VER. 1-4 were thus printed in the first edition—A faithful swain, whom Love had taught to sing,Bewail'd his fate beside a silver spring;Where gentle Thames his winding waters leadsThrough verdant forests, and through flowery meads.VER. 3, 4. Originally thus in the MS.—There to the winds he plain'd his hapless love,And Amaryllis fill'd the vocal grove.VER. 27-29—Oft in the crystal spring I cast a view,And equall'd Hylas, if the glass be true;But since those graces meet my eyes no moreI shun, &c.VER. 79, 80—Your praise the tuneful birds to heaven shall bear,And listening wolves grow milder as they hear.VER. 91—Me love inflames, nor will his fires allay.
Beneath the shade a spreading beech displays,Hylas and Ægon sung their rural lays;This mourn'd a faithless, that an absent love.And Delia's name and Doris' fill'd the grove.Ye Mantuan nymphs, your sacred succour bring;Hylas and Ægon's rural lays I sing.Thou, whom the Nine with Plautus' wit inspire,The art of Terence, and Menander's fire;Whose sense instructs us, and whose humour charms,Whose judgment sways us, and whose spirit warms! 10Oh, skill'd in Nature! see the hearts of swains,Their artless passions, and their tender pains.Now setting Phoebus shone serenely bright,And fleecy clouds were streak'd with purple light;When tuneful Hylas, with melodious moan,Taught rocks to weep, and made the mountains groan.Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!To Delia's ear the tender notes convey.As some sad turtle his lost love deplores,And with deep murmurs fills the sounding shores, 20Thus, far from Delia, to the winds I mourn,Alike unheard, unpitied, and forlorn.Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along!For her, the feather'd choirs neglect their song:For her, the limes their pleasing shades deny;For her, the lilies hang their heads and die.Ye flowers that droop, forsaken by the spring,Ye birds that, left by summer, cease to sing,Ye trees that fade when autumn-heats remove,Say, is not absence death to those who love? 30Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!Cursed be the fields that cause my Delia's stay;Fade every blossom, wither every tree,Die every flower, and perish all but she.What have I said? Where'er my Delia flies,Let spring attend, and sudden flowers arise;Let opening roses knotted oaks adorn,And liquid amber drop from every thorn.Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs along!The birds shall cease to tune their evening song, 40The winds to breathe, the waving woods to move,And streams to murmur, ere I cease to love.Not bubbling fountains to the thirsty swain,Not balmy sleep to labourers faint with pain,Not showers to larks, or sunshine to the bee,Are half so charming as thy sight to me.Go, gentle gales, and bear my sighs away!Come, Delia, come; ah, why this long delay?Through rocks and caves the name of Delia sounds,Delia, each care and echoing rock rebounds. 50Ye Powers, what pleasing frenzy soothes my mind!Do lovers dream, or is my Delia kind?She comes, my Delia comes!—Now cease, my lay,And cease, ye gales, to bear my sighs away!Next Ægon sung, while Windsor groves admired;Rehearse, ye Muses, what yourselves inspired.Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strain!Of perjured Doris, dying I complain:Here where the mountains, lessening as they rise,Lose the low vales, and steal into the skies: 60While labouring oxen, spent with toil and heat,In their loose traces from the field retreat:While curling smokes from village-tops are seen,And the fleet shades glide o'er the dusky green.Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay!Beneath yon poplar oft we pass'd the day:Oft on the rind I carved her amorous vows,While she with garlands hung the bending boughs:The garlands fade, the vows are worn away;So dies her love, and so my hopes decay. 70Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strain!Now bright Arcturus glads the teeming grain,Now golden fruits on loaded branches shine,And grateful clusters swell with floods of wine;Now blushing berries paint the yellow grove;Just gods! shall all things yield returns but love?Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay!The shepherds cry, 'Thy flocks are left a prey'—Ah! what avails it me, the flocks to keep,Who lost my heart—while I preserved my sheep. 80Pan came, and ask'd, what magic caused my smart,Or what ill eyes malignant glances dart?What eyes but hers, alas, have power to move?And is there magic but what dwells in love?Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful strains!I'll fly from shepherds, flocks, and flowery plains.From shepherds, flocks, and plains, I may remove,Forsake mankind, and all the world—but Love!I know thee, Love! on foreign mountains bred,Wolves gave thee suck, and savage tigers fed. 90Thou wert from Etna's burning entrails torn,Got by fierce whirlwinds, and in thunder born!Resound, ye hills, resound my mournful lay!Farewell, ye woods; adieu, the light of day!One leap from yonder cliff shall end my pains;No more, ye hills, no more resound my strains!Thus sung the shepherds till the approach of night,The skies yet blushing with departing light,When falling dews with spangles deck'd the glade,And the low sun had lengthen'd every shade. 100
VER. 48-5l—Originally thus in the MS.—With him through Libya's burning plains I'll go,On Alpine mountains tread the eternal snow;Yet feel no heat but what our loves impart,And dread no coldness but in Thyrsis' heart.
