which he was a member. He had a genius either for poetry or oratory; and, though very young, compofed feveral very agreeable pieces. In all probability he would have wrote as finely as his brother did nobly. He might have been the Waller, as the other was the Milton, of his time. The one might celebrate Marlborough, the other his beautiful offspring. This had not been fo fit to defcribe the actions of heroes as the virtues of private men. In a word, he had been fitter for my place; and, while his brother was writing upon the greatest men that any age ever produced, in a ftyle equal to them, he might have ferved as a panegyrift on him, This is all I think neceffary to fay of his family. I fhall proceed to himself and his writings; which I fhall firft treat of, because I know they are cenfured by fome out of envy, and more out of ignorance. The Splendid Shilling, which is far the leaft confiderable, has the more general reputation, and perhaps hinders the character of the reft. The style agreed fo well with the burlesque, that the ignorant thought it could become nothing else. Every body is pleased with that work. But to judge rightly of the other requires a perfect mastery of poetry and criticifm, a just contempt of the little turns and witticifms now in vogue, and, above all, a perfect understanding of poetical diction and description. All that have any taste of poetry will agree, that the great burlefque is much to be preferred to the low. It is much easier to make a great thing appear little, than a little one great: Cotton and others of a very low genius have done the former; but Philips, Garth, and Boileau, only the latter. A picture in miniature is every painter's talent; but a piece for a cupola, where all the figures are enlarged, yet proportioned to the eye, requires a master's hand. It muft ftill be more acceptable than the low burlefque, becaufe the images of the latter are mean and filthy, and the language itself entirely unknown to all men of good breeding. The ftyle of Billingfgate would not make a very agreeable figure at St. James's. A gentleman would would take but little pleasure in language, which he would think it hard to be accofted in, or in reading words which he could not pronounce without blufhing. The lofty burlefque is the more to be admired, because, to write it, the author must be mafter of two of the most different talents in nature. A talent to find out and expose what is ridiculous, is very different from that which is to raise and elevate. We must read Virgil and Milton for the one, and Horace and Hudibras for the other. We know that the authors of excellent comedies have often failed in the grave style, and the tragedian as often in comedy. Admiration and Laughter are of fuch opposite natures, that they are feldom created by the fame perfon. The man of mirth is always obferving the follies and weakneffes, the ferious writer the virtues or crimes, of mankind; one is pleased with contemplating a beau, the other a hero: even from the fame object they would draw different ideas: Achilles would appear in very different lights to Therfites and Alexander; the one would admire the courage and greatnefs of his foul; the other would ridicule the vanity and rashness of his temper. As the fatyrift fays to Hanibal: I curre per Alpes Ut pueris placeas, & declamatio fias. The contrariety of style to the fubject plea. fes the more strongly, because it is more furprifing; the expectation of the reader is pleafantly deceived, who expects an humble style from the fubject, or a great fubject from the ftyle. It pleases the more univerfally, because it is agreeable to the tafte both of the grave and the merry; but more particularly fo to those who have a relifh of the beft writers, and the nobleft fort of poetry. I fhall produce only one paffage out of this poet, which is the misfortune of his Galligafkins: My Galligafkins, which have long withstood This is admirably pathetical, and fhews very well the vciffitudes of fublunary things. The reft goes on to a prodigious height; and a mán in Greenland could hardly have made a more pathetick and terrible complaint. Is it not furprifing that the subject should be so mean, and the verse so pompous, that the least things in his poetry, as in a microscope, should grow great great and formidable to the eye; efpecially confidering that, not understanding French, he had no model for his ftyle? that he should have no writer to imitate, and himself be inimitable? that he should do all this before he was twenty? at an age which is ufually pleased with a glare of false thoughts, little turns, and unnatural fuftian? at an age, at which Cowley, Dryden, and I had almost faid Virgil, were inconfiderable? So foon was his imagination at its full ftrength, his judgement ripe, and his humour complete. This poem was written for his own diverfion, without any defign of publication. It was communicated but to me: but foon spread, and fell into the hands of pirates. It was put out, vilely mangled, by Ben Bragge; and impudently faid to be corrected by the author. This grievance is now grown more epidemical; and no man now has a right to his own thoughts; or a title to his own writings. Xenophon answered the Perfian, who demanded his arms, "We have nothing now "left but our arms and our valour; if we "furrender the one, how fhall we make ufe "of the other?" Poets have nothing but their Gg 4 |