present age.' Ib. xiv. 220. He says the same of his Juvenal. Ib. xiii. 122. 'Aubrey describes him and his brother as 'both excellent scholars and excellent poets.' Brief Lives, ii. 228. Sherburne thus ends his attack on the new school of translators:-'And this may be enough to manifest the groundless prejudice of these Fastidious Brisks.' Sherburne's Seneca, 1701, Preface, p. 38. 3 Ars Poetica, l. 133. 4 Pope says of Dryden's 'extreme haste in writing' that it'never ought to be imputed as a fault to him, but to those who suffered so noble a genius to lie under the necessity of it.' Iliad, 1760, i. 13. See also Dryden's Works, xiv. 206. Macaulay describes Scott as 'writing with the slovenly haste of Dryden in order to satisfy wants which were not, like those of Dryden, caused by circumstances beyond his control.' Macvey Napier Corres. p. 258. 5 'Dryden seems to me greater 229 of an author, if he had not been solicited by something more pressing than the love of praise1. But as is said by his Sebastian, 'What had been, is unknown; what is, appears '.' We know that Dryden's several productions were so many successive expedients for his support: his plays were therefore often borrowed 3, and his poems were almost all occasional. 230 In an occasional performance no height of excellence can be expected from any mind, however fertile in itself, and however stored with acquisitions *. He whose work is general and arbitrary has the choice of his matter, and takes that which his inclination and his studies have best qualified him to display and decorate. He is at liberty to delay his publication, till he has satisfied his friends and himself; till he has reformed his first thoughts by subsequent examination, and polished away those faults which the precipitance of ardent composition is likely to leave behind it 5. Virgil is related to have poured out a great number of lines in the morning, and to have passed the day in reducing them to fewer. 231 The occasional poet is circumscribed by the narrowness of his subject: whatever can happen to man has happened so often that little remains for fancy or invention'. We have been all born; we have most of us been married; and so many have died before us that our deaths can supply but few materials for a poet. In the fate of princes the publick has an interest; and what happens to them of good or evil the poets have always considered as business for the Muse. But after so many inauguratory gratulations, nuptial hymns, and funeral dirges, he must be highly favoured by nature or by fortune who says any thing not said before. Even war and conquest, however splendid, suggest no new images; the triumphal chariot of a victorious monarch can be decked only with those ornaments that have graced his predecessors. Not only matter but time is wanting. The poem must not be 232 delayed till the occasion is forgotten. The lucky moments of animated imagination cannot be attended; elegances and illustrations cannot be multiplied by gradual accumulation: the composition must be dispatched while conversation is yet busy and admiration fresh; and haste is to be made lest some other event should lay hold upon mankind. Occasional compositions may however secure to a writer the 233 praise both of learning and facility; for they cannot be the effect of long study, and must be furnished immediately from the treasures of the mind. The death of Cromwell was the first publick event which called 234 forth Dryden's poetical powers". His heroick stanzas have beauties and defects; the thoughts are vigorous, and though not always proper shew a mind replete with ideas; the numbers are smooth, and the diction, if not altogether correct, is elegant and easy. Davenant was perhaps at this time his favourite author, though 235 Gondibert never appears to have been popular3; and from Davenant he learned to please his ear with the stanza of four lines alternately rhymed. 1 Ante, DRYDEN, 7 ; post, 338. Ante, DRYDEN, 24. Dryden, in his Essay of Heroic Plays (1672), says of Davenant's dramas:-'We are bound, with all veneration to his memory, to acknowledge what advantage we received from that excellent ground-work which he laid.' Works, IV. 20. 3 [It is styled An Heroick Poem, and fills 165 folio pages. It was praised by Cowley, Waller, and Hobbes, but 'Four eminent wits of that age (two of which were St John Denham and Mr. Donne) published several copies of verses to Sir William's discredit under this title, Certain Verses Written by Several of the Author's Friends, to be reprinted with the Second edition of Gondibert. London, 1653.' Langbaine's Dram. Poets, p. 112. See also Ath. Oxon. iii. 808, where the 'wits' are given as 'Sir John Denham, Jo. Donne, Sir Allen Broderick, &c.' Donne would be the son of the Dean of St. Paul's (1604-62), who published 'several frivolous trifles under his own name.' Fasti, i. 503. He was the author of Donne's Satyr, a ribald production.] 4 Gondibert begins :- |