LEARN then what morals Critics ought to show, | |
| For ’t is but half a judge’s task to know. | |
| ’T is not enough Taste, Judgement, Learning join; | |
| In all you speak let Truth and Candour shine; | |
| That not alone what to your Sense is due | 5 |
| All may allow, but seek your friendship too. | |
| Be silent always when you doubt your Sense, | |
| And speak, tho’ sure, with seeming diffidence. | |
| Some positive persisting fops we know, | |
| Who if once wrong will needs be always so; | 10 |
| But you with pleasure own your errors past, | |
| And make each day a critique on the last. | |
| ’T is not enough your counsel still be true; | |
| Blunt truths more mischief than nice falsehoods do. | |
| Men must be taught as if you taught them not, | 15 |
| And things unknown proposed as things forgot. | |
| Without good breeding truth is disapprov’d; | |
| That only makes superior Sense belov’d. | |
| Be niggards of advice on no pretence, | |
| For the worst avarice is that of Sense. | 20 |
| With mean complacence ne’er betray your trust, | |
| Nor be so civil as to prove unjust. | |
| Fear not the anger of the wise to raise; | |
| Those best can bear reproof who merit praise. | |
| ’T were well might critics still this freedom take, | 25 |
| But Appius reddens at each word you speak, | |
| And stares tremendous, with a threat’ning eye, | |
| Like some fierce tyrant in old tapestry. | |
| Fear most to tax an honourable fool, | |
| Whose right it is, uncensured to be dull: | 30 |
| Such without Wit, are poets when they please, | |
| As without Learning they can take degrees. | |
| Leave dangerous truths to unsuccessful satires, | |
| And flattery to fulsome dedicators; | |
| Whom, when they praise, the world believes no more | 35 |
| Than when they promise to give scribbling o’er. | |
| ’T is best sometimes your censure to restrain, | |
| And charitably let the dull be vain; | |
| Your silence there is better than your spite, | |
| For who can rail so long as they can write? | 40 |
| Still humming on their drowsy course they keep, | |
| And lash’d so long, like tops, are lash’d asleep. | |
| False steps but help them to renew the race, | |
| As, after stumbling, jades will mend their pace. | |
| What crowds of these, impenitently bold, | 45 |
| In sounds and jingling syllables grown old, | |
| Still run on poets, in a raging vein, | |
| Ev’n to the dregs and squeezings of the brain, | |
| Strain out the last dull droppings of their sense, | |
| And rhyme with all the rage of impotence! | 50 |
| Such shameless bards we have; and yet ’t is true | |
| There are as mad abandon’d critics too. | |
| The bookful blockhead ignorantly read, | |
| With loads of learned lumber in his head, | |
| With his own tongue still edifies his ears, | 55 |
| And always list’ning to himself appears. | |
| All books he reads, and all he reads assails, | |
| From Dryden’s Fables down to Durfey’s Tales. | |
| With him most authors steal their works, or buy; | |
| Garth did not write his own Dispensary. | 60 |
| Name a new play, and he ’s the poet’s friend; | |
| Nay, show’d his faults—but when would poets mend? | |
| No place so sacred from such fops is barr’d, | |
| Nor is Paul’s church more safe than Paul’s churchyard: | |
| Nay, fly to altars; there they ’ll talk you dead; | 65 |
| For fools rush in where angels fear to tread. | |
| Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks, | |
| It still looks home, and short excursions makes; | |
| But rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks | |
| And never shock’d, and never turn’d aside, | 70 |
| Bursts out, resistless, with a thund’ring tide. | |
| But where ’s the man who counsel can bestow, | |
| Still pleas’d to teach, and yet not proud to know? | |
| Unbiass’d or by favour or by spite; | |
| Not dully prepossess’d nor blindly right; | 75 |
| Tho’ learn’d, well bred, and tho’ well bred sincere; | |
| Modestly bold, and humanly severe; | |
| Who to a friend his faults can freely show, | |
| And gladly praise the merit of a foe; | |
| Bless’d with a taste exact, yet unconfin’d, | 80 |
| A knowledge both of books and humankind; | |
| Gen’rous converse; a soul exempt from pride; | |
| And love to praise, with reason on his side? | |
| Such once were critics; such the happy few | |
| Athens and Rome in better ages knew. | 85 |
| The mighty Stagyrite first left the shore, | |
| Spread all his sails, and durst the deeps explore; | |
| He steer’d securely, and discover’d far, | |
| Led by the light of the Mæonian star. | |
| Poets, a race long unconfin’d and free, | 90 |
| Still fond and proud of savage liberty, | |
| Receiv’d his laws, and stood convinc’d ’t was fit | |
| Who conquer’d Nature should preside o’er Wit. | |
