Part 4
Now let us see what an _English_ Poet has said on the First of _May_; and tho' there is in it hardly any Thing but Words, and those Words rustick to Affectation; yet they are _Prettiness_ itself compared to Mons. _Ranchin_'s Guardian, Nº 124:
I.
_Oh the charming Month of_ May, _Oh the charming Month of_ May, _When the Breezes fan the_ Treeses, _Full of Blossoms fresh and gay._
II.
_Oh what Joys our Prospects yield! Charming Joys our Prospects yield! In a new Livery,_ &c.
III.
_Oh how fresh the Morning Air! Charming fresh the Morning Air!_ &c.
Tho' there is little Meaning here, yet the Dancing of the Words and the Sprightliness of the Images, make it a prettier Lyrick than our _Italian_ Opera's can produce.
According to my Conception nothing can be prettier than this Thought of _Buchanan_.
Ilia mihi semper presenti dura _Neæra_; Me, quoties absum, semper abesse dolet; Non desiderio, nostro non moeret Amore, Sed se non nostro posse Dolore frui.
_Cruel, when I am present, she appears; As often as I'm absent she's in Tears: Not that_ Neæra _wishes my Return, To see me love her, but to see me mourn._
These Verses of Mr. _Waller_ are, methinks, as pretty as they are gallant:
Phillis, _why should we delay Pleasures shorter than the Day! Cou'd we, which we never can, Stretch our Lives beyond their Span; Beauty like a Shadow flies, And our Youth before us dies. Or would Youth and Beauty stay, Love hath Wings, and will away. Love hath swifter Wings than Time,_ &c.
Notice has been taken of the Prettiness of these Verses in _Dryden_'s Fable of the _Cock_ and the _Fox_.
The _Cock_ speaks to his Wife Dame _Partlet_:
_See my Dear How lavish Nature hath adorn'd the Year; How the pale Primrose and the Violet spring, And Birds essay their Throats, disus'd to sing: All these are ours, and I with Pleasure see Man strutting on two Legs, and aping me._
Madam _Dacier_ takes Notice of a very pretty Circumstance in _Sappho_'s Hymn to _Venus_, translated into _Latin_ by _Catullus_, and into _English_ by Mr. _Philips_.
_Thou once didst leave Almighty_ Jove, _And all the golden Roofs above: The Carre thy wanton Sparrows drew, Hov'ring in Air, they lightly flew. As to my Bow'r, they wing'd their Way I saw their quiv'ring Pinions play: The Birds dismist, while you remain, Bore back their empty Carre again._
The Circumstance that renders it so pretty, according to the _Critical Lady_, is _Venus_'s dismissing her Sparrows and her Carre, and shewing she did not intend to make _Sappho_ a Court-Visit, but to dwell with her some Time. There's another Ode of _Sappho_, which is preserved in _Longinus_, and translated by _Boileau_. It is in the sublime Kind, and shews the Violence of Love.
_From Vein to Vein I feel a subtle Flame, When e'er I see thee, run thro' all my Frame: And as the Transport seizes on my Mind, I'm dumb, and neither Tongue nor Voice can find. A Mist of Pleasure o'er my Eyes is spread, I hear no more, and am to Reason dead; Pale, breathless, speechless, I expiring lie, I burn, I freeze, I tremble, and I die._
In the _Spectator_, Nº 388. is a Paraphrase on the second Chapter of _Solomon_'s Song.
STANZA IV.
