The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. in Nine Volumes, Volume 08

It is remarked by Watts, that there is scarcely a happy combination of words, or a phrase poetically elegant, in the English language, which Pope has not inserted into his version of Homer. How he obtained possession of so many beauties of speech, it were desirable to know. That he gleaned from authors, obscure as well as eminent, what he thought brilliant or useful, and preserved it all in a regular collection, is not unlikely. When, in his last years, Hall’s Satires were shown him, he wished that he had seen them sooner.

New sentiments, and new images, others may produce; but to attempt any further improvement of versification will be dangerous. Art and diligence have now done their best, and what shall be added will be the effort of tedious toil and needless curiosity.

After all this, it is, surely, superfluous to answer the question that has once been asked, whether Pope was a poet? otherwise than by asking in return, if Pope be not a poet, where is poetry to be found? To circumscribe poetry by a definition, will only show the narrowness of the definer, though a definition, which shall exclude Pope, will not easily be made. Let us look round upon the present time, and back upon the past; let us inquire to whom the voice of mankind has decreed the wreath of poetry; let their productions be examined, and their claims stated, and the pretensions of Pope will be no more disputed. Had he given the world only his version, the name of poet must have been allowed him: if the writer of the Iliad were to class his successors, he would assign a very high place to his translator, without requiring any other evidence of genius.

The following Letter, of which the original is in the hands of lord Hardwicke, was communicated to me by the kindness of Mr. Jodrell.

“To Mr. Bridges, at the bishop of London’s, at Fulham.

“Sir,—The favour of your letter, with your remarks, can never be enough acknowledged; and the speed with which you discharged so troublesome a task, doubles the obligation.

“I must own, you have pleased me very much by the commendations so ill bestowed upon me; but, I assure you, much more by the frankness of your censure, which I ought to take the more kindly of the two, as it is more advantageous to a scribbler to be improved in his judgment, than to be soothed in his vanity. The greater part of those deviations from the Greek, which you have observed, I was led into by Chapman and Hobbes; who are, it seems, as much celebrated for their knowledge of the original, as they are decried for the badness of their translations. Chapman pretends to have restored the genuine sense of the author, from the mistakes of all former explainers, in several hundred places; and the Cambridge editors of the large Homer, in Greek and Latin, attributed so much to Hobbes, that they confess they have corrected the old Latin interpretation, very often by his version. For my part, I generally took the author’s meaning to be as you have explained it; yet their authority, joined to the knowledge of my own imperfectness in the language, overruled me. However, sir, you may be confident I think you in the right, because you happen to be of my opinion: for men (let them say what they will) never approve any other’s sense, but as it squares with their own. But you have made me much more proud of, and positive in, my judgment, since it is strengthened by yours. I think your criticisms, which regard the expression, very just, and shall make my profit of them: to give you some proof that I am in earnest, I will alter three verses on your bare objection, though I have Mr. Dryden’s example for each of them. And this, I hope, you will account no small piece of obedience, from one, who values the authority of one true poet above that of twenty criticks or commentators. But, though I speak thus of commentators, I will continue to read carefully all I can procure, to make up, that way, for my own want of critical understanding in the original beauties of Homer. Though the greatest of them are certainly those of the invention and design, which are not at all confined to the language: for the distinguishing excellencies of Homer are (by the consent of the best criticks of all nations) first in the manners, (which include all the speeches, as being no other than the representations of each person’s manners by his words;) and then in that rapture and fire, which carries you away with him, with that wonderful force, that no man, who has a true poetical spirit, is master of himself, while he reads him. Homer makes you interested and concerned before you are aware, all at once; whereas, Virgil does it by soft degrees. This, I believe, is what a translator of Homer ought, principally, to imitate; and it is very hard for any translator to come up to it, because the chief reason, why all translations fall short of their originals is, that the very constraint they are obliged to, renders them heavy and dispirited.

