Spenser's false Florimel made of snow, it melts and vanishes when the true one comes in sight. I will not excuse but justify myself for one pretended crime, with which I am liable to be charged by false critics, not only in this translation, but in many of my original poems-that I Latinise too much. It is true, that, when I find an English word significant and sounding, I neither borrow from the Latin nor any other language: but when I want at home, I must seek abroad. If sounding words are not of our growth and manufacture, who shall hinder me to import them from a foreign country? I carry not out the treasure of the nation, which is never to return but what I bring from Italy I spend in England: here it remains, and here it circulates: for, if the coin be good, it will pass from one hand to another. I trade both with the living and the dead, for the enrichment of our native language. We have enough in England to supply our necessity; but, if we will have things of magnificence and splendour, we must get them by commerce. Poetry requires ornament; and that is not to be had from our old Teuton monosyllables; therefore, if I find any elegant word in a classic author, I propose it to be naturalized, by using it myself; and if the public approves of it, the bill passes. But every man cannot distinguish between pedantry and poetry: every man therefore is not fit to innovate. On the whole matter, a poet must first be certain that the word he would introduce is beautiful in the Latin, and is to consider, in the next place, whether it will agree with the English idiom; after this, he ought to take the opinion of judicious friends, such as are learned in both languages: and lastly, since no inan is infallible, let him use this license very sparingly; for, if too many foreign words are poured in on us, it looks as if they were designed not to assist the natives, but to conquer them. I am now drawing towards a conclusion, and' suspect your lordship is very glad of it. But permit me first to own what helps I have had in this undertaking. The late Earl of Lauderdale sent me over his new translation of the Eneid, which he had ended before I engaged in the same design. Neither did I then intend it: but some proposals being afterward made me by my bookseller, I desired his lordship's leave that I might accept them, which he freely granted and I have his letter yet to show for that permission. He resolved to have printed his work (which he might have done two years before I could publish mine), and had performed it, if death had not prevented him. But, having his manuscript in my hands, I consulted it as often as I doubted of my author's sense for no man understood Virgil better than that learned nobleman. His friends, I hear, have yet another and more correct copy of that translation by them, which had they pleased to have given the public, the judges must have been convinced that I have not flattered him. Besides this help, which was not inconsiderable, Mr. Congrève has done me the favour to review the Æneid, and compare my version with. the original. I shall never be ashamed to own that this excellent young man has shown me many faults, which I have endeavoured to correct. it is true he might have easily found more; and then my translation had been more perfect. Two other worthy friends of mine, who desire to have their names concealed, seeing me straitened in my time, took pity on me, and gave me the Life of Virgil, the two prefaces to the Pastorals and the Georgics, and all the arguments in prose to the whole translation; which perhaps has caused a report that the two first poems are not mine. If it had been true that I had taken their verses for my own, I might have gloried in their aid, and, like Terence, have fathered the opinion that Scipio and Lælius joined with me. But the same style being continued through the whole, and the same laws of versification observed, are proofs sufficient that this is one man's work and your lordship is too well aequainted with my manner to doubt that any part of it is another's. That your lordship may see I was in earnest when I promised to hasten to an end, I will not give the reasons why I writ not always in the proper terms of navigation, land-service, or in the cant of any profession. I will only say, that Virgil has avoided those proprieties, because he writ not to mariners, soldiers, astronomers, gardeners, peasants, &c.; but to all in general, and in particular to men and ladies of the first quality, who have been better bred than to be too nicely knowing in the terms. In such cases, it is enough for a poet to write so plainly that he may be understood by his readers; to avoid impropriety, and not affect to be thought learned in all things. I have omitted the four preliminary lines of the first book of the Æneid, because I think them inferior to any four others in the whole poem, and consequently believe they are not Virgil's. There is too great a gap between the adjective "vicina" in the second line, and the substantive "arva" in the latter end of the third, which keeps his meaning in obscurity too long, and is contrary to the clearness of his style. Ut quamvis avido is too ambitious an ornament to be his; and Gratum opus agricolis are all words unnecessary, and independent of what he said before. -Horrentia Martis Arma is worse than any of the rest. "Horrentia" is such a flat epithet, as Tully would have given us in his verses. It is a mere filler, to stop a vacancy in the hexameter, and connect the preface to the work of Virgil. Our author seems to sound a