THE SECOND EPISTLE

OF THE

SECOND BOOK OF HORACE.

This Epistle is addressed to colonel Cotterell, of Rousham, near Oxford, the descendant of sir Charles Cotterell, who, at the desire of Charles I., translated Davila into English. Pope in this poem once more gracefully alludes to his personal circumstances, his self-taught knowlege, his love of a country life, his indifference to wealth, and the resignation with which he was prepared to give up the great world and life together.

Dear colonel, Cobham's and your country's friend,
You love a verse; take such as I can send.
A Frenchman comes, presents you with his boy ;
Bows, and begins :- This lad, sir, is of Blois :
Observe his shape how clean! his locks how curld!
My only son! I'd have him see the world: 6
His French is pure; his voice too—you shall hear:
Sir, he's your slave, for twenty pound a year.
Mere wax as yet, you fashion him with ease,
Your barber, cook, upholsterer, what you please :

A perfect genius at an opera-song:

11 To say too much might do my

honor

wrong. Take him with all his virtues, on my word; His whole ambition was to serve a lord : But, sir, to you, with what would I not part? 15 Though, faith, I fear, 'twill break his mother's

heart. Once, and but once, I caught him in a lie, And then, unwhipp’d, he had the grace to cry: The fault he has I fairly shall reveal ; (Could you o'erlook but that) it is—to steal.' 20

If, after this, you took the graceless lad, Could you complain, my friend, he proved so bad? Faith, in such case, if you should prosecute, I think sir Godfrey should decide the suit; Who sent the thief that stole the cash away, 25 And punish'd him that put it in his way.

Consider then, and judge me in this light: I told you, when I went, I could not write ; You said the same; and are you discontent With laws, to which you gave your own assent? Nay, worse, to ask for verse at such a time! 31 D'ye think me good for nothing but to rhyme? In Anna's wars, a soldier poor

and old Had dearly earn'd a little purse of gold : Tired with a tedious march, one luckless night, 35 He slept, poor dog! and lost it, to a doit. This put the man in such a desperate mind, Between revenge, and grief, and hunger join'd, Against the foe, himself, and all mankind,

40

He leap'd the trenches, scaled a castle-wall, Tore down a standard, took the fort and all. • Prodigious well!' his great commander cried; Gave him much praise, and some reward beside. Next pleased his excellence a town to batter: (Its name I know not, and ’tis no great matter) 45 • Go on, my friend,' he cried; see yonder

walls !
Advance and conquer! go where glory calls !
More honors, more rewards, attend the brave.'
Don't you remember what reply he gave?
• D'
ye
think

me,
noble

general, such a sot? Let him take castles who has ne'er a groat.'

Bred up at home, full early I begun
To read in Greek the wrath of Peleus' son.
Besides, my father taught me, from a lad,
The better art to know the good from bad :
And little sure imported to remove,
To hunt for truth in Maudlin's learned grove.
But knottier points, we knew not half so well,
Deprived us soon of our paternal cell;

50

55

55 To know the good from bad. The original,'curvo dignoscere rectum,' produces some critical skirmishing. Dacier pronounces it to mean, the study of geometry; Warton pronounces Dacier's meaning to be absurd; Wakefield pronounces that Pope was wrong, and Warton puzzled ; and repeats, with Dacier, that the true purport is, to distinguish a right line from a curve,' geometry being one of the preliminary studies of the Academy.

57 In Maudlin's learned grove. Pope had a partiality for this college in Oxford, in which he had spent many agreeable days with his friend Mr. Digby, who provided rooms for him at that college.—Warton.

59 Deprived us soon. The apologies of the original for the

65

And certain laws, by sufferers thought unjust, 60
Denied all posts of profit or of trust :
Hopes after hopes of pious papists fail'd,
While mighty William's thundering arm prevail'd.
For right hereditary tax'd and fined,
He stuck to poverty with peace of mind;
And me, the Muses help to undergo it;
Convict a papist he, and I a poet.
But, thanks to Homer! since I live and thrive,
Indebted to no prince or peer alive,
Sure I should want the care of ten Monroes, 70
If I would scribble rather than repose.
Years following years, steal something every

day;
At last they steal us from ourselves away ;
In one our frolics, one amusements end,
In one a mistress drops, in one a friend :
This subtle thief of life, this paltry time,
What will it leave me, if it snatch my rhyme ?

75

part which Horace took in the civil wars, are among the happiest instances of his felicitous style :

Dura sed emovere loco me tempora grato;
Civilisque rudem belli tulit æstus in arma,
Cæsaris Augusti non responsura lacertis.
Unde simul primum me dimisere Philippi,
Decisis humilem pennis, inopem que paterni
Laris et fundi; paupertas impulit audax

Versus ut facerem. Warton, in the spirit of a scholar, observes this apologetical delicacy of throwing the blame on necessity, inexperience, and the whirl of the time. Horace had the high command, of a legion ;-a command equivalent to that of a British majorgeneral.

me do?

If every wheel of that unwearied mill, ,
That turn'd ten thousand verses, now stands

still?
But after all, what would you

have

80 When out of twenty I can please not two; When this heroics only deigns to praise, Sharp satire that, and that Pindaric lays? One likes the pheasant's wing, and one the leg; The vulgar boil, the learned roast an egg; 85 Hard task! to hit the palate of such guests, When Oldfield loves what Darteneuf detests.

But grant I may relapse, for want of grace, Again to rhyme; can London be the place? Who there his Muse, or self, or soul attends, 90 In crowds, and courts, law, business, feasts, and

friends? My counsel sends to execute a deed : A poet begs me I will hear him read: In Palace-yard at nine you 'll find me there At ten for certain, sir, in Bloomsbury-square- 95 Before the lords at twelve my cause comes onThere's a rehearsal, sir, exact at one.•, but a wit can study in the streets, And raise his mind above the mob he meets.' Not quite so well however as one ought: A hackney-coach may chance to spoil a thought;

100

83 Pindaric lays? Those unfortunate performances find no mercy from the rough gripe of Warburton :-Of our modern lyrics,' he says, 'the English are Pindaric, and the Latin Horatian : the former are, like boiled meats, of different tastes, but all insipid ; the latter, like the same meats potted, but all of one taste.' The reason assigned for this sweeping condemnation is, that the English ode-makers only imitate Pindar's ideas; the Latin employ Horace's very words.'