AN ACCOUNT OF THE ENSUING POEM, IN A LETTER TO THE HON. SIR ROBERT HOWARD. 81 R, I AM fo many ways obliged to you, and fo little able to return your favours, that, like thofe who owe too much,l ̊can only live by getting farther into your debt. You have not only been careful of my fortune, which was the effect of your nobleness, but you have been folicitous of my reputation, which is that of your kindness. It is not long fince I gave you the trouble of perufing a play for me, and now, inftead of an acknowledgment, I have given you a greater, in the correction of a poem. But fince you are to bear this perfecution, I will at least give you the encouragement of a martyr; you could never fuffer in a nobler caufe. For I have chofen the most heroic fubject, which any poet could defire: I have taken upon me to defcribe the motives, the beginning, progrefs, and fucceffes, of a moft just and neceffary war; in it, the care, management, and prudence of our king; the conduct and valour of a royal admiral, and of two incomparable generals; the invincible courage of our captains and feamen; and three glorious, victories, the refult of all. After this, I have, in the fire, the most deplorable, but withal the greateft, argument that can be imagined: the deftruction being fo fwift, fo fudden, so vast and miferable, as nothing can parallel in flory. The former part of this poem, relating to the war, is but a due expi ation for my not having ferved my king and country in it. All gentlemen are almost obliged to it: and I know no reafon we should give that advantage to the commonality of England, to be foremost in brave actions, which the nobles of France would never fuffer in their peasants. I fhould not have written this but to a perfon who has been ever forward to appear in all employ. ments whither his honour aud generofity have called him. The latter part of my poem, which defcribes the Fire, I owe, first to the piety and fatherly affection of our monarch to his fuffering fubjects; and, in the fecond place, to the courage, loyalty, and magnanimity of the city; both which were fo confpicuous, that I wanted words to celebrate them as they deferve. I have called my poem Historical, not Epic, though both the actions and actors are as much heroic as any poem can contain. But fince the action is not properly one, nor that accomplished in the laft fucceffes, I have. judged it too bold a title for a few ftanzas, which are little more in number than a single Iliad, or the longeft of the Æneids. For this reason (I mean not of length, but broken action, tied too feverely to the laws of hiftory) I am apt to agree with thofe, who rank Lucan, rather among historians in verfe, than Epic poets: in whofe room, if I am not deceived, Silius Italicus, though a worfe writer, may more justly be admitted. I have chofen to write my poem in quatrians, or ftanzas of four in alternate thyme, because I have ever : opportunity to correct them; the whole poent being first written, and now sent you from a place where I have not fo much as the converse of any feaman. Yet though the trouble I had in judged them more noble, and of greater dignity, both for the found and number, than any other verfe in ufe amongst us; in which I am fure I have your approbation. The learned languages have certainly a great advantage of us, in not be-writing it was great, it was no more than recoming tied to the flavery of any rhyme; and were lefs conftrained in the quantity of every fyllable; which they might vary with fpondees or dactyls, befides fo many other helps of grammatical figures, for the lengthening or abreviation of them, than the modern are in the clofe of that one fyllable, which often confines, and more often corrupts, the fenfe of all the reft. Bnt in this neceffity of our rhymes, I have always found the couplet verfe most easy, though not fo proper for this occafion for there the work is fooner at an end, every two lines concluding the labour of the poet; but in quatrains he is to carry it farther on, and not only fo, but to bear along in his head the troublesome fenfe of four lines together. For thofe, who write correctly in this kind, must needs acknowledge, that the laft line of the ftanza is to be confidered in the compofition of the first. Neither can we give ourfelves the liberty of making any part of a verfe for the fake of rhyme, or concluding with a word which is not current English, or using the variety of female rhymes; all which our fathers practifed and for the female rhymes, they are ftill in ufe amongst other nations; with the Italian in every line, with the Spaniard promifcuously, with the French alternately; as those who have read the Alarique, the Pucelli, or any of their later poems, will agree with me. And befides this, they write in Alexandrins, or veries of fix feet; fuch as amongst us is the old tranflation of Homer by Chapman: all which, by lengthning of their chain, makes the fphere of their activity the larger. I have dwelt too long upon the choice of my ftanza, which you may remember is much better defended in the preface to Gondibert; and therefore I will haften to acquaint you with my endeavours in the writing. In general I will only fay, I have never yet feen the defcription of any naval