LYCIDAS.Thyrsis, the music of that murmuring springIs not so mournful as the strains you sing;Nor rivers winding through the vales below,So sweetly warble, or so smoothly flow.Now sleeping flocks on their soft fleeces lie,The moon, serene in glory, mounts the sky,While silent birds forget their tuneful lays,Oh sing of Daphne's fate, and Daphne's praise!THYRSIS.Behold the groves that shine with silver frost,Their beauty wither'd, and their verdure lost. 10Here shall I try the sweet Alexis' strain,That call'd the listening Dryads to the plain?Thames heard the numbers as he flow'd along,And bade his willows learn the moving song.LYCIDAS.So may kind rains their vital moisture yieldAnd swell the future harvest of the field.Begin; this charge the dying Daphne gave,And said, 'Ye shepherds, sing around my grave!'Sing, while beside the shaded tomb I mourn,And with fresh bays her rural shrine adorn. 20THYRSIS.Ye gentle Muses, leave your crystal spring,Let nymphs and sylvans cypress garlands bring;Ye weeping Loves, the stream with myrtles hide,And break your bows, as when Adonis died;And with your golden darts, now useless grown,Inscribe a verse on this relenting stone:'Let Nature change, let Heaven and Earth deplore,Fair Daphne's dead, and Love is now no more!''Tis done, and Nature's various charms decay;See gloomy clouds obscure the cheerful day! 30Now hung with pearls the dropping trees appear,Their faded honours scatter'd on her bier.See where, on earth, the flowery glories lie,With her they flourish'd, and with her they die.Ah, what avail the beauties Nature wore,Fair Daphne's dead, and Beauty is no more!For her the flocks refuse their verdant food,The thirsty heifers shun the gliding flood,The silver swans her hapless fate bemoan,In notes more sad than when they sing their own; 40In hollow caves sweet Echo silent lies,Silent, or only to her name replies;Her name with pleasure once she taught the shore;Now Daphne's dead, and Pleasure is no more!No grateful dews descend from evening skies,Nor morning odours from the flowers arise;No rich perfumes refresh the fruitful field,Nor fragrant herbs their native incense yield.The balmy zephyrs, silent since her death,Lament the ceasing of a sweeter breath; 50Th' industrious bees neglect their golden store;Fair Daphne's dead, and Sweetness is no more!No more the mounting larks, while Daphne sings,Shall, listening in mid air, suspend their wings;No more the birds shall imitate her lays,Or, hush'd with wonder, hearken from the sprays:No more the streams their murmurs shall forbear,A sweeter music than their own to hear;But tell the reeds, and tell the vocal shore,Fair Daphne's dead, and Music is no more! 60Her fate is whisper'd by the gentle breeze,And told in sighs to all the trembling trees;The trembling trees, in every plain and wood,Her fate remurmur to the silver flood;The silver flood, so lately calm, appearsSwell'd with new passion, and o'erflows with tears;The winds and trees and floods her death deplore,Daphne, our grief, our glory now no more!But see! where Daphne wondering mounts on highAbove the clouds, above the starry sky! 70Eternal beauties grace the shining scene,Fields ever fresh, and groves for ever green!There while you rest in amaranthine bowers,Or from those meads select unfading flowers,Behold us kindly, who your name implore,Daphne, our goddess, and our grief no more!LYCIDAS.How all things listen, while thy Muse complains!Such silence waits on Philomela's strains,In some still evening, when the whispering breezePants on the leaves, and dies upon the trees. 80To thee, bright goddess, oft a lamb shall bleed,If teeming ewes increase my fleecy breed.While plants their shade, or flowers their odours give,Thy name, thy honour, and thy praise shall live!THYRSIS.But see, Orion sheds unwholesome dews;Arise, the pines a noxious shade diffuse;Sharp Boreas blows, and Nature feels decay,Time conquers all, and we must Time obey.Adieu, ye vales, ye mountains, streams, and groves;Adieu, ye shepherds, rural lays, and loves; 90Adieu, my flocks; farewell, ye sylvan crew;Daphne, farewell; and all the world, adieu!
VER. 29, 30—Originally thus in the MS.—'Tis done, and Nature's changed since you are gone;Behold, the clouds have put their mourning on.VER. 83, 84. Originally thus in the MS.—While vapours rise, and driving snows descend,Thy honour, name, and praise shall never end.
