AN ACCOUNT OF THE GREATEST ENGLISH POETS. TO MR. H. S.1 APRIL 3, 1694. b SINCE, dearest Harry, you will needs request A short account of all the muse-possest, That, down from Chaucer's days to Dryden's times, Have spent their noble rage in British rhymes; To speak the undertaker's want of strength, 1 The Sacheverell to whom these lines were addressed, was, according to one account, a Manxman, who died young, leaving a history of the Isle of Man. He left his papers to Addison, and among them the plan of a tragedy on the death of Socrates. In this case, Johnson's sarcasm is at fault, though it is somewhat strange that with the voucher for this fact among his own papers, he should not have corrected his mistake.-[Vide note to Johnson's Life of Addison.] But as is more generally believed, he was the celebrated Dr. Sacheverell, whose trial excited so much attention; and Addison is said, on the authority of Dr. Young, to have been in love with a sister of his. This piece was first published in a miscellany, and never reprinted by Addison himself, who probably saw reason, in after years, to change some of his opinions. Johnson says he never printed it. The omission of Shakspeare's name has been often noticed. The finest passage is the lines on Milton.-G. Henry Sacheverell, whose story is well known. Yet with all his follies, some respect may seem due to the memory of a man, who had merit in his youth, as appears from a paper of verses under his name, in Dryden's Miscellanies; and who lived in the early friendship of Mr. Addison. bThe introductory and concluding lines of this poem are a bad imitation of Horace's manner-Sermoni propiora. In the rest, the poetry is better than the criticism, which is right or wrong, as it chances; being echoed from the common voice. I'll try to make their several beauties known, Long had our dull forefathers slept supine, Through pathless fields, and unfrequented floods, Great Cowley then (a mighty genius) wrote, Old Spenser. Addison is said to have confessed that when he wrote this judgment, he had never read Spenser. In the Spectator he puts Spenser "in the same class with Milton."-G. 2 Great Cowley then. But if he had not read Spenser, he evidently had read Cowley, whose prose he must have admired, if for nothing else, for its freedom from the faults which are here so justly condemned in his verse. His turns too closely on the reader press : O'er-flows the heav'ns with one continu'd light; Th' unnumber'd beauties of thy verse with blame; a But wit like thine in any shape will please. And plays in more unbounded verse, and takes a nobler flight. In Sprat's successful labours and thy own. But Milton, next, with high and haughty stalks, No vulgar hero can his muse ingage; Nor earth's wide scene confine his hallow'd rage. Parts of his criticism are admirable; but the unfortunate line-"He more had pleased us," has been severely ridiculed.-G. Cowley had great merit, but nature had formed him to manage Anacreon's lute, and not Pindar's lyre Shakes heaven's eternal throne with dire alarms, Bold, and sublime, my whole attention draws, What sounds of brazen wheels, what thunder, scare, And stun the reader with the din of war! To see the seraphs sunk in clouds of fire; I wonder what these laws could be. Nobody understood the critic's nicest laws, better than Milton, or observed them with more respect. The observation might be true of Shakspeare; but, by illhap, we do not so much as find his name in this account of English poets. A vision so profuse of pleasantness. A prettily turned line. The expression (originally Milton's, P. L. iv. 243. viii. 286) pleased our poet so much, that we have it again in the letter from Italy-profuse of bliss, and elsewhere. • Serene and bright. This is a strange description of Milton's language, if he means the language of his prose works. The panegyric seems made at random. But now my muse a softer strain rehearse, 1 Thy verse, harmonious bard, and flatt'ring song, What scenes of death and horror had we view'd, Nor must Roscommon pass neglected by, Rules, whose deep sense, and heav'nly numbers show Nor, Denham, must we e'er forget thy strains, While Cooper's Hill commands the neighb'ring plains. 1 Thy verse can show. Of this and the four next lines, Johnson says,"What is this but to say, that he who would compliment Cromwell had been the proper poet for King William ?"-G. VOL. 1.-7 |