_I faint, I dye, my lab'ring Breast Is with the mighty Weight of Love opprest. I feel the Fire possess my Heart, And Pain convey'd to ev'ry Part: Thro' all my Veins the Passion flyes, My feeble Soul forsakes its Place; A trembling Faintness seals my Eyes, And Paleness dwells upon my Face._
To descend again to the lower Kinds of Thinking, I shall conclude the Pretty with these Verses of Mr. _Prior_'s on the Squirrel in the Cage:
_Mov'd in the Orb, pleas'd with the Chimes, The foolish Creature thinks he climbs. Bus here or there, turn Wood or Wire He never gets two Inches higher. So fares it with those merry Blades, That frisk it under Pindus Shades. In noble Songs, and lofty Odes, They tread on Stars, and talk with gods; Still dancing in an airy Round, Still pleas'd with their own Verses Sound; Brought back how fast soe'er they go, Always aspiring, always low._
Agreeable Thoughts may be also reckon'd among the Natural, the Soft, and the Tender; all which in the general Acceptation, are also taken for Wit. This Speech of _Eve_'s to _Adam_ in the _Paradice Lost_, has an Agreeableness which cannot be match'd in the most Tender of our Lyrick or Elegiac Poets:
_With thee conversing, I forget all Time, All Seasons and their Change, all please alike: Sweet is the Breath of Morn, her Rising sweet With Charm of earliest Birds, pleasant the Sun When first on this delightful Land he spreads His orient Beams, on Herb, Tree, Fruit and Flow'r, Glistring with Dew: Fragrant the fertile Earth After soft Show'rs, and sweet the Coming on Of grateful Evening mild: Then silent Night With this her solemn Bird, and this fair Moon, And these the Gems of Heaven, her starry Train. But neither Breath of Morn, when she ascends With Charm of earliest Birds; nor rising Sun On this delightful Land, nor Herb, Fruit, Flow'r, Glistring with Dew, nor Fragrance after Showers, Nor grateful Evening mild, nor silent Night With this her solemn Bird; nor walk by Moon, Or glittering Star Light, without thee is sweet._
To speak poetically one would think every Verse was turn'd and polish'd by the _Loves_ and the _Graces_. Indeed all the Conversation between the first Bridegroom and his Bride, in this Poem, is exquisitely agreeable and tender, except the very Incident of the Fall.
I take the Verses in _Waller_, address'd to _Amoret_, to be of the agreeable Kind:
_Fair, that you may truly know What you unto_ Thyrsis _owe; I will tell you how I do_ Sacharissa _love, and you_.
_Joy salutes me, when I set My blest Eyes on_ Amoret; _But with Wonder I am strook; While I on the Other look_.
_If sweet_ Amoret _complains, I have Sense of all her Pains: But for_ Sacharissa _I Do not only grieve, but die._ &c.
I could give many Instances of agreeable Thoughts but of _Dryden_'s Fables, especially that of _Cymon_ and _Iphigenia_, which had been taken notice of long enough before the _Spectator_ was thought of; and I do not think it fair, that he should engross all the _Beaux Endroits_, because he printed them first. The Rusticity of _Cymon_, and even his Stupidity, has something in it very agreeable in the Image, which is the pure Nature that we meet with there:
_It happen'd on a Summer's Holy-day, That to the Greenwood Shade he took his Way; His Quarter-Staff, which he cou'd ne'er forsake, Hung half before, and half behind his Back; He trudg'd along unknowing what he sought, And whistled as he went for Want of Thought._
There is not a more natural Picture in Language than this. Of the same Kind is that of _Iphigenia_ sleeping by the Fountain: The very Numbers express the Wantonness of the Wind so livelily, that we feel the Air, and are fanned by it while we read them, which I think has had the good Luck to escape Observation:
_Her Bosom to the View was only bare;_ _The fanning Wind upon her Bosom blows;_ } _To meet the fanning Wind her Bosom rose;_ } _The fanning Wind, and purling Streams continue her Repose._}
Mr. _Dryden_ was 68 Years old when he wrote this Fable, which I have always taken for a Master-piece, with Respect to natural Thoughts, which are always agreeable, and harmonious Numbers. The Reader will perceive, that I do not forbear quoting fine Passages, because they are in the _Spectator_. I cannot allow of his Forestalling the Market; and besides, I take his Example to be preferable to his Precept. Himself does not stick to quote even from himself; as,
Nº 91. Sidley _has that prevailing gentle Art_, &c.
