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Rhyme, he says, and fays truly, is no neceffary adjunct of true poetry. But perhaps, of poetry as a mental operation, metre or mufick is no neceffary adjunct: it is however by the mufick of metre that poetry has been difcriminated in all languages; and in languages melodiously conftructed, by a due proportion of long and fhort fyllables, metre is fufficient. But one language cannot communicate its rules to another: where metre is fcanty and imperfect, fome help is neceffary. The mufick of the English heroick line ftrikes the ear so faintly that it is easily loft, unless all the fyllables of every line co-operate together: this cooperation can be only obtained by the prefervation of every verfe unmingled with another, as a distinct fyftem of founds; and this diftinctness is obtained and preferved by the artifice of rhyme. The variety of pauses, so much boafted by the lovers of blank verse, changes the measures of an English poet to the periods of a declaimer; and there are only a few skilful and happy readers of Milton, who enable their audience to perceive where the lines end or begin. Blank verfe, faid an ingenious critick, feems to be verfe only to the eye.

Poetry may fubfift without rhyme, but Englifh poetry will not often please; nor can rhyme ever be fafely fpared but where the fubject is able to fupport itself. Blank verse makes fome approach to that which is called the lapidary file; has neither the eafinefs of profe, nor the melody of numbers, and therefore tires by long continuance. Of the Italian writers without rhyme, whom Milton alleges as precedents, not one is popular; what reafon could

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urge in its defence, has been confuted by the

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But, whatever be the advantage of rhyme, I cannot prevail on myself to with that Milton had been a rhymer; for I cannot wish his work to be other than it is; yet, like other heroes, he is to be admired rather than imitated. He that thinks himself capable of aftonishing, may write blank verfe; but those that hope only to please, muft condescend to rhyme.

The highest praise of genius is original invention. Milton cannot be faid to have con

trived the structure of an epick poem, and therefore muft yield to that vigour and amplitude of mind to which all generations must be indebted for the art of poetical narration, for the texture of the fable, the variation of incident, the interpofition or dialogue, and all the ftratagems that surprise and enchain attention. But, of all the borrowers from Homer, Milton is perhaps the leaft indebted. He was naturally a thinker for himself, confident of his own abilities, and difdainful of help or hindrance: he did not refufe admiffion to the thoughts or images of his predeceffors, but he did not seek them. From his contemporaries he neither courted nor received fupport; there is in his writings nothing by which the pride of other authors might be gratified, or favours gained; no exchange of praife, nor folicitation of fupport. His great works were performed under discountenance, and in blindness, but difficulties vanished at his touch; he was born for whatever is arduous, and his work is not the greatest of heroick poems, only because it is not the first.

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F the great author of Hudibras there is a life prefixed to the later edition of his poem, by an unknown writer, and therefore of difputable authority; and fome account is incidentally given by Wood, who confeffes the uncertainty of his own narrative; more however than they knew cannot now be learned, and nothing remains but to compare and copy them.

SAMUEL BUTLER was born in the parish of Strenfham in Worcestershire, according to his biographer, in 1612; but Mr. Longueville, the fon of Butler's principal friend, informed the author of the "General "Dictionary" that he was born in 1600.

His father's condition is variously represented. Wood mention him as competently wealthy; but the other fays he was an honest farmer with fome small eftate, who made a shift to educate his fon at the grammar-school of Worcester, under Mr. Henry Bright, from whose care he removed for a fhort time to Cambridge; but, for want of money, was never made a member of any college. Wood leaves us rather doubtful whether he went to Cambridge or Oxford; but at laft makes him pafs fix or feven years at Cambridge,

without

without knowing in what hall or college: yet it can hardly be imagined that he lived fo long in either univerfity, but as belonging to one house or another; and it is still less likely that he could have fo long inhabited a place of learning with fo little diftinction as to leave his refidence uncertain.

Wood has his information from his brother, whose narrative placed him at Cambridge, in oppofition to that of his neighbours which fent him to Oxford. The brother's feems the beft authority, till, by confeffing his inability to tell his hall or college, he gives reafon to fufpect that he was refolved to bestow on him an academical education; but durft not name a college, for fear of detection.

He was for fome time, according to the author of his life, clerk to Mr. Jefferys of Earl's-Croom in Worcestershire, an eminent juftice of the peace. In his fervice he had not only leifure for ftudy, but for recreation; his amufements were mufick and painting; and the reward of his pencil was the friendship of the celebrated Cooper.

He was afterwards admitted into the family of the countefs of Kent, where he had the ufe of a library; and fo much recommended himself to Selden, that he was often employed by him in literary bufinefs. Selden, as is well known, was fteward to the countess, and is fuppofed to have gained much of his wealth. by managing her estate.

In what character Butler was admitted into that lady's fervice, how long he continued in it, and why he left it, is, like the other incidents of his life, utterly unknown.

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The viciffitudes of his condition placed him afterwards in the family of Sir Samuel Luke, one of Cromwel's officers. Here he obferved fo much of the character of fectaries, that he is faid to have written or begun his poem at this time; and it is likely that fuch a defign would be formed in a place where he faw the principles and practices of the rebels, audacious and undisguised in the confidence of fuccefs.

At length the king returned, and the time came in which loyalty hoped for its reward. Butler, however, was only made secretary to the earl of Carbury, prefident of the principality of Wales; who conferred on him the stewardship of Ludlow Castle, when the Court of the Marches was revived.

In this part of his life, he married Mrs. Herbert, a gentlewoman of a good family; and lived, fays Wood, upon her fortune, having ftudied the common law, but never practised it. A fortune fhe had, fays his biographer, but it was lost by bad fecurities.

In 1663 was published the first part, containing three cantos, of the poem of Hudibras, which, as Prior relates, was made known at court by the taste and influence of the earl of Dorfet. When it was known, it was neceffarily admired: the king quoted, the courtiers ftudied, and the whole party of the royalifts applauded it. Every eye watched for the golden fhower which was to fall upon the author, who certainly was not without his part in the general expectation.

In 1664 the fecond part appeared; the curiofity of the nation was rekindled, and the

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