The Greeks for a time travelled into Egypt, but they tranflated no books from the Egyptian language; and when the Macedonians had overthrown the empire of Perfia, the countries that became fubject to the Grecian dominion ftudied only the Grecian literature. The books of the conquered nations, if they had any among them, funk in oblivion; Greece confidered herfelf as the mistress, if not as the parent of arts, her language contained all that was fuppofed to be known, and, except the facred writings of the Old Teftament, I know not that the library of Alexandria adopted any thing from a foreign

tongue.

The Romans confefied themselves the fcholars of the Greeks, and do not appear to have expected, what has fince happened, that the ignorance of fucceeding ages would prefer them to their teachers. Every man who in Rome afpired to the praife of literature, thought it neceflary to learn Greek, and had no need of verfions when they could ftudy the originals. Tranflation, however, was not wholly neglected. Dramatic poems could be underflood by the people in no language but their own, and the Romans were fometimes enterrained with the tragedies of Euripides and the comedies of Menander. Other works were fometimes attempted; in an old fcholiaft there is mention of a Latin Iliad, and we have not wholly loft Tully's ver fion of the poem of Aratus; but it does not appear that any man grew eminent by interpreting another, and perhaps it was more frequent to tranflate for exercise or amufement than for fame.

The Arabs were the firft nation who felt the ardour of tranflation: when they had fubdued the eastern provinces of the Greek empire, they found their captives wifer than themselves, and made hafte to relieve their wants by imparted knowledge. They discovered that many might grow wife by the labour of a few, and that improvements might be made with speed, when they had the knowledge of former ages in their own language. They therefore made hafte to lay hold on medicine and philofophy, and turned their chief authors into Arabic. Whether they attempted the poems is not known; their literary zeal was vehement, but it was fhort, and probably expired before they had time to add the arts of elegance to thofe of neceffity.

The study of ancient literature was interrupted in Europe by the irruption of

the northern nations, who fubverted the Roman empire, and erected new kingdoms with new languages. It is not ftrange, that fuch confusion should fufpend literary attention: those who lost, and those who gained dominion, had immediate difficulties to encounter and immediate miferies to redrefs, and had little leifure, amidst the violence of war, the trepidation of flight, the diftreffes of forced migration, or the tumults of unfettled conqueft, to enquire after fpeculative truth, to enjoy the amusement of imaginary adventures, to know the hiftory of former ages, or study the events of any other lives. But no fooner had this chaos of dominion funk into order, than learning began again to flourish in the calm of peace. When life and poffeffions were fecure, convenience and enjoyment were foon fought, learning was found the highest gratification of the mind, and tranflation became one of the means by which it was imparted.

At last, by a concurence of many causes, the European world was roufed from its lethargy; those arts which had been long obfcurely ftudied in the gloom of monafteries became the general favourites of mankind; every nation vied with its neighbour for the prize of learning; the epidemical emulation spread from fouth to north, and curiosity and tranflation found their way to Britain.

He that reviews the progrefs of English literature, will find that tranflation was very early cultivated among us, but that fome principles, either wholly erroneous, or too far extended, hindered our fuccefs from being always equal to our diligence.

Chaucer, who is generally confidered as the father of our poetry, has left a verfion of Boetius on the Comforts of Philofophy, the book which feems to have been the favourite of middle ages, which had been tranflated into Saxon by King Alfred, and illuftrated with a copious comment afcribed to Aquinas. It may be supposed that Chaucer would apply more than common attention to an author of so much

celebrity, yet he has attempted nothing higher than a verfion ftrictly literal, and has degraded the poetical parts to profe, that the constraint of verfification might not obftruct his zeal for fidelity.

Caxton taught us typography about the year 1490. The first book printed in English was a tranflation. Caxton was both the tranflator and printer of the Deftruccion of Troye, a book which, in that

infancy

infancy of learning, was confidered as the best account of the fabulous ages, and which, though now driven out of notice by authors of no greater use or value, ftill continued to be read in Caxton's English to the beginning of the prefent century.