In reading several passages of the Prophet Isaiah, which foretell the coming of Christ and the felicities attending it, I could not but observe a remarkable parity between many of the thoughts, and those in the 'Pollio' of Virgil. This will not seem surprising, when we reflect, that the eclogue was taken from a Sibylline prophecy on the same subject. One may judge that Virgil did not copy it line by line, but selected such ideas as best agreed with the nature of pastoral poetry, and disposed them in that manner which served most to beautify his piece. I have endeavoured the same in this imitation of him, though without admitting anything of my own; since it was written with this particular view, that the reader, by comparing the several thoughts, might see how far the images and descriptions of the prophet are superior to those of the poet. But as I fear I have prejudiced them by my management, I shall subjoin the passages of Isaiah and those of Virgil, under the same disadvantage of a literal translation.
Ye Nymphs of Solyma! begin the song:To heavenly themes sublimer strains belong.The mossy fountains, and the sylvan shades,The dreams of Pindus and the Aonian maids,Delight no more—O Thou my voice inspireWho touch'd Isaiah's hallow'd lips with fire!Rapt into future times, the bard begun:A virgin shall conceive, a virgin bear a son!From Jesse's root behold the branch arise,Whose sacred flower with fragrance fills the skies: 10The ethereal Spirit o'er its leaves shall move,And on its top descends the mystic Dove.Ye Heavens! from high the dewy nectar pour,And in soft silence shed the kindly shower!The sick and weak the healing plant shall aid,From storms a shelter, and from heat a shade.All crimes shall cease, and ancient fraud shall fail;Returning Justice lift aloft her scale;Peace o'er the world her olive wand extend,And white-robed Innocence from heaven descend. 20Swift fly the years, and rise the expected morn!Oh spring to light, auspicious Babe, be born!See, Nature hastes her earliest wreaths to bring,With all the incense of the breathing spring!See lofty Lebanon his head advance,See nodding forests on the mountains dance:See spicy clouds from lowly Saron rise,And Carmel's flowery top perfumes the skies!Hark! a glad voice the lonely desert cheers;'Prepare the way! a God, a God appears:' 30'A God, a God!' the vocal hills reply,The rocks proclaim the approaching Deity.Lo, Earth receives him from the bending skies!Sink down, ye mountains, and ye valleys, rise;With heads declined, ye cedars, homage pay;Be smooth, ye rocks, ye rapid floods, give way!The Saviour comes! by ancient bards foretold:Hear him, ye deaf, and all ye blind, behold!He from thick films shall purge the visual ray,And on the sightless eyeball pour the day: 40'Tis he the obstructed paths of sound shall clear,And bid new music charm th' unfolding ear:The dumb shall sing, the lame his crutch forego,And leap exulting like the bounding roe.No sigh, no murmur the wide world shall hear,From every face he wipes off every tear.In adamantine chains shall Death be bound,And Hell's grim tyrant feel th' eternal wound.As the good shepherd tends his fleecy care,Seeks freshest pasture and the purest air, 50Explores the lost, the wandering sheep directs,By day o'ersees them, and by night protects,The tender lambs he raises in his arms,Feeds from his hand, and in his bosom warms;Thus shall mankind his guardian care engage,The promised Father of the future age.No more shall nation against nation rise,Nor ardent warriors meet with hateful eyes,Nor fields with gleaming steel be cover'd o'er,The brazen trumpets kindle rage no more; 60But useless lances into scythes shall bend,And the broad falchion in a ploughshare end.Then palaces shall rise; the joyful sonShall finish what his short-lived sire begun;Their vines a shadow to their race shall yield,And the same hand that sow'd, shall reap the field;The swain in barren deserts with surpriseSee lilies spring, and sudden verdure rise;And start, amidst the thirsty wilds, to hearNew falls of water murmuring in his ear. 70On rifted rocks, the dragons' late abodes,The green reed trembles, and the bulrush nods,Waste sandy valleys, once perplex'd with thorn,The spiry fir, and shapely box adorn:To leafless shrubs the flowering palms succeed,And odorous myrtle to the noisome weed.The lambs with wolves shall graze the verdant mead,And boys in flowery bands the tiger lead;The steer and lion at one crib shall meet,And harmless serpents lick the pilgrim's feet. 80The smiling infant in his hand shall takeThe crested basilisk and speckled snake,Pleased, the green lustre of the scales survey,And with their forky tongue shall innocently play.Rise, crown'd with light, imperial Salem, rise!Exalt thy towery head, and lift thy eyes!See, a long race thy spacious courts adorn;See future sons, and daughters yet unborn,In crowding ranks on every side arise,Demanding life, impatient for the skies! 90See barbarous nations at thy gates attend,Walk in thy light and in thy temple bend;See thy bright altars throng'd with prostrate kings,And heap'd with products of Sabean springs!For thee Idumè's spicy forests blow,And seeds of gold in Ophir's mountains glow.See Heaven its sparkling portals wide display,And break upon thee in a flood of day!No more the rising sun shall gild the morn,Nor evening Cynthia fill her silver horn; 100But lost, dissolved in thy superior rays,One tide of glory, one unclouded blazeO'erflow thy courts: The Light himself shall shineReveal'd, and God's eternal day be thine!The seas shall waste, the skies in smoke decay,Rocks fall to dust, and mountains melt away;But fix'd his word, his saving power remains;Thy realm for ever lasts, thy own MESSIAH reigns!