And again,
Nº [400.] Sidley _has that prevailing gentle Art_, &c.
_Guard_ 110. Motto----Non ego paucis, Offendor maculis.
_Spec._ 291. Motto----Non ego paucis, Offendor maculis.
This however I will declare in my own Behalf, that I have quoted nothing from him which he has quoted from _Milton_ or _Dryden_, but what I had before collected my self as remarkable Passages in their several Kinds of Thinking.
What follows, taken out of Mr. _Charles Hopkins_'s Verses to the Earl of _Dorset_, is of the agreeable Kind:
_As Nature does in new-born Infants frame With their first Speech their careful_ Forstrer_'s Name, Whose needful Hands their daily Food provide, And by whose Aid they have their Wants supply'd: You are, my Lord, the Poet's earliest Theme, And the first Word he speaks is_ Dorset_'s Name._
Were not the next Verses written on a Tomb Stone, they wou'd be very _agreeable_. They are _Ben Johnson_'s:
_Underneath this Stone doth lie As much Virtue as cou'd die: Which when alive did Vigour give To as much Beauty as cou'd live._
Is not this Picture of _Venus_ in _Palamon_ and _Arcite_ of the same Kind:
_The Goddess self some noble Hand had wrought, Smiling she seem'd, and full of pleasing Thought, From Ocean, as she first began to rise, And smooth'd the ruffled Waves, and clear'd the Skies. She trod the Brine, all bare below the Breast, And the green Waves, but ill conceal'd the Rest: A Lute she held, and on her Head was seen A Wreath of Roses red, and Myrtles green: Her Turtles fan'd the buxom Air above, And by his Mother stood an Infant Love With Wings display'd.--------_
These Verses out of _Dryden_'s St. _Cecilia_'s Ode are very agreeable:
_Softly sweet in_ Lydian _Measures Soon he sooth'd his Soul to Pleasures, War, he sung, is Toil and Trouble, Honour but an empty Bubble. Never ending, still beginning, Fighting still, and still destroying; If the World is worth thy Winning, Think, Oh think, it worth enjoying._
But as the finest Meats are most apt to surfeit, so too many agreeable Thoughts together may flatten upon the Palate: And I shall only add an Instance in Prose, taken out of Mr. _Waller_'s Letter to the Lady _Lucy Sydney_, on the Marriage of her Sister the Lady _Dorothy_, who was his _Sacharissa_.
_May my Lady_ Dorothy, _if we may yet call her so, suffer as much, and have the like Passion for this young Lord, whom she has preferred to the Rest of Mankind, as others have had for her; and may this Love before the Year goes about, make her taste of the first Curse impos'd upon Woman-kind, the Pains of becoming a Mother. May the First-born be none of her own Sex; and may she that always affected Silence and Retiredness, have the House fill'd with the Noise and Number of her Children. May she, at last, arrive at that great Curse much declin'd by fair Ladies, Old Age_, &c.
Under the Character of Father _Bouhours_'s fine Thoughts may be put these Verses of Mr. _Waller_'s, alluding to his gallant Poems upon _Sacharissa_, and the Story of _Phoebus_ and _Daphne_.
