cam sensible, as I ought to be, of the scandal I have given by my loose 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 disown it. Totum hoc indictum 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 character, before the Canterbury tales, thus excuses the ribaldry, which is very gross in many of his novels :

But first I pray you of your courtesy,
That ye he arrette 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 shall tellen a tale after a man,
He mote rehearse as nye, as ever he can :
Everich word of it been in his charge,
All speke he, never so 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 say o word as another.
Christ spake himself full broad in holy writ,
And well I wote no villany is it,
Eke Plato saith, who so can him rede,
The words mote been cousin to the dede.

Yet if a man should have inquired of Boccace or of Chaucer, what need they had of introducing such characters, where obscene words were proper in the mouths, but very indecent to be heard; 1 know not what answer they could have made; for that reason, such tale shall be left untold by me. You have here a specimen of Chaucer's language, which is so obsolete, that his sense is scarce to be understood; and you have likewise more than one example of his unequal numbers, which were mentioned be<fore. Yet many of his verses consist of ten syllables, and the words not much behind our present English as for example, these two lines, in the description of the carpenter's young wife: Wincing she was, as is a jolly colt, Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. I have almost done with Chaucer, when I have answered some objections relating to my present work. I find some people are offended that I have turned these tales 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 say, 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 so great an author; but I think it fair, how

ever, to leave the decision to the public: Mr. Cowley was too modest to set up for a dictator; and being shocked perhaps with his old style, never examined into the depth of his good sense. Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must first be polished, ere he shines. I deny not, likewise, that living in our early days of poetry, he writes not always of a piece; but sometimes mingles trivial things with those of greater moment. Sometimes also, though not often, he runs riot, like Ovid, and knows not when he has said enough. But there are more great wits besides Chaucer, whose fault is their excess of conceits, and those ill sorted. An author is not to write all he can, but only all he ought. Having observed this redundancy in Chaucer, (as it is an easy matter for a man of ordinary parts to find a fault in one of greater) 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 presumed farther in some places, and ad ded somewhat of my own where I thought my author was deficient, and had not given his thoughts their true lustre, 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 say it of myself) I found I had a soul congenial to his, and that I had been conversant in the same studies. Another poet in another age, may take the same liberty with my writings; if at least they live long enough to deserve correction. It was also necessary sometimes to restore the sense of Chaucer, which was lost or mangled in the errors of the press: let this example suffice at present; in the story of Palamon and Arcite, where the

temple of Diana is described, you find these

verses in all the editions of our author:

There saw I Dane turned into a tree,
I mean not the goddess Diane,

But Venus daughter, which that hight Dane : Which after a little consideration I knew was to be reformed into this sense, that Daphne, the daughter of Peneus, was turned into a tree. I durst not make thus bold with Ovid, lest some future Milbourn should 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 translated Chaucer into English, out of a quite contrary notion: they suppose there is a certain veneration due to his old language; and that it is a little less than profanation and sacrilege to alter it. They are farther of opinion, that somewhat of his good sense will suffer in this transfusion, and much of the beauty of his thoughts will infallibly be lost,

