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AN ESSAY ON TRANSLATED VERSE, by                    
First Line: Happy that author, whose correct essay
Last Line: Which none know better, and none come so near.
Alternate Author Name(s): Roscommon, 4th Earl Of
Subject(s): Translating & Interpreting


Happy that author, whose correct Essay
Repairs so well our old Horatian way;
And happy you, who (by propitious fate)
On great Apollo's sacred standard wait,
And with strict discipline instructed right,
Have learn'd to use your arms before you fight.
But since the press, the pulpit, and the stage
Conspire to censure and expose our age:
Provoked too far, we resolutely must,
To the few virtues that we have, be just.
For who have long'd, or who have labour'd more
To search the treasures of the Roman store,
Or dig in Grecian mines for purer ore?
The noblest fruits transplanted in our isle
With early hope and fragrant blossoms smile.
Familiar Ovid tender thoughts inspires,
And Nature seconds all his soft desires;
Theocritus does now to us belong,
And Albion's rocks repeat his rural song.
Who has not heard how Italy was blest,
Above the Medes, above the wealthy East?
Or Gallus' song, so tender, and so true,
As ev'n Lycoris might with pity view?
When mourning nymphs attend their Daphnis' herse,
Who does not weep, that reads the moving verse?
But hear, oh hear, in what exalted strains
Sicilian Muses through these happy plains,
Proclaim Saturnian times; our own Apollo reigns.

When France had breath'd, after intestine broils,
And peace and conquest crown'd her foreign toils,
There, cultivated by a royal hand,
Learning grew fast, and spread, and blest the land;
The choicest books that Rome or Greece have known
Her excellent translators made her own,
And Europe still considerably gains,
Both by their good example and their pains.

From hence our gen'rous emulation came,
We undertook and we perform'd the same:
But now we shew the world a nobler way,
And in translated verse do more than they,
Serene, and clear, harmonious Horace flows,
With sweetness not to be expressed in prose;
Degrading prose explains his meaning ill,
And shows the stuff, but not the workman's skill;
I who have served him more than twenty years
Scarce know my master as he there appears.
Vain are our neighbours' hopes, and vain their cares,
The fault is more their language's, than theirs;
'Tis courtly, florid, and abounds in words
Of softer sound than ours perhaps affords,
But who did ever in French authors see
The comprehensive English energy?
The weighty bullion of one sterling line,
Drawn to French wire, would through whole pages shine.
I speak my private, but impartial sense,
With freedom, and I hope without offence,
For I'll recant, when France can show me wit
As strong as ours, and as succinctly writ.
'Tis true, composing is the nobler part,
But good translation is no easy art,
For though materials have long since been found,
Yet both your fancy and your hands are bound;
And by improving what was writ before,
Invention labours less, but judgment more.

The soil intended for Pierian seeds
Must be well purged from rank pedantic weeds.
Apollo starts, and all Parnassus shakes,
At the rude rumbling Baralipton makes.
For none have been with admiration read,
But who beside their learning were well-bred.

The first great work, a task perform'd by few,
Is that yourself may to yourself be true:
No mask, no tricks, no favour, no reserve;
Dissect your mind, examine every nerve.
Whoever vainly on his strength depends,
Begins like Virgil, but like Maevius ends.
That wretch (in spite of his forgotten rhymes)
Condemned to live to all succeeding times,
With pompous nonsense and a bellowing sound
Sung lofty Ilium tumbling to the ground.
And (if my muse can through past ages see)
That noisy, nauseous, gaping fool was he;
Exploded, when with universal scorn,
The mountains laboured and a mouse was born.

Learn, learn, Crotona's brawny wrestler cries,
Audacious mortals, and be timely wise!
'Tis I that call, remember Milo's end,
Wedg'd in that timber which he strove to rend.

Each poet with a different talent writes,
One praises, one instructs, another bites.
Horace did ne'er aspire to epic bays,
Nor lofty Maro stoop to lyric lays.
Examine how your humour is inclin'd,
And which the ruling passion of your mind;
Then seek a poet who your way does bend,
And choose an author as you choose a friend,
United by this sympathetic bond,
You grow familiar, intimate, and fond;
Your thoughts, your words, your styles, your souls agree,
No longer his interpreter, but he.