_Yet what he sang in his immortal Strain, Tho' unsuccessful, was not sung in Vain: All but the Nymph that should redress his Wrong Attend his Passion, and approve his Song; Like_ Phoebus, _thus acquiring unsought Praise, He caught at Love, and fill'd his Arms with Bays._
Much of the same Kind is this of the Lord _Landsdown_'s on the same Subject:
_Thy Beauty,_ Sidney, _like_ Achilles _Sword, Resistless stands upon as sure Record; The foremost Herce, and the brightest Dame Both sung alike shall have their Fate the same._
This Part of Mr. _Prior_'s Prologue spoken before the late Queen, is in the fine Way of Thinking:
_Let the young_ Austrian _then her Terrours bear, Great as he is, her Delegate in War. Let him in Thunder speak to both his_ Spains, _That in these dreadful Isles a Woman reigns: Whilst the bright Queen does on her Subjects show'r, The gentle Blessings of her softer Pow'r, Gives sacred Morals to a vicious Age, To Temples Zeal, and Manners to the Stage; Bids the chaste Muse without a Blush appear, And Wit be that, which Heaven and she may hear._
Of what Kind shall we take this Image in _Spencer_ to be:
_His haughty Helmet, horrid all with Gold, Both glorious Brightness and great Terrour bred; For all the Crest a Dragon did enfold With greedy Paws, and over all did spread His golden Wings; his dreadful hideous Head, Close couched on the Bever, seem'd to throw, From flaming Mouth, bright Sparkles fiery red_, &c.
This of _Cowley_ is finely thought:
_Now all the wide extended Sky, And all th' harmonious Worlds on high, And_ Virgil_'s sacred Work shall dye._
And this of _Waller_ to Queen _Henrietta Maria_:
_A brave Romance who would exactly frame, First brings his Knight from some immortal Dame, And then a Weapon and a flaming Shield, Bright as his Mother's Eyes, he makes him wield. None might the Mother of_ Achilles _be, But the fair Pearl and Glory of the Sea. The Man to whom Great_ Maro _gives such Fame, From the high Bed of heavenly_ Venus _came. And our next_ Charles, _whom all the Stars design Like Wonders to accomplish, springs from thine._
And this to _Zelinda_:
_Fairest Piece of well form'd Earth, Urge not thus your haughty Birth; The Pow'r, which you have o'er us, lies, Not in your Race, but in your Eyes._
And these Verses of Mr. _Addison_ to the Lord _Hallifax_:
_Oh Liberty, thou Goddess heav'nly bright! Profuse of Bliss, and Pregnant with Delight; Eternal Pleasures in thy Presence reign, And smiling plenty leads thy wanton Train. Eas'd of her Load, Subjection grows more light, And Poverty looks chearful in thy Sight: Thou mak'st the gloomy Face of Nature gay, Giv'st Beauty to the Sun, and Pleasure to the Day._
These four Verses, Part of the late Duke of _Buckingham_'s Poem upon _Hobbes_, contain, as I conceive, a fine Thought:
_But such the Frailty is of humane Kind, Men toil for Fame, which no Man lives to find; Long rip'ning under Ground this_ China _lies; Fame bears no Fruit, till the vain Planter dies._
But the next Verses contain a false Thought, if I have a Right Conception of it:
_And Nature tir'd with his unusual Length Of Life, which put her to her utmost Strength; So vast a Soul, unable to supply, To save herself, was forc'd to let him die._
Whatever it is we understand by Nature, we can have no such Idea of it, as to imagine Mr. _Hobbes_ cou'd have been too hard for it.
These Verses of Mr. _Waller_, on _Westminster-Abbey_ escaping a Fire, are finely imagined:
_So Snow on_ Ætna _does unmelted lie, Whence rolling Flames, and scatter'd Cinders flie: The distant Country in the Ruin shares, What falls from Heaven the burning Mountain spares._
Tho' some of these _fine_ Thoughts are very nearly allied to the Noble, yet one may easily perceive, that there is not so much Dignity, tho' there may be as much Beauty in the One as in the Other. Thus also, as to delicate and agreeable Thoughts, they are as nearly related; but a Thing may be agreeable which is not delicate, tho' it cannot be delicate, but it must be agreeable: An agreeable Thought expresses it self entirely; a delicate One leaves something to the Readers Imagination which is very flattering.
As in this beauteous old Verse of _Chaucer_'s, preserv'd in _Dryden_'s, _Palamon_ and _Arcite_:
_Uprose the Sun, and uprose_ Emily.