which appear with more grace in their old habit. Of this opinion was that excellent person, whom I mentioned, the late Earl of Leicester, who valued Chaucer as much as Mr. Cowley despised him. My lord dissuaded me from this attempt, (for I was thinking of it some years before his death) and his authority prevailed so far with me, as to defer my undertaking while he lived, in deference to him: yet my reason was not convinced with what he urged against it. If the first end of a writer be to be understood, then as his language grows obsolete, his thoughts must grow obscure: multa renascentur quæ nunc cecidere; cadentque, quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, quem penes arbitrium est et jus et norma loquendi. When an ancient word for its sound and significancy deserves to be revived, I have that reasonable veneration for antiquity, to restore it. All beyond this is superstition. Words are not like landmarks, so sacred as never to be removed; customs are changed, and even statutes are silently repealed, when the reason ceases for which they were enacted. As for the other part of the argument, that his thoughts will lose of their original beauty, by the innovation of words; in the first place, not only their beauty, but their being is lost where they are no longer understood, which is the present case. I grant that something, must be lost in all transfusion, that is, in all translations; but the sense will remain, which would otherwise be lost, or at least be maimed, when it is scarce intelligible; and that but to a few. How few are there who can read Chaucer, so as to understand him perfectly? And if imperfectly, then with less profit and no pleasure. 'Tis not for the use of some old Saxon friends, that I have taken these pains with him: let them neglect my version, because they have no need of it. I made it for their sakes who understand sense and poetry as well as they, when that poetry and sense is put into words which they understand. I will go farther, and dare to add, that what beauties I lose in some places I give to others which had them not originally; but in this I may be tial to myself; let the reader judge, and I submit to his decision. Yet I think I have just occasion to complain of them, who because they understand Chaucer, would deprive the greater part of their countrymen of the same advantage, and hoard him up, as misers do their grandam gold, only to look on it themselves, and hinder others from making use of it. In sum, I seriously protest, that no man ever had, or can have, a greater veneration for Chaucer, than myself. I have translated some

par

part of his works, only that I might perpetuate his memory, or at least refresh it, amongst my countrymen. If 1 have altered him any where for the better, I must at the same time acknowledge, that I could have done nothing without him: Facile est inventis addere, is no great commendation; and I am not so vain to think I have deserved a greater. I will conclude what I have to say of him singly, with this one remark: a lady of my acquaintance, who keeps a kind of correspondence with some authors of the fair sex in France, has been informed by them, that Mademoiselle de Scudery, who is as old as Sibyl, and inspired like her by the same god of poetry, is at this time translating Chaucer into modern French. From which I gather, that he has been formerly translated into the old Provencal (for how she should come to understand old English I know not.) But the matter of fact being true, makes me think that there is something in it like fatality; that, after certain periods of time, the fame and memory of great wits should be renewed, as Chaucer is both in France and England. If this be wholly chance, 't is extraordinary, and I dare not call it more, for fear of being taxed with supersti

tion.

Boccace comes last to be considered, who, living in the same age with Chaucer, had the same genius, and followed the same studies: both writ novels, and each of them cultivated his mother tongue. But the greatest resemblance of our two modern authors being in their familiar style, and pleasing way of relating comical adventures, I may pass it over, because I have translated nothing from Boccace of that nature. In the serious part of poetry, the advantage is wholly on Chaucer's side; for though the Englishman has borrowed many tales from the Italian, yet it appears that those of Boccace were not generally of his own making, but taken from authors of former ages, and by him only modelled: so that what there was of invention in either of them, may be judged equal. But Chaucer has refined on Boccace, and has mend-ed the stories which he has borrowed, in his way of telling; though prose allows more liberty of thought, and the expression is more easy, when unconfined by numbers. Our countryman carries weight, and yet wins the race at disadvantage. I desire not the reader should take my word and therefore I will set two of their discourses on the same subject, in the same light, for every man to judge betwixt them. I translated Chaucer first, and amongst the rest pitched on the wife of Bath's tale: not daring, as I have said, to adventure on her prologue, because it is too licentious: there Chaucer in

troduces an old woman of mean parentage, whom a youthful knight of noble blood was forced to marry, and consequently loathed her; the crone being in bed with him on the wedding-night, and finding his aversion, endeavours to win his affection by reason, and speaks a good word for herself (as who could blame her?) in hope to mollify the sullen bridegroom. She takes her topics from the benefits of poverty, the advantages of old age and ugliness, the vanity of youth, and the silly pride of ancestry and titles without inherent virtue, which is the true nobility. When I had closed Chaucer, I returned to Ovid, and translated some more of his fables; and by this time had so far forgotten the wife of Bath's tale, that, when I took up Boccace unawares, I fell on the same argument of preferring virtue to nobility of blood, and titles, in the story of Sigismunda; which I had certainly avoided for their semblance of the two discourses, if my memory had not failed me. Let the reader weigh them both; and if he thinks me partial to Chaucer, it is in him to right Boccace.

