We do not affect to despise emolument. It is worse than idle, for men engaged in temporal traffic, to talk of indifference for gain, and pretend to consider their own personal interest as nothing, compared to the wish they have of sercing the public. It may be received as an axiom, that he who serves the public, expects the public to serve him in return. But as we know that fame and reward, in literature, are bestowed with more than usual equity, so no man has a right to expect them till he deserves them. If any pledge, however, were needed of the sincerity of our wishes to procure the approbation of our subscribers, that pledge may be found in our past endcavours: we hace exceeded the tenor of our engagement with them: for, in our original prospectus, we stipulated to give only occasional embellishments: this was a word of wide import, and might have been used at discretion; but twice only, in the course of fifty-five numbers, have we availed ourselves of this conditional promise: and even then we gave other engravings, when the portraits were omitted. Let this subdue the caviller. We could willingly hope, however, that less than what has been here said would have been sufficient to produce a willing acquiescence to the present measure. The pleasure of an engraving is but the pleasure of a moment: the value of a portrait depends upon its fidelity; deprive it of that, and it is worthless; and who can answer for the fidelity of successive transmission? Besides, in this age of pictured embellishment, when not an ode or an elegy can come forth without the aid of extrinsic ornament, the importance of such ornament necessa rily diminished. And who would, for a moment, put in competition with the transitory gratification of looking at a plate, the higher, the nobler, the more lasting one of the mind? The one is the gratification of a child: the other, the delight of a rational being; and we trust, that the nature of our increased literary communications, will well repay the loss of an engraving. After all, if any of our readers can engage to point out, cach month, a truly great, or even a secondary great character, we will consent to have his head engraved for their benefit; but if this cannot be done, who will be the advocate for advancing temporary notoriety to the permanent honour of the pencil? Devouring what he saw He, with an empty picture, fed his mind.' London, July 21, 1808. DRYDEN. ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS. IS MILTON & PLAGIARY, or an INI- at Cologne for the use of his scholars, TATOR of MASENIUS? Sir, JAMES Masenius, a Latin poet and and the idea of comparing the immortal poem of Milton with the obscure work of Masenius is preposterous. German Jesuit, has become ce- I do not, indeed, wish to deny that lebrated, from the pretended confor- the poem of Masenius contains some mity of his poem, intitled Sarcotis, fine verses and some powerful descripwith the Paradise Lost of Milton: and tions: but there is a general bad taste it has even been attempted to pro- which prevails throughout: it is not nounce the latter a plagiary of the interesting; all his moral and allegoformer. Perhaps too much has been rical personages neither satisfy the said about a few vague and indefinite mind, nor please the imagination : points of resemblance between two his fictions smell of the college, and authors, who have both written have nothing rich or striking about upon a similar subject. The plagia- them. The partisans, even of Maserism appears to me to be a chimera; nius, (for he has partisans) are obliged the imitation even is not sufficiently to confess after him, that he has less proved; it may even be doubted whether Milton, living in London, knew any thing about the Latin verses which a jesuit professor had composed attempted to write an epic poem, than to collect a series of examples adapted to the lessons contained in his Poetique, another work intended Formidat Rhodanus. for the use of his scholars. The Sar- country was not under his dominion, cotis of Masenus has been translated and it was very unfortunate for it, into French by the Abbe Dinouart. when this prince made an irruption Both the poem and the translation into Provence in 1530, and which is were admitted, in 1757, into Barbou's implied by the expression collection of Latin authors, and it is no small honour for the Surcotis to It was therefore necessary, that the be found in such good company. In distinguishing expression should have 1771, the same Barbou gave a new been retained to each of these rivers, edition, which also forms a part of as originally applied