Had _Chaucer_ said, _Up rose the Sun_, and then _up rose Emily_ brighter than the Sun, _Emily_ and the Reader would have been entertain'd with only a common Complement; but now the Reader fills up the Thought himself, and imagines that the Sun rose to prepare the Way for something brighter than himself: _Up rose_ Emily.
Mr. _Dryden_, in another place,
_Now Day appears, and with the Day the King,_
imitates _Chaucer_, but the Delicacy is lost, for there is nothing more to be understood by it, as there is in this Couplet of his to the Dutchess of _Ormond_ upon her going to _Ireland_ before the late Duke,
_As_ Ormond_'s Harbinger, to you they run, For_ Venus _is the Promise of the Sun._
There the Reader fills up the Comparison himself, and consequently cannot but be pleas'd, as we are apt to be, with every thing which we do our selves.
The Delicacy of Thought is recommended to us by the _Spectator_, in this beautiful Passage out of _Milton_, where after the most dismal Prospect of Death, which the Heart of Man was ever terrify'd with, _Adam_ is presented with one of the gayest Scenes with which it ever was delighted.
_When from the Tents, behold A Beavy of fair Women richly gay, In Jems and wanton Dress. To the Harp they sang Soft amorous Ditties, and in Dance came on. The Men, tho' Grave, ey'd them, and let their Eyes Rove without Rein, 'till in the amorous Net First caught they lik'd, and each his liking chose. And now of Love they treat, till the Evening Star Love's Harbinger appear'd; then all in Heat They light the Nuptial Torch, and bid invoke_ Hymen: _Then first to Marriage Rights invok'd. With Feast and Musick, all the Tents resound; Such happy Interview, and fair Event Of Love and Youth not lost: Songs, Garlands, Flowers, And charming Symphonies attach the Heart Of_ Adam.--------
The Reader takes in the Infection all along in Reading as _Adam_ does in seeing, and imagines at the End of the Description the Pleasure of _Adam_'s Imagination.
Is there not Delicacy in these Verses of Mr. _Wallers_ upon a Lady's _Girdle_, which leave the Reader much more to be imagin'd than is exprest.
_No Monarch but would give his Crown, His Arms might do what this has done. My Joy, my Grief, my Hope, my Love, Did all within this Circle move; A narrow Compass, and yet there Dwells all that's good, and all that's fair. Give me but what this Ribbon bound, Take all the Rest the Sun goes round._
Father _Bouhours_, in his _Maniere de bien penser_, besides these several Kinds of Thoughts, has the _true_, the _beautiful_, the _soft_, the _natural_, the _simple_, the _gay_, and many more, which has spun the Subject so very fine, that it will not endure handling but by very tender Fingers.
True Thoughts and false Thoughts are often confounded, especially, if there's any Point, Glittering or Glaring in the Latter. Something like distinguishing the one from the other is attempted in the _Guardian_, Nº 110. But I cannot help thinking that it does not deserve the Recommendation with which it is introduced in that Paper. We are told, the Remarks are very curious and just, and must of Consequence conclude, the Applause which the Author sinks, because 'twas in favour of himself, was so too. A very pretty Way of returning a Compliment which he could not accept of without Offence to his Modesty; but, I humbly conceive, the Remarks are not very curious, if they are just; the same having been made a Hundred times before the publishing of them in the critical Letter; and whoever would be at the Trouble of taking _Dryden_ and _Lee_'s Tragedies to pieces, would find enough of the like Curiosities.
The first is, _Lee_ makes one of his Persons a _Cartesian_ Philosopher, 2 or 3000 Years before _Descartes_ was born: Why did not the Critick remember this too in the same Tragedy _Oedipus_?
_As oft I have at_ Athens _seen, The Stage arise, and the big Clouds descend._
Several Hundred Years before there was such a Thing heard of as a Stage at _Athens_.