With how much ease is a young Muse betray'd,
How nice the reputation of the maid!
Your early, kind, paternal care appears
By chaste instruction of her tender years;
The first impression in her infant breast
Will be the deepest, and should be the best;
Let not austerity breed servile fear,
No wanton sound offend her virgin ear;
Secure from foolish pride's affected state,
And specious flattery's more pernicious bait,
Habitual innocence adorns her thoughts,
But your neglect must answer for her faults.

Immodest words admit of no defence,
For want of decency is want of sense.
What mod'rate fop would rake the park or stews,
Who among troops of faultless nymphs may choose?
Variety of such is to be found;
Take then a subject proper to expound,
But moral, great, and worth a poet's voice;
For men of sense despise a trivial choice,
And such applause it must expect to meet,
As would some painter busy in a street,
To copy bulls and bears, and every sign
That calls the staring sots to nasty wine.

Yet 'tis not all to have a subject good,
It must delight us when 'tis understood.
He that brings fulsome objects to my view,
(As many old have done, and many new)
With nauseous images my fancy fills,
And all goes down like oxymel of squills.
Instruct the list'ning world how Maro sings
Of useful subjects and of lofty things.
These will such true, such bright ideas raise,
As merit gratitude as well as praise:
But foul descriptions are offensive still,
Either for being like or being ill.
For who, without a qualm, hath ever looked
On holy garbage, though by Homer cooked?
Whose railing heroes, and whose wounded gods,
Make some suspect he snores as well as nods.
But I offend ------ Virgil begins to frown,
And Horace looks with indignation down;
My blushing Muse with conscious fear retires,
And whom they like, implicitly admires.

On sure foundations let your fabric rise,
And with attractive majesty surprise,
Not by affected, meretricious arts,
But strict harmonious symmetry of parts,
Which through the whole insensibly must pass,
With vital heat to animate the mass,
A pure, an active, an auspicious flame,
And bright as heaven, from whence the blessing came;
But few, oh few souls, preordain'd by fate,
The race of gods, have reach'd that envied height.
No rebel Titan's sacrilegious crime
By heaping hills on hills can thither climb.
The grizzly ferry-man of hell denied
AEneas entrance, 'til he knew his guide;
How justly then will impious mortals fall,
Whose pride would soar to heaven without a call?

Pride, of all others the most dangerous fault,
Proceeds from want of sense or want of thought;
The men who labour and digest things most
Will be much apter to despond than boast.
For if your author be profoundly good,
'Twill cost you dear before he's understood.
How many ages since has Virgil writ?
How few are they who understand him yet?
Approach his altars with religious fear,
No vulgar Deity inhabits there:
Heaven shakes not more at Jove's imperial nod,
Than poets should before their Mantuan god.
Hail mighty Maro! may that sacred name
Kindle my breast with thy celestial flame,
Sublime ideas, and apt words infuse,
The Muse instruct my voice, and thou inspire the Muse.

What I have instanced only in the best,
Is, in proportion, true of all the rest.
Take pains the genuine meaning to explore;
There sweat, there strain, there tug the laborious oar:
Search every comment that your care can find,
Some here, some there, may hit the poet's mind.
Yet be not blindly guided by the throng;
The multitude is always in the wrong.
When things appear unnatural or hard,
Consult your author, with himself compar'd;
Who knows what blessing Phoebus may bestow,
And future ages to your labour owe?
Such secrets are not easily found out,
But once discovered leave no room for doubt,
Truth stamps conviction in your ravish'd breast,
And peace and joy attend the glorious guest.

Truth still is one, Truth is divinely bright,
No cloudy doubts obscure her native light:
While in your thoughts you find the least debate,
You may confound, but never can translate;
Your style will this through all disguises show,
For none explain more clearly than they know.
He only proves he understands a text,
Whose exposition leaves it unperplex'd.
They who too faithfully on names insist,
Rather create than dissipate the mist,
And grow unjust by being over-nice,
For superstitious virtue turns to vice.
Let Crassus' ghost and Labienus tell
How twice in Parthian plains their legions fell.
Since Rome hath been so jealous of her fame,
That few know Pacorus' or Monaeses' name.

