#poetry, not to mention the French critics, I fhould "be very glad to have the benefit of the difcovery p." He is followed (as in fame, fo in judgment) by the modeft and fimple-minded

Mr. LEONARD WELSTED.

Who, out of great refpect to our poet, not naming him, doth yet glance at his Effay, together with the Duke of Buckingham's, and the Criticisms of Dryden, and of Horace, which he more openly taxeth 9: "As to "the numerous treatifes, effays, arts, &c. both in "verfe and profe, that have been written by the mo"derns on this ground-work, they do but hackney the fame thoughts over again, making them ftill more trite. Most of their pieces are nothing but a pert, infipid heap of common-place. Horace has, even in "his Art of Poetry, thrown out feveral things which "plainly fhew, he thought an Art of Poetry was of "no ufe, even while he was writing one."

To all which great authorities, we can only oppofe that of

Mr. ADDISON.

"The Art of Criticifm (faith he) which was pub"lished fome months fince, is a mafter-piece in its “kind. The obfervations follow one another like "thofe in Horace's Art of Poetry, without that metho"dical regularity which would have been requifite in

P Effay on Criticifm in profe, octavo, 1728, by the author of the Critical Hiftory of England. 9 Preface to his Poems, p. 18, 53. Spectator, No 253.

C 4

"a profe

"a profe writer. They are fome of them uncommon, "but fuch as the reader muft affent to, when he fees "them explained with that eafe and perfpicuity in "which they are delivered. As for those which are "the most known and the most received, they are placed "in fo beautiful a light, and illustrated with such apt "allufions, that they have in them all the graces of "novelty; and make the reader, who was before ac"quainted with them, ftill more convinced of their "truth and folidity. And here give me leave to men"tion what Monfieur Boileau has fo well enlarged upon "in the preface to his works: That wit and fine wri"ting doth not confift so much in advancing things "that are new, as in giving things that are known an "agreeable turn. It is impoffible for us, who live in "the latter ages of the world, to make obfervations "in criticism, morality, or any art or science, which "have not been touched upon by others; we have "little elfe left us, but to reprefent the common sense "of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more "uncommon lights. If a reader examines Horace's "Art of Poetry, he will find but few precepts in it "which he may not meet with in Aristotle, and which "were not commonly known by all the poets of the "Auguftan age. His way of expreffing, and applying "them, not his invention of them, is what we are "chiefly to admire.

"Longinus, in his Reflections, has given us the fame "kind of fublime, which he obferves in the several "paffages that occafioned them; I cannot but take

"notice

"notice that our English author has after the fame "manner exemplified feveral of the precepts in the

very precepts themfelves." He then produces fome inftances of a particular beauty in the numbers, and concludes with faying, that "there are three poems in "our tongue of the fame nature, and each a master"piece in its kind! The Effay on Tranflated Verse; "the Effay on the Art of Poetry; and the Effay on "Criticism."

Of WINDSOR FOREST, pofitive is the judgment of the affirmative

Mr. JOHN DENNIS.

"That it is a wretched rhapfody, impudently writ "in emulation of the Cooper's Hill of Sir John Den"ham: The author of it is obfcure, is ambiguous, is "affected, is temerarious, is barbarous."

But the author of the Difpenfary',

Dr. GARTH,

in the preface to his poem of Claremont, differs from this opinion: Thofe who have feen these two excel"lent poems of Cooper's Hill, and Windfor Foreft, "the one written by Sir John Deram, the other by "Mr. Pope, will fhew a great deal of candor if they "approve of this."

Of the Epistle of ELOISA, we are told by the obfcure writer of a poem called Sawney, "That because "Prior's Henry and Emma charmed the finest taftes,

Letter to B. B. at the end of the Remarks on Pope's Homer, 1717. Printed 1728, p. 12.

❝ our

cr

our author writ his Eloife in oppofition to it; but forgot innocence and virtue: If you take away her "tender thoughts, and her fierce defires, all the reft is of no value." In which, methinks, his judgment refembleth that of a French taylor on a villa and gardens by the Thames: "All this is very fine; but take *away the river, and it is good for nothing." But very contrary hereunto was the opinion of Mr. PRIOR

himself, faying in his Alma".

O Abelard! ill fated youth,

Thy tale will justify this truth:
But well I weet, thy cruel wrong
Adorns a nobler Poet's fong:

Dan Pope, for thy misfortune griev'd,
With kind concern and fkill has weav'd

A filken web; and ne'er fhall fade

Its colours gently has he laid

:

The mantle o'er thy fad distress,

And Venus fhall the texture blefs, &c.

Come we now to his tranflation of the ILIAD, celebrated by numerous pens, yet fhall it fuffice to mention the indefatigable

Sir RICHARD BLACKMORE, Kt.

Who (though otherwise a fevere cenfurer of our author) yet tyleth this a "laudable tranflation w." That ready writer

u Alma, Cant. 2.

w In his Effays, vol. 1. printed for E. Curll.

Mr.

Mr. OLDMIXON,

in his forementioned Effay, frequently commends the fame. And the painful

Mr. LEWIS THEOBALD

thus extols it, "The fpirit of Homer breathes all "through this tranflation.-I am in doubt, whether I "fhould most admire the juftnefs to the original, or the "force and beauty of the language, or the founding 46 variety of the numbers: But when I find all thefe "meet, it puts me in mind of what the poet fays of

46

one of his heroes, That he alone raised and flung "with eafe a weighty ftone, that two common men "could not lift from the ground; juft fo, one fingle "perfon has performed in this tranflation, what I once "defpaired to have feen done by the force of feveral "mafterly hands." Indeed the fame gentleman appears to have changed his fentiment in his Effay on the Art of finking in reputation, (printed in Mift's Journal, March 30, 1728.) where he fays thus: "In order to "fink in reputation, let him take it into his head to "defcend into Homer (let the world wonder, as it will, "how the devil he got there) and pretend to do him "into English, fo his verfion denote his neglect of the "manner how." Strange Variation! We are told in MIST'S JOURNAL, June 8.

"That this tranflation of the Illiad was not in all refpects conformable to the fine tafte of his friend Mr. "Addifon; infomuch that he employed a younger Muse,

x Cenfor, vol. ii. n. 33