breeding; fch as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are vicious, and fome virtuous; fome are unlearned, or (as Chaucer calls them) lewd, and some are learned. Even the ribaldry of the low characters is different: the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook, are several men, and distinguished from each other, as much as the mincing lady priorefs, and the broad-speaking gap-toothed wife of Bath. But enough of this: there is such a variety of game springing up before me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. It is fufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's plenty. We have our fore-fathers and great grand-dames all before us, as they were in Chaucer's days; their general characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in England, though they are called by other names than thofe of Monks and Friars, and Chanons, and lady Abbesses, and Nuns: for mankind is ever the fame, and nothing loft out of nature, though every thing is altered. May I have leave to do myself the juftice, (fince my enemies will do me none, and are so far from granting me to be a good poet, that they will not allow me so much as to be a Christian, or a moral man); may I have leave, I say, to inform my reader, that I have confined my choice to such tales of Chaucer as favour nothing of immodefty. If I had defired more to please than to inftruct, the Reeve, the Miller, the Shipman, the Merchants, the Sumner, and, above all, the Wife of Bath, in the prologue to her tale, would have procured me as many friends and readers, as there are

beaux and ladies of pleasure in the town. But I will no more offend against good-manners: I am fenfible, as I ought to be, of the fcandal I have given by my loofe writings; and make what reparation I am able, by this public acknowledgment. If any thing of this nature, or of profaneness, be crept into these poems, I am so far from defending it, that I difown it. "Totum hoc in

dictum volo." Chaucer makes another manner of apology for his broad-speaking, and Boccace makes the like; but I will follow neither of them. Our countryman, in the end of his characters, before the Canterbury tales, thus excufes the ribaldry, which is very grofs in many of his novels.

But first, I pray you of your courtesy,

That ye ne arrettee it nought my villany,
Though that I plainly speak in this mattere
'To tellen you her words, and eke her chere:
Ne though I speak her words properly,

For this ye knowen as well as I,

Who fhall tellen a tale after a man,

He mote rehearfe as nye, as ever he can :
Everich word of it been in his charge,
All speke he, never fo rudely, ne large.
Or else he mote tellen his tale untrue,
Or feine things, or find words new :

He may not spare, although he were his brother,
He mote as well fay o word as another.

Chrift fpake himself full broad in holy writ,

And well I wote no villany is it,

VOL. III.

D

Eke

Eke Plato faith, who fo can him rede,

The words mote been coufin to the dede.

Yet if a man fhould have inquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were proper in their mouths, but very indecent to be heard; I know not what anfwer they could have made: for that reafon, fuch tale thall be left untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which is fo obfolete, that his fenfe is fcarce to be underfood; and you have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were mentioned before. Yet many of his verfes confift of ten fyllables, and the words not much behind our prefent English: as for example, thefe two lines, in the defcription of the carpenter's young wife :

Wincing flie was, as is a jolly colt,

Long as a maft, and upright as a bolt.

I have aloft done with Chaucer, when I have anfwered fome objections relating to my prefent work. I find fome people are offended that I have turned these talts into modern English; because they think them unworthy of my pains, and look on Chaucer as a dry, old-fashioned wit, not worth reviving. I have often heard the late earl of Leicester fay, that Mr. Cowley himself was of that opinion; who, having read him over at my lord's request, declared he had no taste of him. I dare not advance my opinion against the judgment of fo great an author: but I think it fair, however, to leave the decifion to the public: Mr. Cowley

was

H

was too modeft to fet up for a dictator; and being shocked perhaps with his old stile, never examined into the depth of his good fenfe. Chaucer, I confefs, is a rough diamond, and must first be polished, ere he fhines. I deny not likewife, that, living in our early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece: but fometimes mingles trivial things with thofe of greater moment. Sometimes alfo, though not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has said enough. But there are more great wits befides Chaucer, whose fault is their excess of conceits, and thofe ill forted. An author is not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having obferved this redundancy in Chaucer (as it is an eafy matter for a man of ordinary parts to find a fault in one of greater), I have not tied myself to a literal translation; but have often omitted what I judged unnecessary, or not of dignity enough to appear in the company of better thoughts. I have prefumed farther, in fome places, and added somewhat of my own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his thoughts their true luftre, for want of words in the beginning of our language. And to this I was the more emboldened, because (if I may be permitted to fay it of myfelf) I found I had a foul congenial to his, and that I had been converfant in the fame ftudies. Another poet, in another age, may take the fame liberty with my writings; if at leaft they live long enough to deserve correction. It was alfo neceffary fometimes to restore the fenfe of Chaucer, which was loft or mangled in the errors of the prefs: let this example fuffice at prefent;

in the story of Palamon and Arcite, where the temple of Diana is defcribed, you find these verfes, in all the editions of our author:

There faw I Danè turned into a tree,

I mean not the goddess Diane,

But Venus daughter, which that hight Danè : Which after a little confideration I knew was to be reformed into this fenfe, that Daphne the daughter of Peneus was turned into a tree. I durft not make thus bold with Ovid, left fome future Milbourn fhould arise, and say, I varied from my author, because I understood him not.

But there are other judges who think I ought not to have tranflated Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they fuppofe there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it is little lefs than profanation and facrilege to alter it. They are farther of opinion, that somewhat of his good sense will fuffer in this transfufion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be loft, which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this opinion was that excellent perfon, whom I mentioned, the late earl of Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley defpifed him. My lord diffuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it fome years before his death) and his authority prevailed fo far with me, as to defer my undertaking while he lived, in deference to him: yet my reafon was not convinced with what he urged against it. If the first end of a writer be