Cathon [Parvus and Magnus] transl. &c. by Caxton 1483* Preceptes of Cato, with Annotations of Erafmus, &c. 1560 and 1562 24mo. Lond Ames mentions a Difcourfe of Human Natre, tranflated from Hippocrates, p. 428; an Extra from Pliny, tranflated from the French, p. 312; Æfp †, &c. by Caxton and others; and there is no doubt, but many Tranflations at prefent unknown may be gradually re~‚· covered, either by Industry or Accident.

There is an entry of Caton at Stationers' hall in 1591 by Adams, Eng. and Lat. Again in the year 1591 by Tho. Orwin. Again in 1605. "Four bookes of morall fentences entituled Cato, tranflated out of Latin into English by J. M. Mafter of Arts."

+"fop's Fables in Englife" were entered May 7th 1590, on the books of the Stationers' company. Again, Oct. 1591. Again, Efop's Fables in Meter, Nov. 1598. Some few of them had been paraphrafed by Lydgate, and I believe are still unpublifed, See the Brit. Muf. MSS. Harl. 2251.

It is much to be lamented that Andrew Maunfell, a bookfeller in Lothbury, who published two parts of a catalogue of English printed books, fol. 1995, did not proceed to his third collection. This, according to his own account of it, would have confifted of "Grammar, Logick, and Rhetoricke, 1 awe, Historie, Poetrie, Policie, &c." which, as he tells us, "for the most part concerne matters of delight and pleasure."

APPENDIX

To Mr. Colman's Tranfiation of Terence Octavo Edition.

ΤΗ

~HE reverend and ingenious Mr. Farmer, in his curious and entertaining Effay on the Learning of ShakSpeare, having done me the honour to animadvert on fome paffages in the preface to this tranflation, I cannot difmifs this edition without declaring how far I coincide with that gentleman; although what I then threw aut carelessly on the fubject of this pamphlet was merely incidental, nor did I mean to enter the lifts as a champion to defend either fide of the question.

It is most true, as Mr. Farmer takes for granted, that I had never met with the old comedy called The Suppofes, nor has it ever yet fallen into my hands; yet I am willing to grant, on Mr. Farmer's authority, that Shakspeare borrowed part of the plot of The Taming of the Shrew, from that old tranflation of Ariofto's play, by George Gascoign, and had no obligations to Plautus. I will accede alfo to the truth of Dr. Johnfon's and Mr. Farmer's obfervation, that the line from Terence, exactly as it ftands in Shakspeare, is extant in Lilly and Udall's Figures for Latin Speaking. Still, however, Shakspeare's total ignorance of the learned languages remains to be proved; for it must be granted, that fuch books are put into the hands of thofe who are learning thofe languages, in which clafs we must neceffarily rank Shakspeare, or he could not even have quoted Terence from Udall or Lilly; nor is it likely, that fo rapid a genius. fhould not have made fome further progrefs. "Our author, "(fays Dr. Johnfon, as quoted by Mr. Farmer) had this line "from Lilly; which I mention, that it may not be brought "as an argument of his learning." It is, however, an argument that he read Lilly; and a few pages further it

feems

feems pretty certain, that the author of The Taming of the Sbrew had at least read Ovid; from whofe Epiftle we find thefe lines.

Hac ibat Simois; hic eft Sigeia tellus ;

Hic feterat Priami regia celfa fenis.

And what does Dr. Johnson say on this occafion? Nothing. And what does Mr. Farmer fay on this occafion? Nothing.

In Love's Labour Loft, which, bad as it is, is afcribed by Dr. Johnson himself to Shakspeare, there occurs the word thrafonical; another argument which feems to fhew that he was not unacquainted with the comedies of Terence; not to mention, that the character of the fchoolmaster in the fame play could not poffibly be written by a man who had travelled no further in Latin than bic, bac, boc.

In Henry the Sixth we meet with a quotation from Virgil,

Tantane animis cœleftibus ire?

But this, it feems, proves nothing, any more than the lines from Terence and Ovid, in the Taming of the Shrew; for Mr. Farmer looks on Shakspeare's property in the comedy to be extremely difputable; and he has no doubt but Henry the Sixth had the fame author with Edward the Third, which had been recovered to the world in Mr. Capell's Prolufions.