I prefer in our countryman, far above all his other stories, the nobic poem of Palamon and Arcite, which is of the Epic kind, and perhaps not much inferior to the Ilias or the Eneis: the story is more pleasing than either of them, the manners as perfect, the diction as poetical, the learning as deep and various; and the disposi tion full as artful; only it includes a greater length of time, as taken up seven years at least; but Aristotle has left undecided the duration of the action; which yet is easily reduced into the compass of a year, by a narration of what preceded the return of Palamon to Athens. I had thought for the honour of our nation, and more particularly for his, whose laurel, though unworthy, I have worn after him, that this story was of English growth, and Chaucer's own; but I was undeceived by Boccace; for casually looking on the end of his seventh Giornata, I found Dioneo (under which name he shadows himself) and Fiametta (who represents his mistress the natural daughter of Robert, king of Naples) of whom these words are spoken, Dioneo e la Fiametta granpezza contarono insieme d' Arcita, e di Palamone: by whcih it appears that this story was written before the time of Boccace; but the name of its author being wholly lost, Chaucer is now become an original; and I question not but the poem has received many beauties by passing through his noble hands. Besides this tale, there is another of his own invention, after the manner of the Provencals, called the Flower and the Leaf; with which I was so particu

larly pleased, both for the invention and the moral, that I cannot hinder myself from recommending it to the reader.

As a corollary to this preface, in which I have done justice to others, I owe somewhat to myself: not that I think it worth my time to enter the lists with one Milbourn, and one Blackmore, but barely to take notice, that such men there are who have written scurrilously against me, without any provocation. Milbourn, who is in orders, pretends amongst the rest this quarrel to me, that I have fallen foul on priesthood: if I have, I am only to ask pardon of good priests, and am afraid his part of the reparation will come to little. Let him be satisfied that he shall not be able to force himself upon me for an adversary. I contemn him too much to enter into competition with him: His own translations of Virgil have answered his criticisms on mine. If (as they say, he has declared in print) he prefers the version of Ogilby to mine, the world has made him the same compliment: for it is agreed on all hands, that he writes even below Ogilby: that you will say, is not easily to be done; but what cannot Milbourn bring about? I am satisfied however, that while he and I live together I shall not be thought the worst poet of the age. It looks as if I had desired him underhand to write so ill against me : but upon my honest word I have not bribed him to do me this service, and am wholly guiltless of his pamphlet. 'T is true, I should be glad, if I could persuade him to continue his good offices, and write such another critique on any thing of mine : for I find by experience he has a great stroke with the reader, when he condemns any of my poems, to make the world have a better opinion of them. He has taken some pains with my poetry; but nobody will be persuaded to take the same with his. If I had taken to the church (as he affirms, but which was never in my thoughts) I should have had more sense, if not more grace, than to have turned myself out of my benefice by writing libels on my parishioners. But his account of my manners and my principles are of a piece with his cavils and his poetry: and so I have done with him for ever.

As for the City Bard, or Knight Physician, I hear his quarrel to me is, that I was the author of Absalom and Achitophel, which he thinks is a little hard on his fanatic patrons in London.

But I will deal the more civilly with his two poems, because nothing ill is to be spoken of the dead: and therefore peace be to the Manes of his Arthurs. I will only say, that it was not for this noble knight that I drew the plan of an Epic poem on king Arthur, in my preface to the translations of Juvenal. The guardian angels of

kingdoms were machines too ponderous for him to manage; and therefore he rejected them, as Dares did the whirlbats of Eryx, when they were thrown before him by Entellus. Yet from that preface he plainly took his hint: for he began immediately upon the story; though he had the baseness not to acknowledge his benefactor; but instead of it, to traduce me in a libel.