fight in the proper terms which are used at fea: and if there be any fuch in another language, as that of Lucan in the third of his Pharfalia, yet I could not avail myfelf of it in the English; the terms of art in every tongue bearing more of the idiom of it than any other words. We hear indeed among our pects, of the thundering of guns, the fmoke, the diforder, and the flaughter; but all thefe are common notions. And certainly, as thofe who in a logical difpute keep in general terms, would hide a fallacy; fo thofe who do it in any poetical defcription, would veil their ignorance. "Defcriptas fervare vices operumque colores, For my own part, if I had little knowledge of the fea, yet I have thought it no fhame to learn; and if I have made fome few mistakes, it is only, as you can bear me witnefs, because I have wanted penfed by the pleafure. I found myself fo warm the Plague, the Country, the Battle of the Bulls, the Labour of the Bees, and thofe many other excellent images of nature, moft f which are neither great in themselves, nor have any natural ornament to bear them up: but the words wherewith he defcribes them are fo excellent, that it might be well as plied to him, which was faid by Ovid, "Materiem fuperabat opus:" the very found of his words has often fomewhat that is connatural to the fubject; and while we read him, we fit, as in a play, beholding the scenes of what he reprefents. To perform this, he made frequent ufe of tropes, which you know change the nature of a known word, by applying it to fome other figni fication; and this is it which Horace means in his epistle to the Pifo's: the thought; the fecond is fancy, or the variata, deriving or moulding of that thought as the judgment reprefents it proper to the fubject; the third is elocution, or the art of clothing and adorning that thought, fo found and varied, in apt, fignificant, and founding words: the quicknefs of the imagination is feen in the invention, the ferty in the fancy, and the accuracy in the expreff. For the two first of these, Ovid is famous amongst the poets; for the latter, Virgil. Ovid images more often the movements and affections' of the mind, either combating between two contrary paffions or extremely difcompofed by one. His words therefore are the leaft part of his care; for he pictures nature in diforder, with which the ftudy and choice of words is inconfiftent. This is the proper wit of dialogue or discourse, and confequently of the drama, where all that is faid is to be lappefed the effect of fudden thought; which, though it excludes not the quickness of wit in repartees, yet admits not a too curious election of words, too frequent allufions, or use of tropes, or in fine any thing that fhews remoteness of thought or labour in the writer. On the other fide, Virgil fpeaks not fo often to us in the perfon of another, like Ovid, but in his own: he relates almoft all things as from himself, and thereby gains more liberty than the other, to exprefs his thoughts with all the graces of elocution, to write more figuratively, and to confefs as well the labour as the force of his imagination. Though he defcribes his Dido well and naturally, in the violence of her pons, yet he muft yield in that to the Myrrha, the Biblis, the Althea, of Ovid; for, as great an admirer of him as I am, I must acknowledge, that if lee not more of their fouls than I fee of Dido's, at least I have a greater concernment for them and that convinces me, that Ovid has touched thofe tender ftrokes more delicately than Virgil could. But when action or perfons are to be defribed, when any fuch image is to be fct before how bold, how masterly are the ftrokes of Vegd! We fee the objects he prefents us with in their native figures, in their proper motions; but So we fee them, as our own eyes could never have behead them fo beautiful in themfelves. We fee the feel of the poet, like that univerfal one of which he fpeaks, informing and moving through all his pictures: -Totamque infufa per artus "Dixeris egregiè, notum fi callida verbum, "Reddiderit junctura novum But I am fenfible I have prefumed too far to entertain you with a rude difcourfe of that art which you both knew fo well, and put into prac tice with fo much happiness. Yet, before I leave Virgil, I muft own the vanity to tell you, and by you the world, that he has been my mafter in this poem: I have followed him every where, I know not with what fuccefs, but I am fure with diligence enough my images are many of them copied from him, and the rest are imitations of him. My expreflions alfo are as near as the idioms of the two languages would admit of in tranflation. And this, fir, I have done with that boldness, for which I will ftand accountable to any of our little critics, who, perhaps, are no be ter acquainted with him than I am. Upon your first perufal of this poem, you have taken notice of foe words, which I have innovated (if it be too bold for me to fay refined) upon his Latin; which, as I offer not to introduce into English profe. fo i hope they are neither improper, nor altogether inelegant in verfe; and, in this, Horace will again defend me. "Et nova fictaque nuper habebunt verba fidem, fi "Græco fonte cadant, parce detorta The inference is exceeding plain: for if a Roman poet might have liberty to coin a word, fuppofing only that it was derived from the Greek, was put into a Latin termination, and that he used this liberty but feldom, and with modefty; how "Mens agitat molem, & magno fe corpore much more juftly may I challenge that privilege "mifcet." to do it with the fame prerequifites, from the best and most judicious of Latin writers! In fome places, where either the fancy or the words were his, or any other's, I have noted it in the margin, that I might not feem a plagiary; in others I have have neglected it, to avoid as well tedioufnels, as the affectation of doing it too often. Such defcriptions or images well wrought, which I promife not for mine, are, as I have faid, the adequate delight of heroic poety; for they beget admiraburlefque, which is contrary to this, by the same tion, which is its proper object; as the images of realon beget laughter; for the one fhews nature B beautified, as in the picture of a fair woman, which we all admire; the other fhews her deformed, as in that of a lazar, or of a fool with dif torted face and antique geftures, at which we cannot forbear to laugh, because it is a deviation from nature. But though the fame images ferve equally for the Epic poefy, and for the hiftoric and panegyric, which are branches of it, yet a feveral fort of fculpture is to be used in them. If fome of them are to be like thofe of Juvenal, " Stantes "in curribus Æmiliani," heroes drawn in their triumphal chariots, and in their full proportion; others are to be like that of Virgil," Spirantia "mollius æra :" there is fomewhat more of foftrefs and tenderness to be fhewn in them. You will foon find I write not this without concern. Some, who have feen a paper of verfes, which I wrote last year to her Highnefs the Dutchefs, have accused them of that only thing I could defend in them. They said, I did “humi ferpere;" that I wanted not only height of fancy, but dignity of words, to fet it off. I might well anfwer with that of Horace," Nunc non erat his locus;" I knew I addreffed them to a lady, and accordingly I affect ed the foftnefs of expreffion, and the fmoothness of measure rather than the height of thought; and in what I did endeavour, it is no vanity to fay I have fucceeded. I deteft arrogance; but there is fome difference betwixt that and a juft defence. But I will not farther bribe your candor, or the reader's. I leave them to speak for me; and, if they can, to make out that character, not pretending to a greater, which I have given them. And now, fir, it is time I fhould relieve you from the tedious length of this account. You have better and more profitable employment for your hours, and I wrong the public to detain you longer. In conclufion, I must leave my poem to you with all its faults, which I hope to find fewer in the printing by your emendations. I know you ar" not of the number of those, of whom the younger Pliny fpeaks; "Nec funt parum multi, "qui carpere amicos fuos judicium vocant;" I am rather too fecure of you on that fide. Your candor in pardoning my errors may make you more remiss in correcting them; if you will not withal confider that they come into the world with your approbation, and through your hands. I beg from you the greatest favour you can confer upon an abfert perfon, fince I repose upon your manage ment what is deareft to me, my fame and reputa tion; and therefore I hope it will stir you up to make my poem fairer by many of your blots; if not, you know the ftory of the gamester who married the rich man's daughter, and when her father denied the portion, christened all the children by his furname, that if, in conclufion, they muft beg, they should do fo by one name, as well as by the other. But fince the reproach of my faults will light on you, it is but reason I fhould do you that juftice to the readers, to let them know, that, if there be any thing tolerable in this poem, they owe the argument to your choice, the writing to your encouragement, the correction to your judgment, and the care of it to your friendship, to which he must ever acknowledge himself to owe all things, who is SIR, The molt obedient, and most Faithful of your fervants, From Charleton in Wiltshire, Nov. 10. 1666. JOHN DRYDIN What peace can be, where both to one pretend? (But they more diligent, and we more strong) Or if a peace, it foon must have an end; For they would grow too powerful were it long. VII. [land : Behold two nations then, engag'd fo far, VIII. See how he feeds th' Iberian with delays, To render us his timely friendship vain : And while his fecret foul in Flanders preys, He rocks the cradle of the babe of Spain. IX. Such deep defigns of empire does he lay O'er them, whofe caufe he feems to take in hand; And prudently would make them lords at fea, To whom with cafe he can give laws by land. X. This faw our king; and long within his breast XI. His generous mind the fair ideas drew of fame and honour, which in dangers lay; Where wealth, like fruit on precipices, grew, Not to be gather'd but by birds of prey. XII. The lofs and gain each fatally were great; And ftill his fubjects call'd aloud for war: But peaceful kings, o'er martial people fet, Each other's poize and counterbalance are. |