ANTIGONE. Loe here all prest', my deare beloued father! OEDIPUS. Vnto the wretched be a wretche guyde. ANTIGONE. In this alonly equall to my father. OEDIPUS. And where shal I fet foorth my trembling feete? ANTIGONE. Here, father, here, and here, fet foorth your feete. OEDIPUS. Nowe can I blame none other for my harmes Thou art the cause, that crooked, old, and blind, That it may be seen in fome measure, how far these two poets, who deferve much praife for even an attempt to introduce the Grecian drama to the notice of our ancestors, have i Ready. 1 Read, of. * Road. Path. TM "She giueth him a staffe and frayeth "him herfelfe alfo." Stage-direction. A& v. Sc. ult. fucceeded fucceeded in tranflating this scene of the tendereft expoftulation, I will place it before the reader in a plain literal version. 66 "OED. My daughter, I praise your filial piety. But yet "ANT. But if I was to marry Creon's fon, and you, my fa«ther, be left alone in banishment? OED. Stay at home, and "be happy. I will bear my own misfortunes patiently. ANT. "But who will attend you, thus blind and helpless, my father? "OED. I shall fall down, and be found lying in fome field on "the ground, as it may chance to happen ". ANT. Where is now that Oedipus, and his famous riddle of the Sphinx ? "OED. He is loft! one day made me happy, and one day "deftroyed me! ANT. Ought I not, therefore, to fhare your "miferies? OɛD. It will be but a base banishment of a prin"cefs with her blind father! ANT. To one that is haughty: "not to one that is humble, and loves her father. OED. Lead ❝me on then, and let me touch the dead body of your mother.. "ANT. Lo, now your hand is upon her. her. OED. O my mo"ther! O my moft wretched wife! ANT. She lies a wretched OED. corpfe, covered with every woe. OED. But where are the "dead bodies of my fons Eteocles and Polynices? ANT. They "lie just by you, ftretched out clofe to one another. OED. "Put my blind hand upon their miferable faces! ANT. LO "now, you touch your dead children with your hand. "O, dear, wretched, carcafes of a wretched father! ANT. "O, to me the most dear name of my brother Polynices! "OED. Now, my daughter, the oracle of Apollo proves true. "ANT, What? Can you tell any more evils than thofe which "have happened? OED. That I should die an exile at Athens. "ANT. What city of Attica will take you in? OED. The "facred Colonus, the house of equeftrian Neptune. Come, "then, lend your affiftance to this blind father, fince you mean "to be a companion of my flight. ANT. Go then into mifer"able banishment! O my antient father, ftretch out your dear "hand! I will accompany you, like a favourable wind to a ship. OED. Behold, I go! Daughter, be you my unfortu"nate guide! ANT. Thus, am I, am I, the most unhappy of "all the Theban virgins! OED. Where fhall I fix my old "feeble foot? Daughter, reach to me my staff. ANT. Here, go here, after me. Place your foot here, my father, you "that have the ftrength only of a dream. OED. O most unhappy banishment! Creon drives me in my old age from my Alas! alas! wretched, wretched things have I "fuffered, &c "." "country. So fudden were the changes or the refinements of our language, that in the fecond edition of this play, printed again with Gascoigne's poems in 1587, it was thought neceffary to affix marginal explanations of many words, not long before in common ufe, but now become obfolete and unintelligible. Among others, are beheft and quell'. This, however, as our author fays, was done at the request of a lady, who did not understand poetical words or termes‘. Seneca's ten Tragedies were tranflated at different times and by different poets. These were all printed together in 1581, under this title, "SENECA HIS TENNE TRAGEDIES, TRANS66 LATED INTO ENGLISH. Mercurii Nutrices horæ. IM"PRINTED AT LONDON IN FLEETSTREETE neare Unio "faincte Dunstons church by Thomas Marshe, 1581." The book is dedicated, from Butley in Cheshire, to fir Thomas Henneage, treasurer of the queen's chamber. translation