charge, and begins like the clangour of a trumpet→→→ Arma, yirumque cano, Trojæ qui primus ab oris scarce a word without an R, and the vowels for the greater part sonorous. The prefacer began with "Ille ego," which he was constrained to patch up in the fourth line with "at nunc," to make the sense cohere. And, if both those words are not notorious botches, I am much deceived, though the French translator thinks otherwise. For my own part, I am rather of the opinion that they were added by Tucca and Varius, than retrenched. I know it may be answered, by such as think Virgil the author of the four lines, that he asserts his title to the Eneid in the beginning of this work, as he did to the two former in the last lines of the fourth Georgic. I will not reply otherwise to this, than by desiring them to compare these four lines with the four others which we know are his, because no poet but he alone could write them. If they cannot distinguish creeping from flying, let them lay down Virgil, and take up Ovid, "de Ponto," in his stead. My master needed not the assistance of that preliminary poet to prove his claim. His own majestic mien discovers him to be the king amid a thousand courtiers. It was a superfluous office; and therefore I would not set those verses in the front of Virgil, but have rejected them to my own preface. I, who before, with shepherds in the groves, And, issuing thence, compell'd the neighb'ring field Manured the glebe, and stock'd the fruitful plain, If there be not a tolerable line in all these six, the prefacer gave me no occasion to write better. This is a just apology in this place. But I have done great wrong to Virgil in the whole translation: want of time, the inferiority of our language, the inconvenience of rhyme, and all the other excuses I have made, may alleviate my fault, but cannot justify the boldness of my undertaking. What avails it me to acknowledge freely that I have not been able to do him right in any line? for even my own confession makes against me; and it will always be returned on me, "Why then did you attempt it?" To which no other answer can be made than that I have done him less injury than any of his former libellers. VIE. VOL. I.-U What they called his picture, had been drawn at length, so many times, by the daubers of almost all nations, and still so unlike him, that I snatched up the pencil with disdain; being satisfied beforehand that I could make some small resemblance of him, though I must be content with a worse likeness. A sixth pastoral, a Pharmaceutria, a single Orpheus, and some other features, have been exactly taken: but those holyday authors writ for pleasure; and only showed us what they could have done, if they would have taken pains to perform the whole. Be pleased, my lord, to accept, with your wonted goodness, this unworthy present, which I make you. I have taken off one trouble from you, of defending it, by acknowledging its imper fections and, though some part of them are covered in the verse (as Erichthonius rode always in a chariot to hide his lameness), such of them as cannot be concealed you will please to connive at, though, in the strictness of your judgment, you cannot pardon. If Homer was allowed to nod sometimes in so long a work, it will be no wonder if I often fall asleep. You took my "Aureng-zeb" into your protection, with all his faults: and hope here cannot be so many, because I translate an author who gives me such examples of correctness. What my jury may be, I know not; but it is good for a criminal to plead before a favourable judge-if I had said partial, would your lordship have forgiven me? or will you give me leave to acquaint the world that I have many times been obliged to your bounty since the Revolution? Though I never was reduced to beg a charity, nor ever had the impudence to ask one, either of your lordship, or your noble kinsman the Earl of Dorset, much less of any other, yet when I least expected it, you have both remembered me; so inherent it is in your family not to forget an old servant. It looks rather like ingratitude on my part, that, where I have been so often obliged, I have appeared so seldom to return my thanks, and where I was also so sure of being well received. Somewhat of laziness was in the case, and somewhat too of modesty, but nothing of disrespect or unthankfulness. I will not say that your lordship has encouraged me to this presumption, lest, if my labours meet with no success in public, I may expose your judgment to be censured. As for my own enemies, I shall never think them worth an answer; and, if your lordship has any, they will not dare to arraign you for want of knowledge in this art, till they can produce somewhat better of their own than your Essay on Poetry." It was on this consideration that I have drawn out my preface to so great a length. Had I not addressed to a poet and a critic of the first magnitude, I had myself been taxed for want of judgment, and shamed my patron for want of understanding. But neither will you, my lord, so soon be tired as any other, because the discourse is on your art; neither will the learned reader think it tedious, because it is "ad Clerum.” At least, when he begins to be weary, the church-doors are open. That I may pursue the allegory with a short prayer after a long sermon May you live happily and long, for the service of your country, the encouragement of good letters, and the ornament of poetry; which cannot be wished more earnestly by any man, than by Your Lordship's most humble, most obliged, and most obedient servant. JOHN DRYDEN. |