Abfque ope pennarum, & graditur fine cruribus ullis.

Abfque loco motuque NIHIL per inane vaga tur. Humano generi utilius NIHIL arte medendi. Ne rhombos igitur, neu Theffala murmura

tentet

Idalia vacuum trajectus arundine pectus,

Neu legat Ideo Dictæum in vertice gramen. Vulneribus fævi NIHIL auxiliatur amoris. Vexerit & quemvis trans mœftas portitor undas,

Ad fuperos imo NIHIL hunc revocabit ab orco. Inferni NIHIL inflectit præcordia regis, Parcarúmque colos, & inexorable penfum. Obruta Phlegræis campis Titania pubes Fulmineo fenfit NIHIL effe potentius ictu : Porrigitur magni NIHIL extra monia mundi : Diíque NIHIL metuunt. Quid longo carmine plura

Commemorem? virtute NIHIL præftantius ipfa, Splendidius NIHIL eft; NIHIL eft Jove denique majus.

Sed tempus finem argutis imponere nugis ; Ne tibi fi multa laudem mea carmina charta, De NIHILO NIHILI pariant faftidia versus,

images. A poem frigidly didactick, without rhyme, is fo near to profe, that the reader only scorns it for pretending to be verse.

Having difentangled himself from the difficulties of rhyme, he may juftly be expected to give the sense of Horace with great exactness, and to fupprefs no fubtilty of fentiment for the difficulty of expreffing it. This demand, however, his tranflation will not fatisfy; what he found obfcure, I do not know that he has ever cleared.

Among his fmaller works, the Eclogue of Virgil and the Dies Ira are well tranflated; though the best line in the Dies Ira is borrowed from Dryden. In return, fucceeding poets have borrowed from Roscommon.

In the verses on the Lap-dog, the pronouns thou and you are offenfively confounded; and the turn at the end is from Waller.

His verfions of the two odes of Horace are made with great liberty, which is not recompensed by much elegance or vigour.

His political verfes are fpritely, and when they were written must have been very popular.

Of the scene of Guarini, and the prologue to Pompey, Mrs. Phillips, in her letters to Sir Charles Cotterel, has given the history.

"Lord Rofcommon," fays fhe, "is cer"tainly one of the most promifing young noblemen in Ireland. He has paraphrased a "Pfalm admirably, and a scene of Paftor Fido very finely, in fome places much better than "Sir Richard Fanshaw. This was underta"ken merely in compliment to me, who hap"Italian,

pened to say that it was the best scene in

Italian, and the worst in English. He was only two hours about it. It begins thus: "Dear happy groves, and you the dark

"retreat

"Of filent horrour, Reft's eternal feat." From these lines, which are fince fomewhat mended, it appears that he did not think a work of two hours fit to endure the eye of criticism without revifal.

When Mrs. Phillips was in Ireland, fome ladies that had seen her tranflation of Pompey, refolved to bring it on the stage at Dublin; and, to promote their defign, Lord Rofcommon gave them a prologue, and Sir Edward Dering an epilogue; "which," fays she, "are "the best performances of thofe kinds I ever "faw." If this is not criticism, it is at least gratitude. The thought of bringing Cæfar and Pompey into Ireland, the only country over which Cæfar never had any power, lucky.

is

Of Rofcommon's works, the judgement of the publick seems to be right. He is elegant, but not great; he never labours after exquifite beauties, and feldom falls into grofs faults. His verfification is smooth, but rarely vigorous, and his rhymes are remarkably exact. He improved tafte, if he did not enlarge knowledge, and may be numbered among the benefactors to English literaturę.

ROCHESTER,

JOHN

HN WILMOT, afterwards earl of Rochefter, the fon of Henry earl of Rochester, better known by the title of Lord Wilmot, fo often mentioned in Clarendon's History, was born in April, 1648, at Ditchley in Oxfordfhire. After a grammatical education at the fchool of Burford, he entered a nobleman into Wadham College in 1659, only eleven years old; and in 1661, at thirteen, was, with fome other perfons of high rank, made master of arts by lord Clarendon in person.

He travelled afterwards into France and Italy; and, at his return, devoted himself to a Court. In 1665 he went to fea with Sandwich, and diftinguished himself at Bergen by uncommon intrepidity; and the next fummer ferved again on board Sir Edward Spragge, who, in the heat of the engagement, having a message of reproof to fend to one of his captains, could find no man ready to carry it but Wilmot, who, in an open boat, went and returned amidst the ftorm of fhot.

But his reputation for bravery was not lafting he was reproached with flinking away in ftreet quarrels, and leaving his companions to fhift as they could without him; and Sheffield duke of Buckingham has left a story of his refusal to fight him.

He