Page images
PDF
EPUB

that neceffity of your writing, that we cannot fubfift intirely without it; any more (I may almost say) than the world without the daily courfe of ordinary Providence, methinks this argument might prevail with you, my Lord, to forego a little of your repose for the pubdic benefit. It is not that you are under any force of working daily miracles, to prove your being; but now and then somewhat of extraordinary, that is any thing of your production, is requifite to refresh your character.

This, I think, my Lord, is a fufficient reproach to you; and, fhould I carry it as far as mankind would authorize me, would be little lefs than fatyr. And, indeed, a provocation is almoft neceffary, in behalf of the world, that you might be induced fometimes to write; and in relation to a multitude of fcribblers, who daily pefter the world with their infufferable stuff, that they might be difcouraged from writing any more. I complain not of their lampoons and libels, though I have been the public mark for many years. I am vindictive enough to have repelled force by force, if I could imagine that any of them had ever reached me; but they either shot at rovers, and therefore missed, or their power was fo weak, that. I might fafely ftand them, at the neareft diftance. I answered not the Rehearsal, because I knew the author fate to himself when he drew the picture, and was the very Bayes of his own farce. Because alfo I knew, that my betters were more concerned than I was in that fatyr: and, lastly, because Mr. Smith and Mr, Jonfon, the main pillars

of

of it, were two such languishing gentlemen in their converfation, that I could liken them to nothing but to their own relations, thofe noble characters of men of wit and pleasure about the town. The like confidera

tions have hindered me from dealing with the lamentable companions of their profe and doggrel; I am fo far from defending my Poetry against them, that I will not fo much as expofe theirs. And for my morals, if they are not proof against their attacks, let me be thought by pofterity, what thofe authors would be thought, if any memory of them, or of their writings, could endure fo long, as to another age. But these dull makers of lampoons, as harmlefs as they have been to me, are yet of dangerous example to the public: fome witty men may perhaps fucceed to their defigns, and, mixing fenfe with malice, blaft the reputation of the most innocent amongst men, and the most virtuous amongst women.

Heaven be praised, our common libellers are as free from the imputation of wit, as of morality; and therefore whatever mifchief they have deligned, they have performed but little of it. Yet thefe ill writers, in all juftice, ought themselves to be exposed: as Perfius has given us a fair example in his first fatyr : which is levelled particularly at them and none is fo fit to correct their faults, as he who is not only clear from any in his own writings, but also fo juft, that he will never defame the good; and is armed with the power of verfe, to punish and make examples of the bad. But of this I fhall have occasion to speak

further,

further, when I come to give the definition and cha racter of true fatires.

In the mean time, as a counfellor, bred up in the knowledge of the municipal and ftatute laws, may honeftly inform a juft prince how far his prerogative extends ; fo I may be allowed to tell your Lordship, who, by an undisputed title, are the king of poets, what an extent of power you have, and how lawfully you may exercise it, over the petulant fcribblers of this age. As Lord Chamberlain, I know, you are absolute by your office, in all that belongs to the decency and good-manners of the ftage. You can banish from thence fcurrility and prophaneness, and restrain the licentious infolence of poets and their actors in all things that fhock the public quiet, or the reputation of private perfons, under the notion of humour. But I mean not the authority which is annexed to your office : I speak of that only which is inborn, and inherent to your perfon. What is produced in you by an excellent wit, a mafterly and commanding genius over all. writers whereby you are impowered, when you please, to give the final decifion of wit; to put your stamp on all. that ought to país for current; and fet a brand of reprobation on clipt poetry and falfe coin. A fhilling, dipt in the bath, may go for gold amongst the ignorant; but the fceptrês on the guineas fhew the difference. That your Lordship is formed by nature for this fupremacy, I could cafily prove, (were it not already granted by the world,) from the diftinguishing character of your writings; which is fo visible to me, that, I

:

never could be impofed on to receive for yours what is written by any others; or to mistake your genuine poetry for their fpurious productions. I can farther add with truth (though not without some vanity in saying it) that in the fame paper, written by divers hands, whereof your Lordship was only part, I could feparate your gold from their copper: and though I could not give back to every author his own brafs (for there is not the fame rule for distinguishing betwixt bad and bad, as betwixt ill and excellently good) yet I never failed of knowing what was yours, and what was not; and was abfolutely certain, that this, or the other part, was pofitively yours, and could not pofitively be written by any other.

True it is, that fome bad poems, though not all, carry their owner's mark about them. There is fome peculiar ankwardnefs, falfe grammar, imperfect fenfe, or, at the leaft, obfcurity; fome brand or other on this buttock, or that ear, that it is notorious who the owners of the cattle, though they should not fign it with their names. But your Lordship, on the contrary, is diftinguished, not only by the excellency of your thoughts, but by your style and manner of expreffing them. A painter, judging of some admirable piece, may affirm with certainty, that it was of Holben, or Van Dyck but vulgar defigns, and common draughts, are cafily mistaken and misapplied. Thus, by my long ftudy of your Lordship, I am arrived at the knowledge of your particular manner. In the good poems of other men, like thofe artifts, I can only fay, this is

like the draught of fuch a one, or like the colouring of another. In fhort, I can only be fure, that it is the hand of a good master; but in your performances, it is fcarcely poffible for me to be deceived. If you write in your ftrength, you ftand revealed at the first view; and fhould you write under it, you cannot avoid fome peculiar graces, which only coft me a fecond confideration to discover you: for I must fay it, with all the feverity of truth, that every line of yours is precious. Your Lordship's only fault is, that you have not written more; unless I could add another, and that yet a greater, but I fear for the publick the accufation would not be true, that you have written, and out of vicious modesty will not publish.

fub

Virgil has confined his works within the compass of eighteen thousand lines, and has not treated many jects; yet he ever had, and ever will have, the reputation of the beft poet. Martial fays of him, that he could have excelled Varius in Tragedy, and Horace in Lyric Poetry, but, out of deference to his friends, he attempted neither.

The fame prevalence of genius is in your Lordship: but the world cannot pardon your concealing it, on the fame confideration; because we have neither a living Varius, nor a Horace, in whofe excellencies both of Poems, Odes, and Satires you have equalled them, if our language had not yielded to the Roman majefty, and length of time had not added a reverence to the works of Horace. For good fenfe is the fame in all or moft ages; and courfe of time rather improves

nature,

« PreviousContinue »