sor Forest, the one written by Sir John Denham, • the other by Mr. Pope, will shew a great deal of candour if they approve of this.' Of the Epistle of Eloisa, we are told by the obscure writer of a poem called Sawney, That 'because Prior's Henry and Emma charmed the • finest tastes, our Author writ his Eloisa in oppo'sition to it, but forgot innocence and virtue: if 'you take away her tender thoughts, and her fierce desires, all the rest is of no value.' In which, methinks, his judgment resembleth that of a French tailor on a villa and gardens by the Thames: All this is very fine ; but take away the river, and it is good for nothing.' But very contrary hereunto was the opinion of MR. PRIOR himself, saying in his Alma ‡, O Abelard! Ill fated youth, Dan Pope, for thy misfortune griev❜d, A silken web, and ne'er shall fade The mantle o'er thy sad distress, 'And Venus shall the texture bless,' &c. Come we now to his Translation of the Iliad, celebrated by numerous pens; yet shall it suffice to mention the indefatigable Alma, canto 2. SIR RICHARD BLACKMORE, KT. who (though otherwise a severe censurer of our Author) yet styleth this 'A laudable Translation*.' That ready writer, MR. OLDMIXON, in his fore-mentioned Essay, frequently commends the same. And the painful MR. LEWIS THEOBALD thus extols itt: 'The spirit of Homer breathes all 'through this Translation.-I am in doubt whether I should most admire the justness to the Original, or the force and beauty of the language, or the sounding variety of the Numbers; but when I find all these meet, it puts me in 'mind of what the poet says of one of his heroes, that he alone raised and flung with ease a weighty stone that two common men could not lift from the ground; just so one single person has per'formed, in this Translation, what I once despaired 'to have seen done by the force of several masterly hands.' Indeed the same gentleman appears to have changed his sentiment in his Essay on the Art of Sinking in Reputation, (printed in MIST'S JOURNAL, March 30, 1728,) where he says: thus: In order to sink in reputation, let him In his Essays, vol. I. printed for E. Curl. + Censor, vol. II. No. 35. take it into his head to descend into Homer, '(let the world wonder, as it will, how the del he got there) and pretend to do him into Eng⚫lish, so his version denote his neglect of the 'manner how.' Strange variation !-We are told in MIST'S JOURNAL, JUNE 8. That this translation of the Iliad was not in all respects conformable to the fine taste of his friend Mr. Addison; insomuch that he employed a younger Muse in an undertaking of this kind, 'which he supervised himself.' Whether Mr. Addison did find it conformable to his taste or not, best appears from his own testimony the year following its publication, in these words: MR. ADDISON'S FREEHOLDER, NO. 40. When I consider myself as a British Freeholder, I am in a particular manner pleased with the labors of those who have improved our language with the translations of old Greek and Latin authors. We have already most of • their historians in our own tongue, and, what is 'more for the honor of our language, it hath been taught to express with elegance the greatest of ⚫ their poets in each nation. The illiterate among our own countrymen may learn to judge from Dryden's Virgil of the most perfect epic perfor mance; and those parts of Homer which have been published already by Mr. Pope, give us reason to think that the Iliad will appear in En'glish with as little disadvantage to that immortal ' poem.' As to the rest, there is a slight mistake; for this younger muse was an elder : nor was the gentleman (who is a friend of our Author) employed by Mr. Addison to translate it after him, since he saith himself that he did it before*. Contrariwise, that Mr. Addison engaged our Author in this work, appeareth by declaration thereof in the Preface to the Iliad, printed some time before his death, and by his own letters of October 26, and November 2, 1713, where he declares, it is his opinion, that no other person was equal to it. Next comes his Shakespear on the stage: 'Let ' him' (quoth one, whom I take to be MR. THEOBALD, MIST'S JOURNAL, June 8, 1728,) publish such an author as he has least studied, ' and forget to discharge even the dull duty of an 'editor. In this project let him lend the book'seller his name (for a competent sum of money) 'to promote the credit of an exorbitant subscrip'tion.' Gentle Reader, be pleased to cast thine eye on the proposal below quoted, and on what follows (some months after the former assertion) • Vide Preface to Mr. Tickel's translation of the First Book of the Iliad, 4to. VOL. IV. in the same Journals of June 8. The bookseller proposed the book by subscription, and raised 'some thousands of pounds for the same: I believe the gentleman did not share in the profits ' of this extravagant subscription.' After the Iliad, he undertook (saith MIST'S JOURNAL, June 8, 1728,) 'the sequel of that work, the Odyssey; and having secured the success by a numerous subscription, he employed some underlings to perform what, according to his Proposals, should come from his own hands.' To which heavy charge we can in truth oppose nothing but the words of MR. POPE'S PROPOSAL for the ODYSSEY, (printed by J. WATTS, Jan. 10. 1724.) Iany ed, 201 foot 12 Righ be I take this occasion to declare, that the subscrip'tion for Shakespear belongs wholly to Mr. Tonson: and that the benefit of this Proposal is not solely for my own use, but for that of two of my friends, who have assisted me in this work.' But these very gentlemen are extolled above our Poet himself in another of MIST'S JOURNALS, March 30, 1728, saying, That he would not • advise Mr. Pope to try the experiment again of getting a great part of a book done by assistants, lest those extraneous parts should unhappily as cend to the sublime, and retard the declension of |