and a more dangerous one to the public, ver. 1. That a true taste is as rare to be found as a true genius, ver. 9-18. That most men are born with some taste, but spoiled by false education, ver. 19-25. The multitude of critics, and causes of them, ver. 26-45. That we are to study our own taste, and know the limits of it, ver. 46-67. Nature the best guide of judgment, ver. 68-87. Improved by art and rules, which are but methodised nature, ver. 88. Rules derived from the practice of the ancient poets, ver. 88-110. That therefore the ancients are necessary to be studied by a critic, particularly Homer and Virgil, ver. 120-138. Of licences, and the use of them by the ancients, ver. 140-180. Reverence due to the ancients, and praise of them, ver. 181, &c.
Causes hindering a true judgment—(1.) pride, ver. 208; (2.) imperfect learning, ver. 215; (3.) judging by parts and not by the whole, ver. 233-288.—Critics in wit, language, versification only, ver. 288, 305, 339, &c.; (4.) being too hard to please, or too apt to admire, ver. 384; (5.) partiality—too much love to a sect—to the ancients or moderns, ver. 394; (6.) prejudice or prevention, ver. 408; (7.) singularity, ver. 424; (8.) in constancy, ver. 430; (9.) party spirit, ver. 452, &c.; (10.) envy, ver. 466; against envy, and in praise of good-nature, ver. 508, &c. When severity is chiefly to be used by critics, ver. 526, &c.
Rules for the conduct of manners in a critic—(1.) candour, ver. 503; modesty, ver. 566; good-breeding, ver. 572; sincerity, and freedom of advice, ver. 578; (2.) when one's counsel is to be restrained, ver. 584. Character of an incorrigible poet, ver. 600. And of an impertinent critic, ver. 610, &c. Character of a good critic, ver. 629. The history of criticism, and characters of the best critics—Aristotle, ver. 645; Horace, ver. 653; Dionysius, ver. 665; Petronius, ver. 667; Quintillian, ver. 670; Longinus, ver. 675. Of the decay of criticism, and its revival. Erasmus, ver. 693; Vida, ver. 705; Boileau, ver. 714; Lord Roscommon, &c., ver. 725. CONCLUSION.
'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skillAppear in writing or in judging ill;But, of the two, less dangerous is the offenceTo tire our patience, than mislead our sense.Some few in that, but numbers err in this;Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss;A fool might once himself alone expose,Now one in verse makes many more in prose.'Tis with our judgments as our watches, noneGo just alike, yet each believes his own. 10In poets as true genius is but rare,True taste as seldom, is the critic's share;Both must alike from Heaven derive their light,These born to judge, as well as those to write.Let such teach others who themselves excel.And censure freely who have written well.Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true,But are not critics to their judgment too?Yet if we look more closely, we shall findMost have the seeds of judgment in their mind: 20Nature affords at least a glimmering light;The lines, though touch'd but faintly, are drawn right.But as the slightest sketch, if justly traced,Is by ill colouring but the more disgraced,So by false learning is good sense defaced:Some are bewilder'd in the maze of schools,And some made coxcombs Nature meant but fools.In search of wit these lose their common sense,And then turn critics in their own defence:Each burns alike, who can, or cannot write, 30Or with a rival's, or an eunuch's spite.All fools have still an itching to deride,And fain would be upon the laughing side;If Maevius scribble in Apollo's spite,There are who judge still worse than he can write.Some have at first for wits, then poets pass'd,Turn'd critics next, and proved plain fools at last.Some neither can for wits nor critics pass,As heavy mules are neither horse nor ass.Those half-learn'd witlings, numerous in our isle, 40As half-form'd insects on the banks of Nile;Unfinished things, one knows not what to call,Their generation's so equivocal:To tell 'em would a hundred tongues require,Or one vain wit's, that might a hundred tire.But you who seek to give and merit fame,And justly bear a critic's noble name,Be sure yourself and your own reach to know,How far your genius, taste, and learning go;Launch not beyond your depth, but be discreet, 50And mark that point where sense and dulness meet.Nature to all things fix'd the limits fit,And wisely curb'd proud man's pretending wit.As on the land while here the ocean gains,In other parts it leaves wide sandy plains;Thus in the soul while memory prevails,The solid power of understanding fails;Where beams of warm imagination play,The memory's soft figures melt away.One science only will one genius fit, 60So vast is art, so narrow human wit:Not only bounded to peculiar arts,But oft in those confined to single parts.Like kings, we lose the conquests gain'd before,By vain ambition still to make them more;Each might his several province well command,Would all but stoop to what they understand.First follow Nature, and your judgment frameBy her just standard, which is still the same:Unerring Nature, still divinely bright, 70One clear, unchanged, and universal light,Life, force, and beauty, must to all impart,At once the source, and end, and test of Art.Art from that fund each just supply provides,Works without show, and without pomp presides;In some fair body thus the informing soulWith spirits feeds, with vigour fills the whole,Each motion guides, and every nerve sustains,Itself unseen, but in the effects, remains.Some, to