“The great beauty of Homer’s language, as I take it, consists in that noble simplicity which runs through all his works; (and yet his diction, contrary to what one would imagine consistent with simplicity, is, at the same time, very copious.) I don’t know how I have run into this pedantry in a letter, but I find I have said too much, as well as spoken too inconsiderately; what farther thoughts I have upon this subject, I shall be glad to communicate to you, for my own improvement, when we meet; which is a happiness I very earnestly desire, as I do likewise some opportunity of proving how much I think myself obliged to your friendship, and how truly I am, sir,

“Your most faithful, humble servant,“A. Pope.”

The criticism upon Pope’s epitaphs,152 which was printed in the Universal Visiter, is placed here, being too minute and particular to be inserted in the life.

Every art is best taught by example. Nothing contributes more to the cultivation of propriety, than remarks on the works of those who have most excelled. I shall, therefore, endeavour, at this visit, to entertain the young students in poetry with an examination of Pope’s epitaphs.

To define an epitaph is useless; every one knows that it is an inscription on a tomb. An epitaph, therefore, implies no particular character of writing, but may be composed in verse or prose. It is, indeed, commonly panegyrical; because we are seldom distinguished with a stone but by our friends; but it has no rule to restrain or modify it, except this, that it ought not to be longer than common beholders may be expected to have leisure and patience to peruse.

I

On Charles, earl of Dorset, in the church of Wythyham, in SussexDorset, the grace of courts, the muse’s pride,Patron of arts, and judge of nature, dy’d,—The scourge of pride, though sanctify’d or great,Of fops in learning, and of knaves in state;Yet soft in nature, though severe his lay,His anger moral, and his wisdom gay.Blest satirist! who touch’d the mean so true,As show’d, vice had his hate and pity too.Blest courtier! who could king and country please,Yet sacred kept his friendship, and his ease.Blest peer! his great forefather’s every graceReflecting, and reflected on his race;Where other Buckhursts, other Dorsets shine,And patriots still, or poets, deck the line.

The first distich of this epitaph contains a kind of information which few would want, that the man for whom the tomb was erected, died. There are, indeed, some qualities worthy of praise ascribed to the dead, but none that were likely to exempt him from the lot of man, or incline us much to wonder that he should die. What is meant by “judge of nature,” is not easy to say. Nature is not the object of human judgment; for it is vain to judge where we cannot alter. If by nature is meant what is commonly called nature by the criticks, a just representation of things really existing, and actions really performed, nature cannot be properly opposed to art; nature being, in this sense, only the best effect of art.

The scourge of pride—

Of this couplet, the second line is not, what is intended, an illustration of the former. Pride in the great, is, indeed, well enough connected with knaves in state, though knaves is a word rather too ludicrous and light; but the mention of sanctified pride will not lead the thoughts to fops in learning, but rather to some species of tyranny or oppression, something more gloomy and more formidable than foppery.

Yet soft his nature—

This is a high compliment, but was not first bestowed on Dorset by Pope153. The next verse is extremely beautiful.

Blest satirist!

In this distich is another line of which Pope was not the author. I do not mean to blame these imitations with much harshness; in long performances they are scarcely to be avoided; and in shorter they may be indulged, because the train of the composition may naturally involve them, or the scantiness of the subject allow little choice. However, what is borrowed is not to be enjoyed as our own; and it is the business of critical justice to give every bird of the muses his proper feather.

Blest courtier!

Whether a courtier can properly be commended for keeping his ease sacred, may, perhaps, be disputable. To please king and country, without sacrificing friendship to any change of times, was a very uncommon instance of prudence or felicity, and deserved to be kept separate from so poor a commendation as care of his ease. I wish our poets would attend a little more accurately to the use of the word sacred, which surely should never be applied in a serious composition, but where some reference may be made to a higher being, or where some duty is exacted, or implied. A man may keep his friendship sacred, because promises of friendship are very awful ties; but, methinks, he cannot, but in a burlesque sense, be said to keep his ease sacred.

Blest peer!

The blessing ascribed to the peer has no connexion with his peerage; they might happen to any other man whose ancestors were remembered, or whose posterity are likely to be regarded.

I know not whether this epitaph be worthy either of the writer or of the man entombed.