Caxton proceeded as he began, and, except the poems of Gower and Chaucer, printed nothing but tranflations from the French, in which the original is fo fcrupuloufly followed, that they afford us little knowledge of our own language; though the words are English, the phrafe is foreign.

As learning advanced, new works were adopted into our language, but I think with little improvement of the art of tranflation, though foreign nations and other languages offered us models of a better method; till in the age of Elizabeth we began to find that greater liberty was neceflary to elegance, and that elegance was neceffary to general reception; fome effays were then made upon the Italian poets, which deferve the praife and gratitude of pofterity.

But the old practice was not fuddenly forfaken; Holland filled the nation with literal tranflation, and, what is yet more strange, the fame exactness was obftinately practifed in the version of the poets. This abfurd labour of conftruing into rhyme was countenanced by Jonfon, in his verfion of Horace; and, whether it be that more men have learning than genius, or that the endeavours of that time were more directed towards knowledge than delight, the accuracy of Jonfon found more imitators than the elegance of Fairfax; and May, Sandys, and Holiday, confined themfelves to the toil of rendering line for line, not indeed with equal felicity, for May and Sandys were poets, and Holiday only a scholar and a critic.

Feltham appears to confider it as the eftablished law of poetical tranflation, that the lines fhould be neither more nor fewer

than thofe of the original; and fo long had his prejudice prevailed, that Denham praises Fanfhaw's verfion of Guarini as the example of a "new and noble way," as the first attempt to break the boundaries of custom, and affert the natural freedom of the mufe.

In the general emulation of wit and genius, which the feftivity of the Reftoration produced, the poets fhook off their conftraint, and confidered tranflation as no longer confined to fervile clofenefs. But reformation is feldom the work of pure

virtue or unaffifted reafon. Tranflation was improved more by accident than conviction. The writers of the foregoing age had at least learning equal to their genius, and, being often more able to explain the fentiments or illuftrate the allufions of the ancients, than to exhibit their graces and transfufe their fpirit, were perhaps willing fometimes to conceal their want of poetry by profufion of literature, and therefore trandated literally, that their fidelity might fhelter their infipidity or harfhnefs. The wits of Charles's time had feldom more than flight and fuperficial views, and their care was to hide their want of learning behind the colours of a gay imagination: they therefore tranflated always with freedom, fometimes with licentioufnefs, and perhaps expected that their readers should accept fprightlinefs for knowledge, and confider ignorance and mistake as the impatience and negligence of a mind too rapid to stop at difficulties, and too elevated to defcend to minuteness.

Thus was tranflation made more eafy to the writer, and more delightful to the reader; and there is no wonder if ease and pleafure have found their advocates. The paraphraftic liberties have been almost univerfally admitted: and Sherbourn, whofe learning was eminent, and who had no need of any excufe to pass flightly over obfcurities, is the only writer who, in later times, has attempted to justify or revive the ancient severity.

There is undoubtedly a mean to be obferved, Dryden faw very early that clofenefs beft preferved an author's fenfe, and that freedom beft exhibited his fpirit: he therefore will deferve the highest praise who can give a reprefentation at once faithful and pleafing, who can convey the fame thoughts with the fame graces, and who, when he tranflates, changes nothing but the language. Idler.