I shall say the less of Mr. Collier, because in many things he has taxed me justly; and I have pleaded guilty to all thoughts and expressions of mine, which can be truly argued of obscenity, profaneness, or immorality: and retract them. If he be my enemy, let him triumph; if he be my friend, as I have given him no personal occasion to be otherwise, he will be glad of my repentance. It becomes me not to draw my pen in the defence of a bad cause, when I have so often drawn it for a good one. Yet it were not difficult to prove that in many places he has perverted my meaning by his glosses; and interpreted my words into blasphemy and bawdry, of which they were not guilty; besides that he is too much given to horse-play in his raillery; and comes to battle like a dictator from the plough. I will not say, The zeal of God's house has eaten him up; but I am sure it has devoured some part of his good manners and civility. It might also be doubted whether it were altogether zeal, which prompted him to this rough manner of proceeding; perhaps it became not one of his function to rake into the rubbish of ancient and modern plays; a divine might have employed his pains to better purpose, than in the nastiness of Plautus and Aristophanes; whose examples, as they excuse not me, so it might be possibly supposed, that he read them not without some pleasure. They who have written commentaries on those poets, or on Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, have explained some vices, which, without their interpretation, had been unknown to modern times. Neither has he judged impartially betwixt the former age and us.

There is more bawdry in one Play of Fletcher's called The Custom of the Country, than in all ours together. Yet this has been often acted on the stage in my remembrance. Are the times so much more reformed now, than they were five and twenty years ago? If they are, I congratulate the amendment of our morals. But I am not to prejudice the cause of my fellow-poets, though I abandon my own defence: they have some of them answered for themselves, and neither they nor I can think Mr. Colliers so formidable an enemy, that we should shun him. He has lost ground at the latter end of the day, by pursuing his point too far, like the Prince of Conde at the

battle of Seneffc: from immoral plays, to no

plays: ab abusu ad usum, non valet consequentia. But being a party, I am not to erect myself into a judge. As for the rest of those who have written against me, they are such scoundrels, that they deserve not the least notice to be taken of them. Blackmore and Milbourn are only distinguished from the crowd, by being remembered to their infamy.

-Demetri, Teque Tigelli

Discipulorum inter jubeo plorare cathedras.

TALES FROM CHAUCER.

TO HER GRACE THE DUCHESS OF ORMOND, WITH THE FOLLOWING POEM OF

PALAMON AND ARCITE.

MADAM,

THE bard who first adorn'd our native tongue, Tun'd to his British lyre this ancient song: Which Homer might without a blush rehearse, And leaves a doubtful palm in Virgil's verse: He match'd their beauties, where they most excel;

Of love sung better, and of arms as well.

Vouchsafe, illustrious Ormond, to behold What power the charms of beauty had of old; Nor wonder if such deeds of arms were done, Inspir'd by two fair eyes, that sparkled like

your own.

If Chaucer by the best idea wrought, And poets can divine each other's thought, The fairest nymph before his eyes he set; And then the fairest was Plantagenet; Who three contending princes made her prize, And rul'd the rival nations with her eyes: Who left immortal trophies of her fame, And to the noblest order gave the name.

Like her, of equal kindred to the throne,
You keep her conquests, and extend your own:
As when the stars, in their ethereal race,
At length have roll'd around the liquid space,
At certain periods they resume their place,
From the same point of heaven their course
advance,

And move in measures of their former dance;
Thus, after length of ages, she returns,
Restor'd in you, and the same place adorns;
Or you perform her office in the sphere, [year.
Born of her blood, and make a new Platonic
O true Plantagenet, O race divine,
(For beauty still is fatal to the line),

Had Chaucer liv'd that angel face to view,
Sure he had drawn his Emily from you;
Or had you liv'd to judge the doubtful right,
Your noble Palamon had been the knight;
And conquering Theseus from his side had sent
Your generous lord, to guide the Theban govern-

ment.