If any play in the collection bears internal evidence of Shakspeare's hand, we may fairly give him Timon of Athens. In this play we have a familiar quotation from Horace,

Ira furor brevis eft,

I will not maintain but this hemiftich may be found in Lilly or Udall; or that it is not in the Palace of Pleafure, or the English Plutarch; or that it was not originally foifted in by the players: it stands, however, in the play of Timon of Athens.

The world in general, and those who purpose to comment on Shakspeare in particular, will owe much to Mr. Farmer, whofe refearches into our old authors throw a luftre on many paffages, the obfcurity of which muft elfe have been impenetrable. No future Upton or Gildon will go further than North's tranflation for Shakspeare's acquaintance with Plutarch, or balance between Dares Phrygius, and the Troye

booke

booke of Lydgate. The hißorie of Hamblet, in black letter, will for ever fuperfede Saxo Grammaticus; tranflated novels and ballads will, perhaps, be allowed the fources of Romeo, Lear, and the Merchant of Venice; and Shakspeare himfelf, however unlike Bayes in other particulars, will ftand convicted of having tranfverfed the profe of Holingshed; and, at the fame time, to prove "that his fludies lay in his "own language," the tranflations of Ovid are determined to be the production of Heywood.

"That his Audies were most demonstratively confined to rature, and his own language," I readily allow : but does it hence follow that he was fo deplorably ignorant of every other tongue, living or dead, that he only or dead, that he only "remembered, "perhaps, enough of his bolby learning to put the big, "bag, bog, into the mouth of Sir H. Evans; and might pick up in the writers of the time, or the courfe of his converfa❝tion, a familiar phrafe or two of French or Italian?" In Shakspeare's plays both these last languages are plentifully, fcattered; but then, we are told, they might be impertinent additions of the players. Undoubtedly they might: but there they are, and, perhaps, few of the players had much more learning than Shakspeare.

Mr. Farmer himself will allow that Shakspeare began to learn Latin: I will allow that his ftudies lay in English: but why infift that he neither made any progress at school; nor improved his acquifitions there? The general encomiums of Suckling, Denham, Milton, &c. on his native genius*, prove nothing;

66

* Mr. Farmer clofes the general teftimonies of Shakspeare's having been only indebted to nature, by faying, "He came out "of her hand, as fome one.elfe expes it, like Pallas out of Jove's head, at full growth and mature." It is whimfical enough, that this fome one else, whofe expreffion is here quoted to countenance the general notion of Shakspeare's want of literature, fhould be no other than myself. Mr. Farmer does not chufe to mention where he met with the expreffion of fome one clse; and fɔme one else does not chufe to mention where he dropt it †.

+ It will appear fill more whimsical that this fome one else whofe expreffion is bere quoted, may have bis claim to it fuperseded by that of ebe late Dr. Young, who in bis Conjectures on Original Compofition (p. 100. Vol. V. Edit. 1773) has the following fentence.

An adult genius comes out of Nature's hands, as Pailas out of "Jove's head, at full growth and mature. Shakespeare's genius

nothing and Ben Jonfon's celebrated charge of Shakspeare's final Latin, and lefs Greek*, feems abfolutely to decide that he had fome knowledge of both; and if we may judge. by our own time, a man, who has any Greck, is feldom without a very competent fhare of Latin; and yet fuch a man is very likely to ftudy Plutarch in English, and to read tranflations of Ovid.

See Dr. Farmer's reply to these remarks by Mr. Colman, in a note on LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST, Act IV. Sc. ir. p. 456.

"was of this kind." Where fome one else the first may have intermediately dropped the contefled expreffion I cannot ascertain; but fome one else the second tranfcribed it from the author already mentioned, ANON,

* In defence of the various reading of this paffage, given in the preface to the laft edition of Shakipeare, fmall Latin, and no Greek," Mr. Farmer tells us, that "it was adopted above a century ago by W. Towers, in a panegyrick on Cartwright.” Surely, Towers haying faid that Cartwright had no Greek, is no proof that Ben Jonfon fard fo of Shakspeare.