II

On sir William Trumbull, one of the principal secretaries of state to king William the third, who, having resigned his place, died in his retirement at Easthamstead, in Berkshire, 1716A pleasing form; a firm, yet cautious mind;Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resign’d;Honour unchang’d, a principle profest,Fix’d to one side, but mod’rate to the rest:An honest courtier, yet a patriot too;Just to his prince, and to his country true;Fill’d with the sense of age, the fire of youth,A scorn of wrangling, yet a zeal for truth;A gen’rous faith, from superstition free;A love to peace, and hate of tyranny;Such this man was; who now, from earth remov’d,At length enjoys that liberty he lov’d.

In this epitaph, as in many others, there appears, at the first view, a fault which, I think, scarcely any beauty can compensate. The name is omitted. The end of an epitaph is to convey some account of the dead; and to what purpose is any thing told of him whose name is concealed? An epitaph, and a history of a nameless hero, are equally absurd, since the virtues and qualities so recounted in either are scattered at the mercy of fortune to be appropriated by guess. The name, it is true, may be read upon the stone; but what obligation has it to the poet, whose verses wander over the earth, and leave their subject behind them, and who is forced, like an unskilful painter, to make his purpose known by adventitious help?

This epitaph is wholly without elevation, and contains nothing striking or particular; but the poet is not to be blamed for the defects of his subject. He said, perhaps, the best that could be said. There are, however, some defects which were not made necessary by the character in which he was employed. There is no opposition between an honest courtier and a patriot; for, an honest courtier cannot but be a patriot.

It was unsuitable to the nicety required in short compositions, to close his verse with the word too: every rhyme should be a word of emphasis; nor can this rule be safely neglected, except where the length of the poem makes slight inaccuracies excusable, or allows room for beauties sufficient to overpower the effects of petty faults.

At the beginning of the seventh line the word filled is weak and prosaick, having no particular adaptation to any of the words that follow it.

The thought in the last line is impertinent, having no connexion with the foregoing character, nor with the condition of the man described. Had the epitaph been written on the poor conspirator154 who died lately in prison, after a confinement of more than forty years, without any crime proved against him, the sentiment had been just and pathetical; but why should Trumbull be congratulated upon his liberty, who had never known restraint?

III

On the honourable Simon Harcourt, only son of the lord chancellor Harcourt, at the church of Stanton-Harcourt, in Oxfordshire, 1720To this sad shrine, whoe’er thou art, draw near,Here lies the friend most lov’d, the son most dear:Who ne’er knew joy, but friendship might divide,Or gave his father grief but when he died.How vain is reason, eloquence how weak!If Pope must tell what Harcourt cannot speak.Oh! let thy once-lov’d friend inscribe thy stone,And with a father’s sorrows mix his own!

This epitaph is principally remarkable for the artful introduction of the name, which is inserted with a peculiar felicity, to which chance must concur with genius, which no man can hope to attain twice, and which cannot be copied but with servile imitation.

I cannot but wish that, of this inscription, the two last lines had been omitted, as they take away from the energy what they do not add to the sense.

IV

ON JAMES CRAGGS, ESQIn Westminster AbbeyJACOBVS CRAGGS,REGI MAGNÆ BRITANNIAE A SECRETISET CONSILIIS SANCTIORIBVSPRINCIPIS PARITER AC POPVLI AMOR ET DELICIÆVIXIT TITVLIS ET INVIDIA MAJOR,ANNOS HEV PAVCOS, XXXVOB. FEB. XVI. MDCCXXStatesman, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere,In action faithful, and in honour clear!Who broke no promise, serv’d no private end,Who gain’d no title, and who lost no friend;Ennobled by himself, by all approv’d,Prais’d, wept, and honour’d, by the muse he lov’d

The lines on Craggs were not originally intended for an epitaph; and, therefore, some faults are to be imputed to the violence with which they are torn from the poem that first contained them. We may, however, observe some defects. There is a redundancy of words in the first couplet: it is superfluous to tell of him, who was sincere, true, and faithful, that he was in honour clear.