Words in one language elegantly used,
Will hardly in another be excused,
And some that Rome admired in Caesar's time,
May neither suit our genius nor our clime;
The genuine sense, intelligibly told,
Shows a translator both discreet and bold.

Excursions are inexpiably bad;
And 'tis much safer to leave out than add.
Abstruse and mystic thoughts you must express
With painful care, but seeming easiness;
For Truth shines brightest through the plainest dress.
Th' AEnean Muse, when she appears in state,
Makes all Jove's thunder on her verses wait,
Yet writes sometimes as soft and moving things
As Venus speaks or Philomela sings.
Your author always will the best advise:
Fall when he falls, and when he rises rise.
Affected noise is the most wretched thing
That to contempt can empty scribblers bring.
Vowels and accents, regularly plac'd,
On even syllables, and still the last,
Though gross innumerable faults abound,
In spite of nonsense, never fail of sound.
But this is meant of even verse alone,
As being most harmonious and most known:
For if you will unequal numbers try,
There accents on odd syllables must lie.
Whatever sister of the learned Nine
Does to your suit a willing ear incline,
Urge your success, deserve a lasting name,
She'll crown a grateful and a constant flame;
But if a wild uncertainty prevail,
And turn your veering heart with every gale,
You lose the fruit of all your former care,
For the sad prospect of a just despair.

A quack too scandalously mean to name
Had, by man-midwifery, got wealth and fame;
As if Lucina had forgot her trade,
The lab'ring wife invokes his surer aid;
Well-seasoned bowls the gossips spirits raise,
Who while she guzzles, chats the doctor's praise,
And largely, what she wants in words, supplies
With maudlin eloquence of trickling eyes.
But what a thoughtless animal is man,
How very active in his own trepan!
For, greedy of physicians' frequent fees,
From female mellow praise he takes degrees,
Struts in a new unlicens'd gown, and then,
From saving women falls to killing men.
Another such had left the nation thin,
In spite of all the children he brought in.
His pills as thick as hand-granadoes flew,
And where they fell, as certainly they slew;
His name struck everywhere as great a damp,
As Archimedes through the Roman camp.
With this the doctor's pride began to cool;
For smarting soundly may convince a fool.
But now repentance came too late for grace,
And meagre famine stared him in the face;
Fain would he to the wives be reconciled,
But found no husband left to own a child.
The friends, that got the brats, were poisoned too;
In this sad case what could our vermin do?
Worried with debts and past all hope of bail,
Th' unpitied wretch lies rotting in a jail,
And there with basket-alms, scarce kept alive,
Shows how mistaken talents ought to thrive.

I pity, from my soul, unhappy men
Compelled by want to prostitute their pen;
Who must, like lawyers, either starve or plead,
And follow, right or wrong, where guineas lead.
But you, Pompilian, wealthy, pamper'd heirs,
Who to your country owe your swords and cares,
Let no vain hope your easy mind seduce,
For rich ill poets are without excuse.
'Tis very dangerous, tampering with a Muse,
The profit's small, and you have much to lose:
For though true wit adorns your birth or place,
Degen'rate lines degrade th' attainted race.
No poet any passion can excite
But what they feel transport them when they write.
Have you been led through the Cumaean cave,
And heard th' impatient maid divinely rave?
I hear her now; I see her rolling eyes:
And panting; "Lo! the God, the God!" she cries;
With words not hers, and more than human sound,
She makes th' obedient ghosts peep trembling through the ground.
But though we must obey when Heaven commands,
And man in vain the sacred call withstands,
Beware what spirit rages in your breast;
For ten inspired, ten thousand are possest.
Thus make the proper use of each extreme,
And write with fury, but correct with phlegm.
As when the cheerful hours too freely pass,
And sparkling wine smiles in the tempting glass,
Your pulse advises, and begins to beat
Through every swelling vein a loud retreat:
So when a Muse propitiously invites,
Improve her favours, and indulge her flights;
But when you find that vigorous heat abate,
Leave off, and for another summons wait.
Before the radiant sun a glimmering lamp,
Adult'rate metals to the sterling stamp,
Appear not meaner than mere human lines
Compar'd with those whose inspiration shines:
These, nervous, bold; those, languid and remiss;
There cold salutes; but here a lover's kiss.
Thus have I seen a rapid, headlong tide,
With foaming waves the passive Saone divide;
Whose lazy waters without motion lay,
While he, with eager force, urged his impetuous way.