whom Heaven in wit has been profuse, 80Want as much more to turn it to its use;For wit and judgment often are at strife,Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife,'Tis more to guide than spur the Muse's steed,Restrain his fury, than provoke his speed;The wingèd courser, like a generous horse,Shows most true mettle when you check his course.Those rules, of old discover'd, not devised,Are Nature still, but Nature methodised;Nature, like liberty, is but restrain'd 90By the same laws which first herself ordain'd.Hear how learn'd Greece her useful rules indites,When to repress, and when indulge our flights:High on Parnassus' top her sons she show'd,And pointed out those arduous paths they trod;Held from afar, aloft, the immortal prize,And urged the rest by equal steps to rise.Just precepts thus from great examples given,She drew from them what they derived from Heaven.The generous critic fann'd the poet's fire, 100And taught the world with reason to admire.Then Criticism the Muse's handmaid proved,To dress her charms, and make her more beloved:But following wits from that intention stray'd,Who could not win the mistress, woo'd the maid;Against the poets their own arms they turn'd,Sure to hate most the men from whom they learn'd.So modern 'pothecaries, taught the art,By doctor's bills to play the doctor's part,Bold in the practice of mistaken rules, 110Prescribe, apply, and call their masters fools.Some on the leaves of ancient authors prey,Nor time nor moths e'er spoil'd so much as they.Some drily plain, without invention's aid,Write dull receipts how poems may be made.These leave the sense, their learning to display,And those explain the meaning quite away.You then, whose judgment the right course would steer,Know well each ancient's proper character;His fable, subject, scope in every page; 120Religion, country, genius of his age;Without all these at once before your eyes,Cavil you may, but never criticise.Be Homer's works your study and delight,Read them by day, and meditate by night;Thence form your judgment, thence your maxims bring,And trace the Muses upward to their spring.Still with itself compared, his text peruse;And let your comment be the Mantuan Muse.When first young Maro in his boundless mind, 130A work t' outlast immortal Rome design'd,Perhaps he seem'd above the critic's law,And but from Nature's fountains scorn'd to draw:But when t' examine every part he came,Nature and Homer were, he found, the same.Convinced, amazed, he checks the bold design,And rules as strict his labour'd work confine,As if the Stagyrite13o'erlook'd each line.Learn hence for ancient rules a just esteem;To copy nature is to copy them. 140Some beauties yet no precepts can declare,For there's a happiness as well as care.Music resembles poetry, in eachAre nameless graces which no methods teach,And which a master-hand alone can reach.If, where the rules not far enough extend,(Since rules were made but to promote their end)Some lucky license answer to the fullThe intent proposed, that license is a rule;Thus Pegasus, a nearer way to take, 150May boldly deviate from the common track;Great wits sometimes may gloriously offend,And rise to faults true critics dare not mend,From vulgar bounds with brave disorder part,And snatch a grace beyond the reach of art,Which, without passing through the judgment, gainsThe heart, and all its end at once attains.In prospects thus, some objects please our eyes,Which out of nature's common order rise,The shapeless rock, or hanging precipice. 160But though the ancients thus their rules invade,(As kings dispense with laws themselves have made)Moderns, beware! or if you must offendAgainst the precept, ne'er transgress its end;Let it be seldom, and compell'd by need,And have at least their precedent to plead.The critic else proceeds without remorse,Seizes your fame, and puts his laws in force.I know there are, to whose presumptuous thoughts,Those freer beauties, even in them, seem faults. 170Some figures monstrous and misshaped appear,Consider'd singly, or beheld too near,Which, but proportion'd to their light, or place,Due distance reconciles to form and grace.A prudent chief not always must displayHis powers in equal ranks, and fair array,But with the occasion and the place comply,Conceal his force, nay, seem sometimes to fly.Those oft are stratagems which errors seem,Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream. 180Still green with bays each ancient altar stands,Above the reach of sacrilegious hands;Secure from flames, from envy's fiercer rage,Destructive war, and all-involving age.See from each clime the learn'd their incense bring!Hear in all tongues consenting paeans ring!In praise so just let every voice be join'd,And fill the general chorus of mankind.Hail, Bards triumphant! born in happier days;Immortal heirs of universal praise! 190Whose honours with increase of ages grow,As streams roll down, enlarging as they flow;Nations unborn your mighty names shall sound,And worlds applaud that must not yet be found!Oh may some spark of your celestial fire,The last, the meanest of your sons inspire,(That on weak wings, from far, pursues your flights,Glows while he reads, but trembles as he writes)To teach vain wits a science little known,T' admire superior sense, and doubt their own! 200
