tinguish your writings from those of any others; it is now time to clear myself from any imputation of self-conceit on that subject. I assume not to myself any particular lights in this discovery; they are such only as are obvious to every man of sense and judgment, who loves poetry, and understands it. Your thoughts are always so remote from the common way of thinking, that they are, as I may say, of another species, than the conceptions of other poets; yet you go not out of nature for any of them. Gold is never bred upon the surface of the ground, but lies so hidden, and so deep, that the mines of it are seldom found; but the force of waters casts it out from the bowels of mountains, and exposes it amongst the sands of rivers; giving us of her bounty, what we could not hope for by our search. This success attends your lordship's thoughts, which would look like chance, if it were not perpetual, and always of the same tenor. If I grant that there is care in it, it is such a care as would be ineffectual and fruitless in other men. It is the curiosa felicitas which Petronius ascribes to Horace in his Ödes. We have not wherewithal to imagine so strongly, so justly, and so pleasantly; in short, if we have the same knowledge, we cannot draw out of it the same quintessence; we cannot give it such a turn, such a propriety, and such a beauty; something is deficient in the manner, or the words, but more in the nobleness of our conception. Yet when you have finished all, and it appears in its full lustre, when the diamond is not only found, but the roughness smoothed, when it is cut into a form, and set in gold, then we cannot but acknowledge, that it is the perfect work of art and nature; and every one will be so vain, to think he himself could have performed the like, until he attempts it. It is

just the description that Horace makes of such a finished piece: it appears so easy,

-Ut sibi quivis

Speret idem, sudet multum, frustraque laboret,
Ausus idem.

And, besides all this, it is your lordship's particular talent to lay your thoughts so close together, that, were they closer, they would be crowded, and even a due connection would be wanting. We are not kept in expectation of two good lines, which are to come after a long parenthesis of twenty bad; which is the April poetry of other writers, a mixture of rain and sunshine by fits: you are always bright, even almost to a fault, by reason of the excess. There is continual abundance, a magazine of thought, and yet a perpetual variety of entertainment; which creates such an appetite in your reader, that he is not cloyed with any thing, but satisfied with all. It is that which the Romans call, cana dubia; where there is such plenty, yet withal so much diversity, and so good order, that the choice is difficult betwixt one excellency and another; and yet the conclusion, by a due climax, is evermore the best; that is, as a conclusion ought to be, ever the most proper for its place. See, my lord, whether I have not studied your lordship with some application; and, since you are so modest that you will not be judge and party, I appeal to the whole world, if I have not drawn your picture to a great degree of likeness, though it is but in miniature, and that some of the best features are yet wanting. Yet what I have done is enough to distinguish you from any other, which is the proposition that I took upon me to de

monstrate.

And now, my lord, to apply what I have said to my present business. The Satires of Juvenal and

Persius appearing in this new English dress, cannot so properly be inscribed to any man as to your lordship, who are the first of the age in that way of writing. Your lordship, amongst many other favours, has given me your permission for this address; and you have particularly encouraged me by your perusal and approbation of the Sixth and Tenth Satires of Juvenal, as I have translated them. My fellow-labourers have likewise commissioned me, to perform, in their behalf, this office of a dedication to you; and will acknowledge, with all possible respect and gratitude, your acceptance of their work. Some of them have the honour to be known to your lordship already; and they who have not yet that happiness, desire it now. Be pleased to receive our common endeavours with your wonted candour, without entitling you to the protection of our common failings in so difficult an undertaking. And allow me your patience, if it be not already tired with this long epistle, to give you, from the best authors, the origin, the antiquity, the growth, the change, and the completement of satire among the Romans; to describe, if not define, the nature of that poem, with its several qualifications and virtues, together with the several sorts of it; to compare the excellencies of Horace, Persius, and Juvenal, and show the particular manners of their satires; and, lastly, to give an account of this new way of version, which is attempted in our performance: all which, according to the weakness of my ability, and the best lights which I can get from others, shall be the subject of my following discourse.

The most perfect work of poetry, says our master Aristotle, is tragedy. His reason is, because it is the most united; being more severely confined within the rules of action, time, and place. The action is entire, of a piece, and one, without episodes; the time

limited to a natural day; and the place circumscribed at least within the compass of one town, or city. Being exactly proportioned thus, and uniform in all its parts, the mind is more capable of comprehending the whole beauty of it without distraction.

But, after all these advantages, an heroic poem is certainly the greatest work of human nature. The beauties and perfections of the other are but mechanical; those of the epic are more noble: though Homer has limited his place to Troy, and the fields about it; his actions to forty-eight natural days, whereof twelve are holidays, or cessation from business, during the funeral of Patroclus.-To proceed; the action of the epic is greater; the extention of time enlarges the pleasure of the reader, and the episodes give it more ornament, and more variety. The instruction is equal; but the first is only instructive, the latter forms a hero, and a prince.

If it signifies any thing which of them is of the more ancient family, the best and most absolute heroic poem was written by Homer long before tragedy was invented. But if we consider the natural endowments, and acquired parts, which are necessary to make an accomplished writer in either kind, tragedy requires a less and more confined knowledge; moderate learning, and observation of the rules, is sufficient, if a genius be not wanting. But in an epic poet, one who is worthy of that name, besides an universal genius, is required universal learning, together with all those qualities and acquisitions which I have named above, and as many more as I have, through haste or negligence, omitted. And, after all, he must have exactly studied Homer and Virgil, as his patterns; Aristotle and Horace, as his guides; and Vida and Bossu, as their commentators; with many others, both Italian and

French critics, which I want leisure here to recommend.

In a word, what I have to say in relation to this subject, which does not particularly concern satire, is, that the greatness of an heroic poem, beyond that of a tragedy, may easily be discovered, by observing how few have attempted that work in comparison to those who have written dramas; and, of those few, how small a number have succeeded. But leaving the critics, on either side, to contend about the preference due to this or that sort of poetry, I will hasten to my present business, which is the antiquity and origin of satire, according to those informations which I have received from the learned Casaubon, Heinsius, Rigaltius, Dacier, and the Dauphin's Juvenal; to which I shall add some observations of my own.

There has been a long dispute among the modern critics, whether the Romans derived their satire from the Grecians, or first invented it themselves. Julius Scaliger, and Heinsius, are of the first opinion; Casaubon, Rigaltius, Dacier, and the publisher of the Dauphin's Juvenal, maintain the latter. If we take satire in the general signification of the word, as it is used in all modern languages, for an invective, it is certain that it is almost as old as verse; and though hymns, which are praises of God, may be allowed to have been before it, yet the defamation of others was not long after it. After God had cursed Adam and Eve in Paradise, the husband and wife excused themselves, by laying the blame on one another; and gave a beginning to those conjugal dialogues in prose, which the poets have perfected in verse. The third chapter of Job is one of the first instances of this poem in holy scripture; unless we will take it higher, from the latter end of the second, where his wife advises him to curse his Maker.