by the poet. the collection: in this are to be found all the different pieces which have any connection either with regard to the plagiarism or the imitation of Milton; also the Poetique of Masenius, and a second poem of this jesuit, which is the eloge of Charles V. This last poem was translated into French, in 1773, by Ausart, a Benedictine of the congregation of St. Maur. It is a panegyric: but it would have been more interesting had it been a portrait. It is vague, prolix, and tedious. The translation is not without elegance and dignity: but, in a few places, from a wish to be too concise, the translator has deviated not only from the sense of the author, but also from historical exactitude. For example: the poet says, in speaking of his hero, Cui Rhenus amorem Debet et obsequium, Bætis famulantibus undis Subjacet, Eridanus pronas substernit are Ansart translated this passage thus: "Le Rhin, le Guaidaquiver, le Po, le Rhône, l'Escaut, virent les pays qu'ils arrosent, hereux sous votre domination." But Masenius distinguishes the different rivers or the countries through which they flow, by different expressions, according to the relations which these countries had with Charles V.; and the translator has confounded all these shades, or rather he has omitted them all for the sake of brevity. From this omission arises sometimes a directly opposite meaning: for in stance, Formidat Rhonus If you think these desultory observations worth the notice of your readers, they are much at your service, and Liverpool, I remain, Sir, &c. July 9, 1808. C. K. The PRAISE of SILENCE. the subject of eulogies, and why not Silence? Besides, there is this difference; that those were but sportive, while the praise of silence might aspire to moral importance. Silence was a deity among the Egyptians, and was called Harpocrates; he is known by having his finger on his month, as if to forbid garrulity: he has had wings since, like Love, to mark the secrecy which lovers should pre-erve; and lastly, the attributes of Esculapius, because the disciples of medicine should be silent and reserved. But what surprises me, is, that this God is often represented under the figure of an infant. Surely that is not the age of discre tion. It is not, however, with this sort of silence that i have to do at present; but with that which by mute enunciation speaks more powerfully than words, and which eloquence often employs with sublimity. The silence of forests, so elevated an object in the Gaulish religion, and of which Lucan has made such use, has served also for an ancient French poet, who says that love has sown there a thousand and ten thousand ideas, which lovers are always employed in collecting. Quinault says, «Jusq'au silence même, tout me parle de ce que j'aime;" is not meant to convey the idea of a and Tasso has also said in his Aminta, Country happy under the domination of Charles V.: tor, in fact, this Et silenzio ancor suole Nothing expresses a refusal better in a small boat, with only four attenthan silence, as the following will dants! In Paris they scarcely knew prove. An ambassador from the city where she lived, so little was she of Abdera (according to Plutarch) thought of, says the journal of Charles harangued, at great length, Agis, VII. king of Sparta, in favour of his fellow The silence of Ajax is well known citizens. Well, Sire! what answer in the eleventh book of the Odyssey. do you wish that I should make It is known what indignation he felt them?-That I have suffered you to when the arms of Achilles were adsay all that you wish, and as much as judged to Ulysses. Ulysses meets you wish, without saying a word my him in hell: he was alone, separated self. from the other shades, and appeared If I may be allowed to quote a ro- to be as indignant as when he was in mance, the celebrity of the Princesse the world, of the injustice that had de Clives will be my excuse. M. de been done him. Ulysses accosts Nemours approaches to Madame du him, says the most flattering things, Clèves, he does not say a word, and she turns briskly round, and exclaims, Eh! mon dieu, monsieur, laissez moi en repos! recals to him all his glory, &c. and the poet, who felt that it was impossible to convey by words the feelings that must have agitated the soul of Ajax, has recourse to silence: Ajax makes no reply. Thus also Timanthes veiled the face of Agamemnon at the sacrifice of Iphigenia. The quos ego of Neptune, in Virgil, is not silence, but retention. This God is ready to menace Eolus, who, without his order, has raised a tempest against Eneas, at the prayer of But what moment more