distinctly ". I shall speak of each man's The HYPPOLITUS, MEDEA, HERCULES OETEUS, and AGAMEMNON, were tranflated by John Studley, educated at Westminster school, and afterwards a scholar of Trinity college in Cambridge. The HYPPOLITUS, which he calls the fourth and moft ruthfull tragedy, the MEDEA, in which are some alterations of the chorus", and the HERCULES OETEUS, were all first printed in Thomas Newton's collection of 1581, just mentioned *. The AGAMEMNON was first and feparately published in 1566, and entitled, "The eyght Tragedie of Seneca enti"tuled AGAMEMNON, tranflated out of Latin into English by John Studley student in Trinitie college in Cambridge. Imprinted at London in Flete ftreete beneath the Conduit at the "figne of S. John Euangelyft by Thomas Colwell A. D. "M.D.LXVI. This little book is exceedingly scarce, and hardly to be found in the choiceft libraries of those who collect our poetry in black letter. Recommendatory verses are prefixed, in praise of our tranflator's performance. It is dedicated to fecretary Cecil. To the end of the fifth act our tranflator has added a whole fcene: for the purpose of relating the death of Caffandra, the imprisonment of Electra, and the flight of Oreftes. Yet thefe circumftances were all known and told before. The narrator is Euribates, who in the commencement of the third act had informed Clitemneftra of Agamemnon's return. These efforts, however imperfect or improper, to improve the plot of a drama by a new conduct or contrivance, deferve particular "I know not the purport of a book licenced to E. Matts, "Difcourfes on Seneca the tragedian," Jun. 22, 1601. REGISTR. STATION. C. fol. 71. b. w See NEWT. edit. fol. 121. a. * But I must except the MEDEA, which is entered as tranflated by John Studley of Trinity college in Cambridge, in 1565-6, with T. Colwell. REGISTR. STATION. A. fol. 140. b. I have never feen this feparate edition. Alfo the HIPPOLITUS, is en notice at this infancy of our theatrical taste and knowledge. They fhew that authors now began to think for themselves, and that they were not always implicitly enslaved to the prescribed letter of their models. Studley, who appears to have been qualified for better ftudies, mifapplied his time and talents in tranflating Bale's Acts of the Popes. That tranflation, dedicated to Thomas lord Effex, was printed in 1574. He has left twenty Latin diftichs on the death of the learned Nicholas Carr, Cheke's fucceffor in the Greek profefforfhip at Cambridge. The OCTAVIA is tranflated by T. N. or Thomas Nuce, or Newce, a fellow of Pembroke-hall in 1562, afterwards rector of Oxburgh in Norfolk, Beccles, Wefton-Market, and vicar of Gayfley, in Suffolk'; and at length prebendary of Ely cathedral in 1586. This verfion is for the most part executed in the heroic rhyming couplet. All the rest of the translators have ufed, except in the chorus, the Alexandrine measure, in which Sternhold and Hopkins rendered the pfalms, perhaps the moft unfuitable fpecies of English verfification that could have been applied to this purpose. Nuce's OCTAVIA was firft printed in 1566'. He has two very long copies of verses, one in English and the other in Latin, prefixed to the first edition of Studley's AGAMEMNON in 1566, juft mentioned. Alexander Nevyle, tranflated, or rather paraphrased, the OEDIPUS, in the fixteenth year of his age, and in the year 1560, not printed till the year 1581. It is dedicated to doctor Wootton, a privy counsellor, and his godfather. Notwithstand In quarto. Bl. Lett. "The pageaunt "of POPES, &c. &c. Englifhed with fun"drye additions, by J. S." For Thomas Marthe, 1574. At the end of Bartholomew Dodington's EPISTLE of Carr's Life and Death, addreffed to fir Walter Mildmay, and subjoined to Carr's Latin Tranflation of seven Orations of Demofthenes. Lond. 1571. 4to. Dodington, a fellow of Trinity college, fucceeded Carr in the Greek chair, 1560. See Camden's MONUM. Ecclef. Coll. Weftmon. edit. 1600. 4to. Signat. K 2. |