There seems to be an opposition intended in the fourth line, which is not very obvious: where is the relation between the two positions, that he gained no title and lost no friend?

It may be proper here to remark the absurdity of joining, in the same inscription, Latin and English, or verse and prose. If either language be preferable to the other, let that only be used; for no reason can be given why part of the information should be given in one tongue, and part in another, on a tomb, more than in any other place, or any other occasion; and to tell all that can be conveniently told in verse, and then to call in the help of prose, has always the appearance of a very artless expedient, or of an attempt unaccomplished. Such an epitaph resembles the conversation of a foreigner, who tells part of his meaning by words, and conveys part by signs.

V

INTENDED FOR MR. ROWE In Westminster Abbey 155Thy reliques, Rowe, to this fair urn we trust,And, sacred, place by Dryden’s awful dust;Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest!Blest in thy genius, in thy love, too, blest!One grateful woman to thy fame suppliesWhat a whole thankless land to his denies.

Of this inscription the chief fault is, that it belongs less to Rowe, for whom it is written, than to Dryden, who was buried near him; and, indeed, gives very little information concerning either.

To wish “Peace to thy shade,” is too mythological to be admitted into a Christian temple: the ancient worship has infected almost all our other compositions, and might, therefore, be contented to spare our epitaphs. Let fiction, at least, cease with life, and let us be serious over the grave.

VI

ON MRS. CORBET, Who died of a cancer in her breast 156Here rests a woman, good without pretence,Blest with plain reason, and with sober sense:No conquest she, but o’er herself, desir’d;No arts essay’d, but not to be admir’d.Passion and pride were to her soul unknown,Convinc’d that virtue only is our own.So unaffected, so compos’d a mind,So firm, yet soft, so strong, yet so refin’d,Heav’n, as its purest gold, by tortures try’d;The saint sustain’d it, but the woman dy’d.

I have always considered this as the most valuable of all Pope’s epitaphs; the subject of it is a character not discriminated by any shining or eminent peculiarities; yet that which really makes though not the splendour, the felicity of life, and that which every wise man will choose for his final and lasting companion in the languor of age, in the quiet of privacy, when he departs weary and disgusted from the ostentatious, the volatile, and the vain. Of such a character, which the dull overlook, and the gay despise, it was fit that the value should be made known, and the dignity established. Domestick virtue, as it is exerted without great occasions, or conspicuous consequences, in an even unnoted tenour, required the genius of Pope to display it in such a manner as might attract regard, and enforce reverence. Who can forbear to lament that this amiable woman has no name in the verses?

If the particular lines of this inscription be examined, it will appear less faulty than the rest. There is scarcely one line taken from commonplaces, unless it be that in which only virtue is said to be our own. I once heard a Jady of great beauty and excellence object to the fourth line, that it contained an unnatural and incredible panegyrick. Of this let the ladies judge.

VII

On the monument of the honourable Robert Digby, and of his sister Mary, erected by their father the lord Digby, in the church of Skerborne, in Dorsetshire, 1727Go! fair example of untainted youth,Of modest wisdom, and pacific truth:Compos’d in sufferings, and in joy sedate,Good without noise, without pretension great.Just of thy word, in ev’ry thought sincere,Who knew no wish but what the world might hear:Of softest manners, unaffected mind,Lover of peace, and friend of human kind:Go, live! for heav’n’s eternal year is thine;Go, and exalt thy mortal to divine.And thou, blest maid! attendant on his doom,Pensive hast follow’d to the silent tomb,Steer’d the same course to the same quiet shore,Not parted long, and now to part no more!Go, then, where only bliss sincere is known!Go, where to love and to enjoy are one!Yet take these tears, mortality’s relief,And, till we share your joys, forgive our grief:These little rites, a stone, a verse receive,’Tis all a father, all a friend can give!

