here makes Cato take for the fake of his fine defcrip. tions. From Cyrene he travels by land, for no better reafon than this;

Hæc eadem fuadebat hiems, quæ clauferat æquorim The winter's effects on the fea, it feems, were more to be dreaded than all the ferpents, whirlwinds, fands &c. by land, which immediately after he paints our in, his fpeech to the foldiers: Then he fetches a compass a vast way round about, to the Nafamones and Jupiter Ammon's temple purely to ridicule the oracles: and Labienus must pardon me, if I do not believe him when he fays fors obtulit, & fortuna viæ eicher Labienus or the map, is very much mistaken here. Thence he returns back to the Syrtes (which he might have taken firft in his way to Utica) and so to Leptis Minor, where our author leaves him; who seems to have made Cato speak his own mind, when he tells his ariny Ire fat eft no matter whither. Lam,

THE

HE fyftem of Tycho Brahe (were it true, as it is novel) could have no room here: Lucan with the reft of the Latin poets, feeins to follow Plato; whose order of the spheres is clear in Cicero, De natura Deorum, De fomnie Scipionis, and in Macrobius. The feat of the Semidei manes is Platonic too, for Apuleius-De

deo Socratis affigns the fathe to the Genii, viz. the region of the Air for their intercourse with gods and men; fo that, I fancy, Rowe miftook the fituation, and I can't be reconcil'd to, Look down on the fun's rays. I am glad you agree with me about the latitude he etakes; and wish you had told me, if the fortilegi, and fatidici, could license his invective against priests; but, I fuppofe you think them (with Helena ) undeferving of your protection. I agree with you in Lucan's errors, and the cause of thein, his poetic descriptions: for the Romans then knew the coaft of Africa from Cyrene (to the fouth east of which lies Ammon toward Egypt.) to Leptis and Utica: but, pray, remember how your Homer nodded while Ulyffes flept, and waking knew not where he was, in the short paffage from Cor. cyra to Ithaca. I like Trapp's verfions for their juít. nefs; his Pfalm is excellent, the prodigies in the fuft Georgic judicious (whence I conclude that 'tis eafier to turn Virgil juftly in blank verfe, than rhyme.) The eclogue of Gallus and fable of Phaeton are pretty well; but he is very faulty in his numbers; the fate of Phaeton might run thus,

I am,

The blasted Phaeton with blazing hair,?
Shot gliding thro' the vast abyss of air,
And tumbled headlong, like a falling star.j

To

Your, &c.

LETTER XXIV..

Nov. 24, 1710.

make use of that freedom and familiarity of style, which we have taken up in our correspondence,

and which is more properly talking upon paper, than writing; I will tell you without any preface, that I never took Tycho Brahe for one of the ancients, or in the leaft an acquaintance of Lucan's; nay, 'tis a mercy on this occafion, that I do not give you an account of his life and converfation; as how he liv'd fome years like an inchanted knight in a certain island, with a tale of a King of Denmark's mistress that shall be nameless But I have compaffion on you, and would not for the world you shall stay any longer among the Genii and Semidei Manes, you know where; for ifonce you get fo near the moon, Sappho will want your prefence in the clouds and inferior regions; not to mention the great lofs Drury lane will fuftain, when Mr. Cis in the milky way. These celeftial thoughts put me in mind of the priests you mention, who are a fort of Sortilegi in one fenfe, because in their lottery there are more blanks than prizes; the adventurers being at best in an uncertainty, whereas the fetters-up are fure of fomething. Priests indeed in their character, as they reprefent God, are facred; and fo are Conftables as they represent the King; but you will own a great many of them are very odd fellows, and the devil of any likeness in them. Yer I can affure you, I honour the good as much as I deteft the bad, and I think, that in condemning these, we praise those. The tranflations from Ovid I have not fo good an opinion of as you; because I think they have little of the main characteristic of this author, a graceful easiness. For let the sense be ever fo exactly render'd, unless an author looks like himself, in his air, habit, and manner, 'tis a disguise, and not a tranflation. But as to the Pfalm, I think DaVol. VII.

H

vid is much more beholden to the tranflator than Ovid; and as he treated the Roman like a Jew, fo he has made the Jew fpeak like a Roman,

THE

HE fame judgment we made on Rowe's ixth of Lucan will ferve for his part of the vith, where I find this memorable line,

Parque novum Fortuna videt concurrere, bellum
Atque virum.

For this he employs fix verses, among which is this,
As if one Knigthly terms in lifts they ran.

Pray can you trace chivalry up higher than Pharamond? will you allow it an anachronifin? Tickel in his ver

fion of the Phænix from Claudian,

When nature ceafes, thou shalt still remain,
Nor fecond Chaos bound thy endless reign.
Claudian thus,

Et clades te nulla rapit, folufque fuperftes,
Edomita tellure, manes.

which plainly refers to the deluge of Deucalion and the conflagration of Phaeton; not to the final diffolution. Your thought of the priests lottery is very fine: you play the wit, and not the critic, upon the errors of your brother.

-

Your obfervations are all very juft: Virgil is eminent for adjusting his diction to his fentiments; and, among the moderns, I find you practife the Profodia of your rules. Your (b) poem fhews you to be, what you fay of Voiture with books well bred: the state of the fair, tho' fatirical, is touch'd with that delicacy, and gallantry, that not the court of Auguftus, not - But hold, I fhall lofe what I lately recovered, your opinion of my fincerity: yet I muft fay, 'tis as faultlefs as the fair to whom 'tis address'd, be she never so perfect. The M. G. (who it feems, had no right notion of you, as you of him) tranfcrib'd it by lucubration: From fome difcourfe of yours, he thought your inclination led you to (what the men of fas hion call learning) pedantry;g but now, he says, he has no lefs, I affure you, than a veneration for you.

Your, &c.

LETTER

XXVI.

Dec. 17, 1710.

feems that my late mention of Crashaw, and my

therefore fend you the whole Author, who has held a place among my other books of this nature for fome years,; in which time having read him twice or thrice, I find him one of those whose works may juft deserve reading. I take this poet to have writ like a gentleman, that is, at leisure hours, and more to keep out of idle

(b) To a Lady, with the Works of Voiture.