Between ver. 25 and 26 were these lines, since omitted by the author:—Many are spoil'd by that pedantic throng,Who with great pains teach youth to reason wrong.Tutors, like virtuosos, oft inclinedBy strange transfusion to improve the mind,Draw off the sense we have, to pour in new;Which yet, with all their skill, they ne'er could do.VER. 80,81:—There are whom Heaven has bless'd with store of wit,Yet want as much again to manage it.VER. 123. The author after this verse originally inserted the following,which he has however omitted in all the editions:—Zoilus, had these been known, without a nameHad died, and Perault ne'er been damn'd to fame;The sense of sound antiquity had reign'd,And sacred Homer yet been unprofaned.None e'er had thought his comprehensive mindTo modern customs, modern rules confined;Who for all ages writ, and all mankind.VER. 130, 131:—When first young Maro sung of kings and wars,Ere warning Phoebus touch'd his trembling ears
Of all the causes which conspire to blindMan's erring judgment, and misguide the mind,What the weak head with strongest bias rules,Is PRIDE, the never-failing vice of fools.Whatever Nature has in worth denied,She gives in large recruits of needless pride;For as in bodies, thus in souls, we findWhat wants in blood and spirits, swell'd with wind:Pride, where wit fails, steps in to our defence,And fills up all the mighty void of sense: 210If once right reason drives that cloud away,Truth breaks upon us with resistless day.Trust not yourself; but your defects to know,Make use of every friend—and every foe.A little learning is a dangerous thing;Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,And drinking largely sobers us again.Fired at first sight with what the Muse imparts,In fearless youth we tempt the heights of arts, 220While from the bounded level of our mind,Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind;But, more advanced, behold with strange surprise,New distant scenes of endless science rise!So, pleased at first the towering Alps we try,Mount o'er the vales, and seem to tread the sky,The eternal snows appear already past,And the first clouds and mountains seem the last:But, those attain'd, we tremble to surveyThe growing labours of the lengthen'd way, 230The increasing prospect tires our wandering eyes,Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise!A perfect judge will read each work of witWith the same spirit that its author writ:Survey the WHOLE, nor seek slight faults to findWhere nature moves, and rapture warms the mind;Nor lose, for that malignant dull delight,The generous pleasure to be charm'd with wit.But in such lays as neither ebb nor flow,Correctly cold, and regularly low, 240That, shunning faults, one quiet tenor keep,We cannot blame indeed—but we may sleep.In wit, as nature, what affects our heartsIs not the exactness of peculiar parts;'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call,But the joint force and full result of all.Thus when we view some well-proportion'd dome,(The world's just wonder, and even thine, O Rome!)No single parts unequally surprise,All comes united to th' admiring eyes; 250No monstrous height, or breadth, or length appear;The whole at once is bold, and regular.Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see,Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be.In every work regard the writer's end,Since none can compass more than they intend;And if the means be just, the conduct true,Applause, in spite of trivial faults, is due.As men of breeding, sometimes men of wit,To avoid great errors, must the less commit: 260Neglect the rules each verbal critic lays,For not to know some trifles is a praise.Most critics, fond of some subservient art,Still make the whole depend upon a part:They talk of principles, but notions prize,And all to one loved folly sacrifice.Once on a time, La Mancha's knight,14they say,A certain bard encountering on the way,Discoursed in terms as just, with looks as sage,As e'er could Dennis, of the Grecian stage; 270Concluding all were desperate sots and fools,Who durst depart from Aristotle's rules.Our author, happy in a judge so nice,Produced his play, and begg'd the knight's advice;Made him observe the subject, and the plot,The Manners, Passions, Unities; what not?All which, exact to rule, were brought about,Were but a combat in the lists left out.'What! leave the combat out?' exclaims the knight.'Yes, or we must renounce the Stagyrite.' 280'Not so, by Heaven!' (he answers in a rage);'Knights, squires, and steeds must enter on the stage.''So vast a throng the stage can ne'er contain.''Then build a new, or act it in a plain.'Thus critics, of less judgment than caprice,Curious, not knowing, not exact but nice,Form short ideas, and offend in arts(As most in manners) by a love to parts.Some to conceit alone their taste confine,And glittering thoughts struck out at every line; 290Pleased with a work where nothing's just or fit;One glaring chaos and wild heap of wit.Poets, like painters, thus, unskill'd to traceThe naked nature and the living grace,With gold and jewels cover every part,And hide with ornaments their want of art.True wit is nature to advantage dress'd;What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd;Something, whose truth convinced at sight we find,That gives us back the image of our mind. 300As shades more sweetly recommend the light,So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit.For works may have more wit than does 'em good,As bodies perish through excess of blood.Others for language all their care express,And value books, as women men, for dress:Their praise is still—'The style is excellent;'The sense, they humbly take upon content.Words are like leaves, and where they most abound,Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found. 