fit, than Juno: but Neptune is a god too powerful to descend to menaces, and a blow of his trident effects the execution of his orders. The Marcellus eris, forced from the tears of the wife of Augustus, is a similar instance of retention in language very superior to words. the interview between Dido and Eneas in the infernal regions, and in which I cannot but think Virgil superior to Homer.. Ulysses leaves Ajax in his silence, and discourses with other shades. The silence of Ajax produces nothing: but let us behold Virgil. Dido slew herself; she meets Eneas in hell, and thus he addresses her: Inter quas Phenissa recens a vulnere Dido Obscuram, qualem primo qui surgere mense What foreign cohort is that which enters the city with the air of a Sovereign? they are the English. Paris has become their capital: Henry V. has married the legitimate heiress: they traverse the whole city, and pass under the windows of Isabel of Bavaria, who is waiting for them to enjoy their thanks and their gratitude. But what is her surprise? they preserve a mournful silence, and do not deign even to look towards the windows! Can there be a more striking picture? Was it to be expected? Is this a day of festivity? The air ought Funeris heu tibi causa fui? per sidera juro, to ring with shouts and acclamations: Per superos, et si qua fides tellure sub ima but no: indignation and contempt are Aut videt, aut vidisse putat per nubile lu- nam, est: Infelix Dido, verus mihi nuntius ergo cutam. est, more powerful than triumph. Invitus, regina, tuo de littore cessi. Such was the power of silence: it ex- Sed me jussa Deum, quæ nunc has ire per presses more than all that has ever been written against this worthless queen. Were not her obsequies, too, a moral lesson? She died at Paris in the year 1435, having hardly wherewith to subsist on her body was carried from the hotel de St. Paul to St. Denis, umbras, &c. * Siste gradum, teque aspectu ne subtrahe nostro. Quem fugis? extremum fato quod te allo- Tandem corroripuit sesc, atque inimica re- nothing which can at all advance my fugit purpose. In nemus umbriferum: conjux ubi pristinus illi. Respondet curis, æquatque Sichæus amo rem. It is in the 11th book of the Eneid: Lavinia, enclosed in the city of La rentium, which Eneas besieges, goes, in the train of the queen her mother, to the temple of Pallas, to implore against Eneas in favour of Turnus: Juxtâque comes Lavinia virgo, Causa mali tanti, oculos dejecta decoros. It is related that a man of genius, reading the above beautiful passage for the first time, closed the book suddenly, and endeavoured whether it was not possible for him to put into the mouth of Dido a reply suitable to M. Grossley imagines that this her situation and, after having com- hiatus, far from being a fault, is even posed a certain number of verses, the a beauty. The hiatus which stops most beautiful that he could, he the reader, by the concurrence of two opened the volume, to measure vowels, is a master stroke, by which lances with Virgil, and found that the is depicted the suspension which the sole reply of Dido was-silence and indignation! sight of the princess must occasion, and to interest in favour of which ever she should offer up her vows for, Eneas or Turnus. In this passage from Virgil, how obvious is the difference between the two poets. I feel, anew, all my The same author mentions a segrief awakened for Dido! If Virgil cond hiatus: it is in the ninth book took the idea from Homer, certainly of the Eneid: he is not his imitator. For what purpose did Ulysses descend into the Hanc sine me spem ferre tui: audentior infernal regions? To consult Tiresias there. Eneas, on the contrary, went there to seek for his father, and to behold pass before him, that noble line of his descendants, which recalls to our minds the recollection of the whole Roman history. ibo. And he explains it, by saying that Eurialus, in making this prayer to Ascanias for him to take care of his mother, if he should fall in his enterprise, exhibits by this hiatus his trouble, and eagerness, to speak. But is this an excuse for the hiatus? is it, in fact, a beanty? A fine passage of Homer, and which appears to me to be too little felt and acknowledged, is when all I shall finish this essay by mentionthe gods are assembled in Olympus, ing an example from the divine writeach with his attributes, and seem to ings of silence; our Saviour before surround Jupiter to win his favour: Pilate. Imagine all that a celestial one, for the Trojans; one, for the being, though invested with the hu Greeks; all the universe is in motion: man form, might have answered, the heavens filled with divinities, and when asked Quid est veritas?