| Horace still charms with graceful negligence, | |
| And without method talks us into sense; | 95 |
| Will, like a friend, familiarly convey | |
| The truest notions in the easiest way. | |
| He who, supreme in judgement as in wit, | |
| Might boldly censure as he boldly writ, | |
| Yet judg’d with coolness, though he sung with fire; | 100 |
| His precepts teach but what his works inspire. | |
| Our critics take a contrary extreme, | |
| They judge with fury, but they write with phlegm; | |
| Nor suffers Horace more in wrong translations | |
| By Wits, than Critics in as wrong quotations. | 105 |
| See Dionysius Homer’s thoughts refine, | |
| And call new beauties forth from ev’ry line! | |
| Fancy and art in gay Petronius please, | |
| The Scholar’s learning with the courtier’s ease. | |
| In grave Quintilian’s copious work we find | 110 |
| The justest rules and clearest method join’d. | |
| Thus useful arms in magazines we place, | |
| All ranged in order, and disposed with grace; | |
| But less to please the eye than arm the hand, | |
| Still fit for use, and ready at command. | 115 |
| Thee, bold Longinus! all the Nine inspire, | |
| And bless their critic with a poet’s fire: | |
| An ardent judge, who, zealous in his trust, | |
| With warmth gives sentence, yet is always just; | |
| Whose own example strengthens all his laws, | 120 |
| And is himself that great sublime he draws. | |
| Thus long succeeding critics justly reign’d, | |
| License repress’d, and useful laws ordain’d: | |
| Learning and Rome alike in empire grew, | |
| And arts still follow’d where her eagles flew; | 125 |
| From the same foes at last both felt their doom, | |
| And the same age saw learning fall and Rome. | |
| With tyranny then superstition join’d, | |
| As that the body, this enslaved the mind; | |
| Much was believ’d, but little understood, | 130 |
| And to be dull was construed to be good; | |
| A second deluge learning thus o’errun, | |
| And the monks finish’d what the Goths begun. | |
| At length Erasmus, that great injur’d name, | |
| (The glory of the priesthood and the shame!) | 135 |
| Stemm’d the wild torrent of a barb’rous age, | |
| And drove those holy Vandals off the stage. | |
| But see! each Muse in Leo’s golden days | |
| Starts from her trance, and trims her wither’d bays. | |
| Rome’s ancient genius, o’er its ruins spread, | 140 |
| Shakes off the dust, and rears his rev’rend head. | |
| Then sculpture and her sister arts revive; | |
| Stones leap’d to form, and rocks began to live; | |
| With sweeter notes each rising temple rung; | |
| A Raphael painted and a Vida sung: | 145 |
| Immortal Vida! on whose honour’d brow | |
| The poet’s bays and critic’s ivy grow: | |
| Cremona now shall ever boast thy name, | |
| As next in place to Mantua, next in fame! | |
| But soon by impious arms from Latium chased, | 150 |
| Their ancient bounds the banish’d Muses pass’d; | |
| Thence arts o’er all the northern world advance, | |
| But critic learning flourish’d most in France; | |
| The rules a nation born to serve obeys, | |
| And Boileau still in right of Horace sways. | 155 |
| But we, brave Britons, foreign laws despised, | |
| And kept unconquer’d and uncivilized; | |
| Fierce for the liberties of wit, and bold, | |
| We still defied the Romans, as of old. | |
| Yet some there were, among the sounder few | 160 |
| Of those who less presumed and better knew, | |
| Who durst assert the juster ancient cause, | |
| And here restor’d Wit’s fundamental laws. | |
| Such was the Muse whose rules and practice tell | |
| ‘Nature’s chief masterpiece is writing well.’ | 165 |
| Such was Roscommon, not more learn’d than good, | |
| With manners gen’rous as his noble blood; | |
| To him the wit of Greece and Rome was known, | |
| And every author’s merit but his own. | |
| Such late was Walsh—the Muse’s judge and friend, | 170 |
| Who justly knew to blame or to commend; | |
| To failings mild but zealous for desert, | |
| The clearest head, and the sincerest heart. | |
| This humble praise, lamented Shade! receive; | |
| This praise at least a grateful Muse may give: | 175 |
| The Muse whose early voice you taught to sing, | |
| Prescribed her heights, and pruned her tender wing, | |
| (Her guide now lost), no more attempts to rise, | |
| But in low numbers short excursions tries; | |
| Content if hence th’ unlearn’d their wants may view, | 180 |
| The learn’d reflect on what before they knew; | |
| Careless of censure, nor too fond of fame; | |
| Still pleas’d to praise, yet not afraid to blame; | |
| Averse alike to flatter or offend; | |
| Not free from faults, nor yet too vain to mend. | 185 |
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