310False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,Its gaudy colours spreads on every place;The face of Nature we no more survey,All glares alike, without distinction gay;But true expression, like the unchanging sun,Clears, and improves whate'er it shines upon;It gilds all objects, but it alters none.Expression is the dress of thought, and stillAppears more decent, as more suitable;A vile conceit in pompous words express'd, 320Is like a clown in regal purple dress'd:For different styles with different subjects sort,As several garbs with country, town, and court.Some by old words to fame have made pretence,Ancients in phrase, mere moderns in their sense;Such labour'd nothings, in so strange a style,Amaze the unlearn'd, and make the learnèd smile.Unlucky, as Fungoso15in the play,These sparks with awkward vanity displayWhat the fine gentleman wore yesterday; 330And but so mimic ancient wits at best,As apes our grandsires, in their doublets dress'd.In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold;Alike fantastic, if too new, or old:Be not the first by whom the new are tried,Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.But most by numbers judge a poet's song;And smooth or rough, with them, is right or wrong:In the bright Muse, though thousand charms conspire,Her voice is all these tuneful fools admire; 340Who haunt Parnassus but to please their ear,Not mend their minds; as some to church repair,Not for the doctrine, but the music there.These equal syllables alone require,Though oft the ear the open vowels tire;While expletives their feeble aid do join,And ten low words oft creep in one dull line:While they ring round the same unvaried chimes,With sure returns of still expected rhymes;Where'er you find 'the cooling western breeze,' 350In the next line, it 'whispers through the trees:'If crystal streams 'with pleasing murmurs creep,'The reader's threaten'd (not in vain) with 'sleep:'Then, at the last and only couplet fraughtWith some unmeaning thing they call a thought,A needless Alexandrine ends the songThat, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along.Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and knowWhat's roundly smooth, or languishingly slow;And praise the easy vigour of a line, 360Where Denham's strength, and Waller's sweetness join.True ease in writing comes from art, not chance,As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance.'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence,The sound must seem an echo to the sense;Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows:But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar.When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw, 370The line too labours, and the words move slow;Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main.Hear how Timotheus' varied lays surprise,And bid alternate passions fall and rise!While, at each change, the son of Libyan JoveNow burns with glory, and then melts with love;Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,Now sighs steal out, and tears begin to flow:Persians and Greeks like turns of nature found, 380And the world's victor stood subdued by sound!The power of music all our hearts allow,And what Timotheus16was, is Dryden now.Avoid extremes; and shun the fault of suchWho still are pleased, too little or too much.At every trifle scorn to take offence:That always shows great pride or little sense;Those heads, as stomachs, are not sure the bestWhich nauseate all, and nothing can digest.Yet let not each gay turn thy rapture move, 390For fools admire, but men of sense approve:As things seem large which we through mists descry,Dulness is ever apt to magnify.Some, foreign writers, some, our own despise;The ancients only, or the moderns prize.Thus wit, like faith, by each man is appliedTo one small sect, and all are damn'd beside.Meanly they seek the blessing to confine,And force that sun but on a part to shine,Which not alone the southern wit sublimes, 400But ripens spirits in cold northern climes;Which from the first has shone on ages past,Enlights the present, and shall warm the last;Though each may feel increases and decays,And see now clearer and now darker days.Regard not then if wit be old or new,But blame the false, and value still the true.Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own,But catch the spreading notion of the town;They reason and conclude by precedent, 410And own stale nonsense which they ne'er invent.Some judge of authors' names, not works, and thenNor praise nor blame the writings, but the men.Of all this servile herd, the worst is heThat in proud dulness joins with quality;A constant critic at the great man's board,To fetch and carry nonsense for my lord.What woful stuff this madrigal would be,In some starved hackney sonnetteer, or me?But let a lord once own the happy lines 420How the wit brightens! how the style refines!Before his sacred name flies every fault,And each exalted stanza teems with thought!The vulgar thus through imitation err;As oft the learn'd by being singular:So much they scorn the crowd, that if the throngBy chance go right, they purposely go wrong:So schismatics the plain believers quit,And are but damn'd for having too much wit.Some praise at morning what they blame at night, 430But always think the last opinion right.A Muse by these is like a mistress used,This hour she's idolised, the next