—What the earth covered with soldiers: Ju- is truth? He was about to disappear piter hears, and afterwards dismisses this multitude of immortals: the uproar of their departure completes the astonishment which is excited: what does Achilles do then? What does Homer oppose to this general fermentation of nature? He makes us behold Achilles alone in his tent, and whose inactivity has an influence on all these great events! from earth was not this therefore the moment to explain himself? No: he was silent · it was thus that he replied to the vain and bold curiosity of a vain and indifferent prince. Surely I have written enough upon this subject, and I shall conclude with a final reflection, viz. that in all my enquiries upon this subject, in all my endeavours to fortify myself with au I have met with a dissertation of thorities, I have been much surprised M. Grossley, upon a verse of Virgil, that in no author upon rhetoric, in no which has furnished him with an op- author who has written upon tropes portunity of saying something upon and figures, and upon whatever is subsilence. Thus you see, Sir, I omit sidiary to eloquence have I found any M. P. H. REMARKS on an EXTRACT from Dr. thing upon this subject in particular. fected the interests, or what difference Quinctilian, Fenelon, P. Bouhours, it made to the people of Scotland, Gibert Jouvenei, Poree, P. le Santé,, whether King James took into his fale P. Brumoi, Blair, Kaimes, &c. vor Cochran a mason, or Angus a sometimes remark upon the beauty noble? According to my concepwhich arises from silence, but only tions, it could only possibly interfere en passant, and I therefore thought with them as he adopted to his favor, that this subject might be considered or promoted the interests, of men, without any fear of treading in a of good and wise, or bad and weak beaten track. In fact, silence is less conduct. Hence, it appears that the a figure of rhetoric than an offspring chief question for them to decide on of taste; and taste has no rules. It is was, which is the best and wisest an instinct of reason, which, like the man, Cochran or Angus? Perhaps instinct of nature, is never wrong. neither. Well, admit that both are July 17, 1808. weak and vicious: will it be contended that his majesty acted wrong by preferring Cochran to Angus? Surely it cannot. He only did wrong by selecting for his companion and confident any man of vicious habits and contemptible abilities. How then can the learned historian be justified in stating that "so despicable a retinue* discovers the capriciousness of James?" Since it is, or ought to be, well known, that no man is the more despicable for being a mason, nor the less so for being a noble. A mason is by no rule of fitness entitled to blame, nor a noble to praise, merely because the one is a mason, and the other a noble. They are both only entitled to blame or praise, as they behave themselves well or ill, properly or impropedy. Neither ought to be taken into royal favor until there be at least presumptive proof of their evincing an eager desire for their country's welfare, and have abi-' lities and rectitude to act accordingly, LAND. Sir, SHOUL Somerset, 20th July, 1808. "Among the most remarkable of those who had engrossed the king's attention, were Cochran a mason, Hommil a taylor, Leonard a smith, Rogers a musician, and Torfifan a fencingmaster. So despicable a retinue discovers the capriciousness of James's character, and accounts for the indignation of the nobles, when they beheld the favor due to them, bestowed on such unworthy objects." Vide Robertson's Ist, Scot, p. 260. 16 Ed. Squirrels for nuts contend,-and, wrong or right, For the world's empire kings ambitious fight. However liberal and just the learned historian's conclusions may generally be, I cannot but think that the above is glaringly illiberal and absurd: A nut, a world, a squirrel, and a king. since it endeavours to establish as an axiom, that the favor of kings is due to nobles, whether they are really deserving of that favor or not. The countenance and protection of monarchs are only due to men possessing the most unbounded integrity, the sincerest love for their country, the best abilities, and the most undaunted What odds? to us 'tis all the self same thit g J. C. The learned historian, in order to have confirmed his position, should have entered into the characters of this despicable retinue," and set forth the superiority of the nobles touching that particular. But here all is darkness and uncertainty. |