This epitaph contains of the brother only a general indiscriminate character, and of the sister tells nothing but that she died. The difficulty in writing epitaphs is to give a particular and appropriate praise. This, however, is not always to be performed, whatever be the diligence or ability of the writer; for, the greater part of mankind have no character at all, have little that distinguishes them from others equally good or bad, and, therefore, nothing can be said of them which may not be applied with equal propriety to a thousand more. It is, indeed, no great panegyrick, that there is inclosed in this tomb one who was born in one year, and died in another; yet many useful and amiable lives have been spent, which yet leave little materials for any other memorial. These are, however, not the proper subjects of poetry; and whenever friendship, or any other motive, obliges a poet to write on such subjects, he must be forgiven if he sometimes wanders in generalities, and utters the same praises over different tombs.

The scantiness of human praises can scarcely be made more apparent, than by remarking how often Pope has, in the few epitaphs which he composed, found it necessary to borrow from himself. The fourteen epitaphs, which he has written, comprise about a hundred and forty lines, in which there are more repetitions than will easily be found in all the rest of his works. In the eight lines which make the character of Digby, there is scarce any thought, or word, which may not be found in the other epitaphs.

The ninth line, which is far the strongest and most elegant, is borrowed from Dryden. The conclusion is the same with that on Harcourt, but is here more elegant and better connected.

VIII

ON SIR GODFREY KNELLERIn Westminster Abbey, 1723Kneller, by heav’n, and not a master, taught,Whose art was nature, and whose pictures thought;Now for two ages, having snatch’d from fateWhate’er was beauteous, or whate’er was great,Lies crown’d with princes’ honours, poets’ lays,Due to his merit, and brave thirst of praise.Living, great nature fear’d he might outvieHer works; and dying, fears herself may die.

Of this epitaph the first couplet is good, the second not bad, the third is deformed with a broken metaphor, the word crowned not being applicable to the honours or the lays; and the fourth is not only borrowed from the epitaph on Raphael, but of very harsh construction.

IX

ON GENERAL HENRY WITHERS. In Westminster Abbey, 1723

Here, Withers, rest! thou bravest, gentlest mind, Thy country’s friend, but more of human kind. O! born to arms! O! worth in youth approv’d! O! soft humanity in age belov’d! For thee the hardy vet’ran drops a tear, And the gay courtier feels the sigh sincere.

Withers, adieu! yet not with thee remove Thy martial spirit, or thy social love! Amidst corruption, luxury and rage, Still leave some ancient virtues to our age: Nor let us say (those English glories gone) The last true Briton lies beneath this stone.

The epitaph on Withers affords another instance of commonplaces, though somewhat diversified, by mingled qualities, and the peculiarity of a profession.

The second couplet is abrupt, general, and unpleasing; exclamation seldom succeeds in our language; and, I think, it may be observed, that the particle O! used at the beginning of a sentence, always offends.

The third couplet is more happy; the value expressed for him, by different sorts of men, raises him to esteem; there is yet something of the common cant of superficial satirists, who suppose that the insincerity of a courtier destroys all his sensations, and that he is equally a dissembler to the living and the dead157.

At the third couplet I should wish the epitaph to close, but that I should be unwilling to lose the two next lines, which yet are dearly bought if they cannot be retained without the four that follow them.

X

ON MR. ELIJAH FENTONAt Easthamstead, in Berkshire, 1730This modest stone, what few vain marbles can,May truly say, here lies an honest man:A poet, blest beyond the poet’s fate,Whom heav’n kept sacred from the proud and great:Foe to loud praise, and friend to learned ease,Content with science in the vale of peace.Calmly he look’d on either life, and hereSaw nothing to regret, or there to fear;From nature’s temp’rate feast rose satisfy’d,Thank’d heav’n that he liv’d, and that he dy’d.

The first couplet of this epitaph is borrowed from Crashaw. The four next lines contain a species of praise, peculiar, original, and just. Here, therefore, the inscription should have ended, the latter part containing nothing but what is common to every man who is wise and good. The character of Fenton was so amiable, that I cannot forbear to wish for some poet or biographer to display it more fully for the advantage of posterity. If he did not stand in the first rank of genius, he may claim a place in the second; and, whatever criticism may object to his writings, censure could find very little to blame in his life.