abused;While their weak heads, like towns unfortified,'Twixt sense and nonsense daily change their side.Ask them the cause; they're wiser still, they say;And still to-morrow's wiser than to-day.We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow;Our wiser sons, no doubt, will think us so.Once school-divines this zealous isle o'erspread; 440Who knew most sentences, was deepest read;Faith, Gospel, all, seem'd made to be disputed,And none had sense enough to be confuted:Scotists and Thomists17now in peace remain,Amidst their kindred cobwebs in Duck-lane.18If Faith itself has different dresses worn,What wonder modes in wit should take their turn?Oft, leaving what is natural and fit,The current folly proves the ready wit,And authors think their reputation safe 450Which lives as long as fools are pleased to laugh.Some valuing those of their own side or mind,Still make themselves the measure of mankind:Fondly we think we honour merit then,When we but praise ourselves in other men.Parties in wit attend on those of state,And public faction doubles private hate.Pride, malice, folly, against Dryden rose,In various shapes of parsons, critics, beaux;But sense survived, when merry jests were past; 460For rising merit will buoy up at last.Might he return, and bless once more our eyes,New Blackmores and new Milbourns19must arise:Nay, should great Homer lift his awful head,Zoilus again would start up from the dead.Envy will Merit, as its shade, pursue,But like a shadow, proves the substance true;For envied wit, like Sol eclipsed, makes knownThe opposing body's grossness, not its own.When first that sun too powerful beams displays, 470It draws up vapours which obscure its rays;But even those clouds at last adorn its way,Reflect new glories, and augment the day.20Be thou the first true merit to befriend;His praise is lost, who stays till all commend.Short is the date, alas! of modern rhymes,And 'tis but just to let them live betimes.No longer now that golden age appears,When patriarch-wits survived a thousand years:Now length of fame (our second life) is lost, 480And bare threescore is all even that can boast;Our sons their fathers' failing language see,And such as Chaucer is, shall Dryden be.So when the faithful pencil has design'dSome bright idea of the master's mind,Where a new world leaps out at his command,And ready Nature waits upon his hand;When the ripe colours soften and unite,And sweetly melt into just shade and light;When mellowing years their full perfection give, 490And each bold figure just begins to live,The treacherous colours the fair art betray,And all the bright creation fades away!Unhappy wit, like most mistaken things,Atones not for that envy which it brings.In youth alone its empty praise we boast,But soon the short-lived vanity is lost:Like some fair flower the early spring supplies,That gaily blooms, but even in blooming dies.What is this wit, which must our cares employ? 500The owner's wife, that other men enjoy;Then most our trouble still when most admired,And still the more we give, the more required;Whose fame with pains we guard, but lose with ease,Sure some to vex, but never all to please;'Tis what the vicious fear, the virtuous shun,By fools 'tis hated, and by knaves undone!If wit so much from ignorance undergo,Ah, let not learning too commence its foe!Of old, those met rewards who could excel, 510And such were praised who but endeavour'd well:Though triumphs were to generals only due,Crowns were reserved to grace the soldiers too.Now, they who reach Parnassus' lofty crown,Employ their pains to spurn some others down;And while self-love each jealous writer rules,Contending wits become the sport of fools:But still the worst with most regret commend,For each ill author is as bad a friend. 520To what base ends, and by what abject ways,Are mortals urged through sacred lust of praise!Ah, ne'er so dire a thirst of glory boast,Nor in the critic let the man be lost.Good-nature and good-sense must ever join;To err is human—to forgive, divine.But if in noble minds some dregs remain,Not yet purged off, of spleen and sour disdain;Discharge that rage on more provoking crimes,Nor fear a dearth in these flagitious times. 530No pardon vile obscenity should find,Though wit and art conspire to move your mind;But dulness with obscenity must proveAs shameful sure as impotence in love.In the fat age of pleasure, wealth, and ease,Sprung the rank weed, and thrived with large increase:When love was all an easy monarch's care;21Seldom at council, never in a war:Jilts ruled the state, and statesmen farces writ;Nay, wits had pensions, and young lords had wit; 540The fair sat panting at a courtier's play,And not a mask went unimproved away:The modest fan was lifted up no more,And virgins smiled at what they blush'd before.The following license of a foreign reignDid all the dregs of bold Socinus drain;Then unbelieving priests reform'd the nation,And taught more pleasant methods of salvation;Where Heaven's free subjects might their rights dispute,Lest God himself should seem too absolute: 550Pulpits their sacred satire learn'd to spare,And vice admired to find a flatterer there!Encouraged thus, wit's Titans braved the skies,And the press groan'd with licensed blasphemies.These monsters, critics! with your darts engage,Here point your thunder, and exhaust your rage!Yet shun their fault, who, scandalously nice,Will needs mistake an author into vice;All seems infected that the infected spy,As all looks yellow to the jaundiced eye. 560