196. What Talents are requifite to form a good Tranflator.

After all, a tranflator is to make his author appear as charming as poffibly he can, provided he maintains his character and makes him not unlike himself. Tranflation is a kind of drawing after the life; where every one will acknowledge there is a double fort of likeness, a good one and a bad. 'Tis one thing to draw the outlines true, the features like, the proportions exact, the colouring itself perhaps tolerable; and another thing to make all thofe grace

ful,

ful, by the pofture, the fhadowings, and chiefly by the fpirit which animates the whole. I cannot, without fome indignation, look on an ill copy of an excellent original; much lefs can I behold with patience, Virgil, Homer, and fome others, whofe beauties I have been endeavouring all my life to imitate, fo abufed, as I may fay, to their faces, by a botching interpreter. What English readers, unacquainted with Greek or Latin, will believe me, or any other man, when we commend thofe authors, and confefs we derive all that is pardonable in us from their fountains, if they take those to be the fame poets whom our Ogilby's have tranflated? But I dare affure them, that a good poet is no more like himself in a dull tranflation, than a carcafe would be to his living body. There are many who understand Greek and Latin, and yet are ignorant of their mothertongue. The proprieties and delicacies of the English are known to few: 'tis impofible even for a good wit to understand and practise them, without the help of a liberal education, long reading, and digefting of thofe few good authors we have amongst us; the knowledge of men and manners; the freedom of habitudes and conversation with the best of company of both fexes; and, in fhort, without wearing off the ruft which he contracted, while he was laying in a flock of learning. Thus difficult it is to understand the purity of English, and critically to difcern not only good writers from bad, and a proper ftyle from a corrupt, but also to diftinguish that which is pure in a good author, from that which is vicious and corrupt in him. And for want of all thefe requifites, or the greatest part of them, mott of our ingenious young men take up fome cry d-up English poet for their model, adore him, and imitate him, as they think, without knowing wherein he is defective, where he is boyish and trifling, wherein either his thoughts are improper to the fubject, or his expreffions unworthy of his thoughts, or the turn of both is unharmonious. Thus it appears neceffary, that a man should be a nice critic in his mother-tongue, before he attempts to tranflate a foreign language. Neither is it fufficient that he be able to judge of words and style; but he must be a mafter of them too; he muft perfectly understand his author's tongue, and abfolutely command his own: fo that, to be a thorough tranflator, he must be a thorough poet. Neither is it enough to give his au

And

thor's fenfe in good English, in poetical expreffious, and in mufical numbers: for, though all thofe are exceeding difficult to perform, there yet remains an harder tafk; and 'tis a fecret of which few tranflators have fufficiently thought. I have already hinted a word or two concerning it; that is, the maintaining the character of an author, which diftinguishes him from all others, and makes him appear that individual poct whom you would interpret. For example, not only the thoughts, but the ftyle and verfification of Virgil and Ovid are very different. Yet I fee even in our beft poets, who have tranflated fome parts of them, that they have contounded their feveral talents; and by endeavouring only at the fweetnefs and harmony of numbers, have made them both fo much alike, that if I did not know the criginals, I should never be able to judge by the copies, which was Virgil and which was Ovid. It was objected against a late noble painter (Sir P. Lely) that he drew many graceful pictures, but few of them were alike. this happened to him because he always ftudied himself more than those who fat to him. In fuch tranflators I can easily diftinguish the hand which performed the work, but I cannot diftinguish their poet from another. Suppofe two authors are equally fweet, yet there is a great diftinction to be made in sweetness; as in that of fugar and in that of honey. I can make the difference more plain, by giving you (if it be worth knowing) my own method of proceeding in my tranflations out of four feveral poets; Virgil, Theocritus, Lucretius, and Horace. In each of thefe, before I undertook them, I confidered the genius and diftinguishing character of my author. I looked on Virgil as a fuccinct, grave, and majestic writer; one who weighed, not only every thought, but every word and fyllable; who was still aiming to crowd his fenfe into as narrow a compafs as poffibly he could; for which reafon he is fo very figurative, that he requires (I may almolt fay) a grammar apart to conftrue him. His verfe is every where founding the very thing in your ears whofe fense it bears: yet the numbers are perpetually varied, to encreafe the delight of the reader; so that the fame founds are never repeated twice together. On the contrary, Ovid and Claudian, though they write in ftyles dif fering from each other, yet have each of them but one fort of mufic in their verfes. All the verfification and little variety of

