NIGHT. AN EPISTLE TO ROBERT LLOYD. THIS poem was published in October, 1761, and if considered in the light of a familiar address to an intimate friend, is not subject to those strict rules of composition which more dignified poetry requires. Notwithstanding this due allowance, Night contains more faulty, bald and prosaic lines than any other, of our author's productions. An instance of his sinning against his own better judgment, occurs in his frequent adoption of the coarse epithet Fool; for the use of which he in the Ghost censures Dr. Johnson, in the concluding part of the character of Pomposo, "For 'tis with him a certain rule The folly's proved when he calls fool." Fool is the most obvious word of contempt amongst the lowest set of speakers; it is attended with no grace, and conveys no strength of idea to the ear or understanding, it marks no character, but is applicable to all alike. The title of the poem may probably have been suggested by Dr. Armstrong's "Day, an Epistle to J. Wilkes, of Aylesbury, Esq." then lately published, without the consent of the author, who was with the English army in Germany; from whence it was written in easy loose verse, with little regard to the matter, and less to the manner. In his epistle Dr. Armstrong ventured to censure Churchill, who expressed much resentment at the attack, and would never be reconciled with the author of it. The principal object of Night was to exculpate the poet and the friend to whom it is addressed, from the censure of the world on the score of those irregularities in conduct, which the celebrity of the foregoing poems rendered more conspicuous in the author of them, by inducing those who smarted under his lash, to make researches into hig private character; and by publishing exaggerated statements of his improprieties of behaviour, to deaden the force of the blow they could not parry. His propensity to late hours and his employment of them in genial converse with his friends, he here avows; and great examples in ancient and modern times, will certainly rescue his taste from the charge of sin gularity. Had he not been himself so severe a censor, his private irregularities would have been softened down to the eccentricities of genius, and his midnight parties would have been dignified with the amiable attributes of social enjoyment, "the feast of reason and the flow of soul;" instead of which, they were blazoned abroad as the orgies of brutal intemperance, and the scenes of vulgar and depraved gratification. His clerical character might indeed have induced a stricter attention to the opinion of the world, though some justification is afforded by a similar predilection for tavern meetings and late hours, in Dr. Johnson, whose purity of life, habitual temperance, and stern morality, would have dignified the most exalted station in the church. The Noctes Atticæ in Ivy Lane, were ushered in by the Doctor with his favourite toast, the dying ejaculation of Father Paul "Esto perpetua!" NIGHT. Contrarius evehor orbi.-OVID. Met. lib. ii. WHEN foes insult, and prudent friends dispense, Let slaves to business, bodies without soul, Misfortunes, like the owl, avoid the light; "This Night, like many others at this time of the year, is very cold, long, dark, and dirty, which will not induce many to walk out in it."-CRITICAL REVIEW, Dec. 1761. The wretch bred up in method's drowsy school, Whose only merit is to err by rule, 20 Who ne'er through heat of blood was tripping caught, Nor guilty deem'd of one eccentric thought; 26 Unless to move the body's dull machine, Good hours-fine words-but was it ever seen Go on, ye fools, who talk for talking sake, Without distinguishing, distinctions make; 18 What have we with day to do! Sons of Care, 'twas made for you. 40 This is the more popular doctrine, and we believe most commonly governs the distribution of the four-and-twenty hours. Shine forth in native folly, native pride, Make yourselves rules to all the world beside; 50 55 Let the sage Doctor (think him one we know) With scraps of ancient learning overflow, In all the dignity of wig declare The fatal consequence of midnight air, How damps and vapours, as it were by stealth, Whilst soul is join'd to body, whether fate 60 65 I'll make them live, as brother should with brother, And keep them in good humour with each other. The surest road to health, say what they will, Is never to suppose we shall be ill. Most of those evils we poor mortals know, From doctors and imagination flow. |