Quid fi peteretur crimine tanto Limes uterque poli, quem Sol emiffus Eoo This was pretty well one would think already, but he goes on Quafque procul terras obliquo fydere tangit Igne Noti? After all this, what cou'd a Poet think of but Hea ven itself for the prize! but what follows is aftonifhing. in -Quid fi Tyria Phrygiæve fub unum I do not remember to have met with fo great a fall any antient author whatfoever. I fhou'd not have infifted fo much on the faults of this Poet, if I did not hope you wou'd take the fame freedom with, and revenge it upon, his Tranflator. I shall be extreamly glad if the reading this can be any amufement to you, the rather because I had the diffatisfaction to hear you have been confin'd to your chamber by an illness, which I fear was as troublesome a companion as I have fometimes been to you in the fame place; where if ever you found any pleasure in my company, it must furely have been that, which moft men take in obferving the faults and follies of another; a pleasure which you fee I take care to give you even in my abfence. If you will oblige me at your leifure with the confirmation of your recovery, under your own hand, it will be extream grateful to me, for next to the pleafure of feeing my friends, is that I take in hearing from them; and in this particular I am beyond all acknowledgments F ledgments obliged to our friend Mr. Wycherley. I know I need no apology to you for fpeaking of him, whofe example as I am proud of following in all things, fo in nothing more than in profeffing my felf like him, Your, &c. You LETTER VI. May 7, 1709. OU had long before this time been troubled with a letter from me, but that I deferr'd it till I cou'd fend you either the Miscellany, or my continuation of the verfion of Statius. The firft I imagin'd you might have had before now, but fince the contrary has happen'd, you may draw this moral from it, That authors in general are more ready to write nonfenfe than bookfellers are to publish it. I had I know not what extraordinary flux of rhyme upon me for three days together, in which time all the verses you fee added, have been written; which I tell you, that you may more freely be fevere upon them. 'Tis a mercy I do not affault you with a number of original Sonnets and Epigrams, which our modern bards put forth in the spring-time, in as great abundance, as trees do bloffoms, a very few whereof ever come to be fruit, and please no longer than juft in their birth. So they make no lefs hafte to bring their flowers of wit to the prefs, than gardeners to bring their other flowers to the market, which if they can't get off their hands in the morning, are fure to die before night. Jacob Tonfon's fixth volume of Poetical Mifcellanies, in which Mr. Pope's Paftorals, and fome verfions Homer and Chaucer were firft printed. Thus Thus the fame reafon that furnishes Covent-garden with thofe nofegays you fo delight in, fupplies the Mufes Mercury and British Apollo (not to fay Jacob's Mifcellanies) with verfes. And it is the happiness of this age, that the modern invention of printing poems for pence a-piece, has brought the nofegays of Parnaffus to bear the fame price; whereby the publickfpirited Mr. Henry Hills of Black-friars has been the cause of great eafe and fingular comfort to all the learned, who never over-abounding in tranfitory coin, fhou'd not be discontented (methinks) even tho' poems were distributed gratis about the streets, like Bunyan's fermons and other pious treatises, ufually publifh'd in a like volume and character. The time now drawing nigh, when you use with Sapho to cross the water in an ev'ning to Spring-garden, I hope you will have a fair opportunity of ravishing her: I mean only (as Oldfox in the Plain-dealer fays) thro' the ear, with your well-penn'd verses. I wish you all the pleasures which the season and the nymph can afford; the best company, the best coffee, and the beft news you can defire: and what more to wish you than this, I do not know; unless it be a great deal of patience to read and examine the verses I fend you: I promise you in return a great deal of deference to your judgment, and an extraordinary obedience to your fentiments for the future, (to which you know I have been fometimes a little refractory.) If you will please to begin where you left off laft, and mark the margins, as you have done in the pages immediately before, (which you will find corrected to your fenfe fince your laft perufal) you will extreamly oblige me, and improve my tranflation. Befides those places which may deviate from the fenfe of the author, it wou'd be very kind in you to obferve any deficien F 2 cies cies in the diction or numbers. The Hiatus in particular I wou'd avoid as much as poffible, to which you are certainly in the right to be a profeís'd enemy; tho' I confess I cou'd not think it poffible at all times to be avoided by any writer, till I found by reading Malherbe lately, that there is fcarce any throughout his poems. I thought your observation true enough to be pafs'd into a rule, but not a rule without exceptions, nor that ever it had been reduc'd to practise: But this example of one of the most correct and best of their Poets has undeceiv'd me, and confirms your opinion very strongly, and much more than Mr. Dryden's authority, who tho' he made it a rule, feldom obferv'd it. LETTER VII. Your, &c. June 10, 1709. I Have receiv'd part of the verfion of Statius, and return you my thanks for your Remarks, which I think to be juft, except where you cry out (like one in Horace's Art of Poetry) pulchre, bene, recte! There I have fome fears, you are often, if not always, in the wrong. One of your objections, namely on that paffage, The reft, revolving years shall ripen into fate, may be well grounded, in relation to its not being the exact fenfe of the words * Cætera reliquo ordine ducam. But the duration of the Action of Statius's poem may as well be excepted againft, as many things befides in him: (which I wonder Boffu has not * See the first book of Statius, verse 302. obferv'd) obferv'd) for instead of confining his narration to one year, it is manifeftly exceeded in the very first two books: The narration begins with Oedipus's prayer to the Fury to promote difcord betwixt his fons; afterward the Poet exprefly defcribes their entring into the agreement of reigning a year by turns; and Polynices take his flight for Thebes on his brother's refufal to refign the throne. All this is in the first book; in the next, Tydeus is fent ambaffador to Etheocles, and demands his refignation in these terms, •Aftriferum velox jam circulus orbem Torfit, & amiffa redierunt montibus umbra, But Boffu himself is mistaken in one particular, relating to the commencement of the action; faying in book 2. cap. 8. that Statius opens it with Europa's Rape, whereas the Poet at moft only deliberates whether he thou'd or not? D Unde jubetis Ire, Dea? gentifne canam primordia dira, but then exprefly paffes all this with a longa retro Series and fays limes mihi carminis efte Oedipoda confuja domus Indeed there are numberless particulars blame-worthy in our author, which I have try'd to foften in the verfion: dubiamq; jugo fragor impulit Oeten In latus, geminis vix fluctibus obftitit Ifthmus, |