The privilege that ancient poets claim,
Now turned to license by too just a name,
Belongs to none but an established fame,
Which scorns to take it ------
Absurd expressions, crude, abortive thoughts,
All the lewd legion of exploded faults,
Base fugitives, to that asylum fly,
And sacred laws with insolence defy.
Not thus our heroes of the former days,
Deserved and gained their never-fading bays;
For I mistake, or far the greatest part
Of what some call neglect, was studied art.
When Virgil seems to trifle in a line,
'Tis like a warning piece, which gives the sign
To wake your fancy, and prepare your sight
To reach the noble height of some unusual flight.
I lose my patience, when with saucy pride,
By untuned ears I hear his numbers tried.
Reverse of nature! shall such copies then
Arraign th' originals of Maro's pen,
And the rude notions of pedantic schools
Blaspheme the sacred founder of our rules?
The delicacy of the nicest ear
Finds nothing harsh or out of order there.
Sublime or low, unbended or intense,
The sound is still a comment to the sense.

A skilful ear in numbers should preside,
And all disputes without appeal decide.
This ancient Rome and elder Athens found,
Before mistaken stops debauch'd the sound.

When, by impulse from heaven, Tyrtaeus sung,
In drooping soldiers a new courage sprung;
Reviving Sparta now the fight maintain'd,
And what two generals lost, a poet gained.
By secret influence of indulgent skies,
Empire and poesy together rise.
True poets are the guardians of a state,
And when they fail, portend approaching fate.
For that which Rome to conquest did inspire,
Was not the Vestal, but the Muse's fire;
Heaven joins the blessings: no declining age
E'er felt the raptures of poetic rage.

Of many faults, rhyme is perhaps the cause;
Too strict to rhyme, we slight more useful laws,
For that in Greece or Rome was never known,
Till by barbarian deluges o'erflown:
Subdued, undone, they did at last obey,
And change their own for their invaders' way.
I grant that from some mossy idol oak
In double rhymes our Thor and Woden spoke;
And by succession of unlearned times,
As bards began, so monks rung on the chimes.
But now that Phoebus and the sacred Nine
With all their beams on our blest island shine,
Why should not we their ancient rites restore,
And be what Rome or Athens were before?

Have we forgot how Raphael's numerous prose
Led our exalted souls through heavenly camps,
And marked the ground where proud apostate thrones
Defy'd Jehovah! Here, 'twixt host and host,
(A narrow but a dreadful interval)
Portentous sight! before the cloudy van
Satan with vast and haughty strides advanced,
Came tow'ring arm'd in adamant and gold.
There bellowing engines, with their fiery tubes,
Dispers'd aethereal forms, and down they fell
By thousands, angels on archangels rolled;
Recovered, to the hills they ran, they flew,
Which with their pond'rous load, rocks, waters, woods
From their firm seats torn by the shaggy tops,
They bore like shields before them through the air,
'Til more incens'd they hurled 'em at their foes.
All was confusion, heaven's foundations shook,
Threatening no less than universal wreck,
For Michael's arm main promontories flung,
And over-prest whole legions weak with sin:
Yet they blasphem'd and struggled as they lay,
'Til the great ensign of Messiah blaz'd,
And, arm'd with vengeance, God's victorious son,
Effulgence of paternal Deity,
Grasping ten thousand thunders in his hand
Drove th' old original rebels headlong down,
And sent them flaming to the vast abyss.

O may I live to hail the glorious day,
And sing loud paeans through the crowded way,
When in triumphant state the British Muse,
True to herself, shall barb'rous aid refuse,
And in the Roman majesty appear,
Which none know better, and none come so near.




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