The next Thing this Critick takes notice of, is _Dryden_'s making _Cleomenes_ a _Copernican_ 2000 Years before _Copernicus_'s Time. The Rest of the Criticisms turn upon the Improbability that Don _Sebastian_ King of _Portugal_ understood Latin, tho' he never prayed to God in any other Language; or that the Emperor of _Barbary_ had ever heard of the Names of _Bacchus_, _Cupid_, _Castor_, and _Pollux_, or the Mufti of _Archimedes_, tho' we are credibly informed, that most of the Greek and Roman Learning was translated into _Arabick_; and it is well known that the _Arabians_ were the greatest Encouragers of Arts and Sciences for three or four Centuries, when they were buried all over Christendom under the Rubbish of Monkery and Barbarism; and the Revivers of Learning were obliged to them for their Translations and Comments, which were turned into _Latin_ out of _Arabick_. I have not only read of a Translation of _Aristotle_ with Comments by _Aben Rois_, and of _Euclid_ by _Nassir Eddyn_, with Notes, but of an _Arabick Ovid_, where the Fable is the Foundation of the Work, and several other Classicks in the _Arabick_ Tongue. How easy would it be to fill up such Critical Epistles as that in the _Guardian_ with as just and curious Remarks out of the best Epick Poets! How has _Chaucer_ confounded the Sacred _Scripture_ History with Pagan Fables:
_There by the Fount_ Narcissus _pin'd alone: There_ Sampson _was, and wiser_ Solomon: Medea'_s Charms were there._ Dryden _from_ Chauc.
_Ariosto_ does the same in the xxxii Book of _Orlando Furioso_:
Joshua_'s Day seemed shorter than the same, Shorter did seem the false_ Amphytrion_'s Night._ Harrington.
The same does _Tasso_, _Canto_ iv of his _Jierusamme_:
_There where_ Cileno_'s foul and loathsome Rout; The_ Sphinges, Centaurs; _there where_ Gorgon_'s fell, There howling_ Scilla_'s, yawling round about: There Serpents hiss, there seven mouth'd_ Hydra_'s yell,_ Chimera _there spues Fire and Brimstone out, And_ Polyphemus _blind suporteth Hell._ Fairfax.
All understood of the Hell, which is the Punishment of the Damned, according to the Christian Theology, and here confounded with the fabled Empire of _Pluto_. _Spencer_ too mixes Scripture History with the Fable: _Canto_ ix.
_The Years of_ Nestor _nothing were to his, Ne yet_ Methusalem, _tho' longest liv'd; For he remembred both their Infancies._
Nay _Milton_ himself adorns the _Pandæmonium_ with Dorick Pillars, while _Adam_ and _Eve_ lived in the _Bowers_ of Paradise before Man had a House to put his Head in:
_Pilasters round Were set, and Dorick Pillars overlaid With golden Architrave._
He also borrows the Rivers of the Hell of the Heathens for his Christian Poem:
_Abhorred_ Styx, _the Flood of deadly Hate, Sad_ Acheron _of Sorrow, black and deep,_ Cocytus _nam'd, of Lamentation loud Heard on her rueful Stream. Fierce_ Phlegeton, _Whose Waves of torrent Fire inflame with Rage. Far off from these a flow and silent Stream_ Lethe _the River of Oblivion rolls;_
Which
Medusa _with_ Gorgonian _Terror guards._
It has been hinted elsewhere, that 'tis ungenerous to criticise on _Dryden_'s Conduct and Sentiments, which 'tis plain he varied at Pleasure, and wrote like a great Original, whose Example was to be a Rule to others, and himself to take Rules from none; but it is not true, as we read in the above-cited _Guardian_, _That his very Faults have more Beauty in them, than the most elaborate Compositions of many more correct Writers_: For I will repeat some few Lines that are monstrous, and then let the Reader judge how they can be beautiful.
_'Tis false, she is not ill, nor can she be; She must be chaste, because she's lov'd by me.
I'll squeeze thee like a Bladder, Or make thee groan thy self away in Air.