Claudian

Claudian is included within the compass of four or five lines, and then he begins again in the fame tenour; perpetually clofing his fenfe at the end of a verfe, and verfe commonly which they call golden, or two fubftantives and two adjectives, with a verb betwixt them to keep the peace. Ovid, with all his fweetness, has as little variety of numbers and found as he he is always, as it were, upon the hand gallop, and his verfe runs upon carpet-ground. He avoids, like the other, all fynalæphas, or cutting off one vowel when it comes. before another in the following word. But to return to Vigil: though he is smooth where fmoothnels is required, yet he is fo far from affecting it, that he feems rather to difdain it; frequently makes ufe of fynalæphas; and concludes his fenfe in the middle of his verfe. He is every where above conceits of epigrammatic wit, and grofs hyperboles: he maintains majefty in the midst of plainnefs; he fhines, but glares nct; and is ftately without ambition, which is the vice of Lucan. I drew my definition of poetical wit from my particular confideration of him: for propriety of thoughts and words are only to be found in him; and where they are proper, they will be delightful. Pleafure follows of neceffity, as the effect does the caufe; and therefore is not to be put into the definition. This exact propriety of Virgil I particularly regarded as a great part of his character; but muft confels to my thame, that I have not been able to tranflate any part of him fo well, as to make him appear wholly like himfeif: for where the original is close, no verfion can reach it in the fame compafs. Hannibal Caro's in the Italian, is the nearest, the most poetical, and the most fonorous of any tranflation of the Æneid: yet, though he takes the advantage of blank verfe, he commonly allows two lines for one of Virgil, and does not always hit his fenfe. Taffo tells us, in his letters, that Sperone Speroni, a great Italian wit, who was his contemporary, observed of Virgil and Tully, that the Latin orator endeavoured to imitate the copioufnefs of Homer, the Greek poet; and that the Latin poet made it his business to reach the concifenefs of Demofthenes, the Greek orator. Virgil, therefore, being fo very fparing of his words, and leaving fo much to be imagined by the reader, can never be tranflated as he ought, in any modern tongue. To make him copious is to alter

his character: and to tranflate him line for line is impoffible, because the Latin is naturally a more fuccinct language than either the Italian, Spanish, French, or even than the English, which, by reafon of its monofyllables, is far the moft compendious of them. Virgil is much the clofeft of any Roman poet, and the Latin hexameter has more feet than the English heroic. Dryden.

§ 97. The Nature of Wit in Writing. The compofition of all poems is, or ought to be, of wit; and wit in poetry, or wit writing (if you will give me leave to ufe a fchool-diftinction) is no other than the faculty of imagination in the writer, which, like a nimble fpaniel, beats over and ranges through the field of memory, till it fprings the quarry it hunted after; or, without a metaphor, which fearches over all the memory for the fpecies or ideas of thofe things which it defigns to reprefent. Wit written is that which is well defined, the happy refult of thought, or product of imagination. But to proceed from wit, in the general notion of it, to the proper wit of an heroic or hiftorical poem; I judge it chiefly to confift in the delightful imagination of perfons, actions, paffions, or things. Tis not the jerk or ftring of an epigram, nor the feeming contradiction of a poor antithefis (the delight of an ill-judging audience in a play of rhyme) nor the jingle of a more poor paranomafia; neither is it fo much the morality of a grave fentence, affected by Lucan, but more sparingly ufed by Virgil: but it is fome lively and apt defcription, drefied in fuch colours of fpeech that it fets before your eyes the abfent object as perfectly and more delightfully than nature. So then the first happiness of a poet's imagination, is properly invention, or finding of the thought; the fecond is fancy, or the variation, dreffing or moulding of that thought, as the judgment reprefents it, proper to the fubject; the third is elocution, or the art of cloathing and adorning that thought, fo found and varied, in apt, fignificant, and founding words: the quickness of the imagination is feen in the invention, the fertility in the fancy, and accuracy in the expreffion. For the first of thefe, 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,