Time shall accomplish that; and I shall see
A Palamon in him, in you an Emily.
Already have the fates your path prepar'd,
And sure presage your future sway declar'd:
When westward, like the sun, you took your
And from benighted Britain bore the day, [way,
Blue Triton gave the signal from the shore,
The ready Nereids heard, and swam before
To smooth the seas; a soft Etesian gale
But just inspir'd, and gently swell'd the sail;
Portunus took his turn whose ample hand
Heav'd up his lighten'd keel and sunk the sand,
And steer'd the sacred vessel safe to land.
The land, if not restrain'd, had met your way,
Projected out a neck, and jutted to the sea.
Hibernia, prostrate at your feet, ador'd,

In
you, the pledge of her expected lord;
Due to her isle; a venerable name;
His father and his grandsire known to fame;
Aw'd by that house, accustom'd to command,
The sturdy kerns in due subjection stand;
Nor bear the reins in any foreign hand.
At your approach, they crowded to the port;
And scarcely landed, you create a court:
As Ormond's harbinger, to you they run;
For Venus is the promise of the sun.
The waste of civil wars, their towns destroy'd,
Pales unhonour'd, Ceres unemploy'd,
Were all forgot; and one triumphant day
Wip'd all the tears of three campaigns away.
Blood, rapines, massacres, were cheaply bought,
So mighty recompense your beauty brought.
As when the dove returning bore the mark
Of earth restor'd to the long-lab'ring ark,
The relics of mankind, secure of rest,
Oped every window to receive the guest,
And the fair bearer of the message bless'd;
So, when you came, with loud repeated cries,
The nation took an omen from your eyes,
And God advanc'd his rainbow in the skies,
To sign inviolable peace restor❜d;
The saints, with solemn shouts, proclaim'd the
new accord.

When at your second coming you appear,
(For I fortell that millenary year)
The sharpen'd share shall vex the soil no more,
But earth unbidden shall produce her store;
The land shall laugh, the circling ocean smile,
And heaven's indulgence bless the holy isle.
Heaven from all ages has reserv'd for you
That happy clime, which venom never knew ;

Or if it had been there, your eyes alone
Have power to chase all poison but their own.
Now in this interval, which fate has cast
Betwixt your future glories and your past,
This pause of power, 't is Ireland's hour to

mourn;

While England celebrates your safe return, By which you seem the season to command, And bring our summers back to their forsaken

land,

The vanquish'd isle our leisure must attend, Till the fair blessing we vouchsafe to send ; Nor can we spare you long, tho' often we may lend.

The dove was twice employ'd abroad, before
The world was dried and she return'd no more.
Nor dare we trust so soft a messenger,
New from her sickness, to that northern air
Rest here awhile your lustre to restore,
That they may see you as you shone before;
For yet, the eclipse not wholly past, you wade
Through some remains, and dimness of a
shade.

A subject in his prince may claim a right, Nor suffer him with strength impar'd to fight; Till force returns, his ardour we restrain, And curb his warlike wish to cross the main.

Now past the danger, let the learn'd begin The inquiry, where disease could enter in; How those maligant atoms forc'd their way, What in the faultless frame they found to make their prey?

Where every element was weigh'd so well,
That heaven alone, who mix'd the mass, could
Which of the four ingredients could rebel; [tell
And where, imprison'd in so sweet a cage,
A soul might well be pleas'd to pass an age.

And yet the fine materials made it weak: Porcelain, by being pure, is apt to break : E'en to your breast the sickness durst aspire ; And, forc'd from that fair temple to retire, Profanely set the holy place on fire.

In vain your lord, like young Vespasian, mourn'd,

When the fierce flames the sanctuary burn'd:
And I prepar'd to pay in verses rude
A most detested act of gratitude :
E'en this had been your elegy, which now
Is offer'd for your health, the table of my vow.
Your angel sure our Morley's mind in-
spir'd,

To find the remedy your ill required.
As once the Macedon, by Jove's decree,
Was taught to dream a herb for Ptolemee:
Or Heaven,which had such over-cost bestow'd
As scarce it could afford to flesh and blood,
So lik'd the frame, he would not work anew,
To save the charges of another you.