spotless credit of the great poet's character, as a tious!" A superstitious fidelity loses the spirit, man and a citizen, vindicated as it ought to be, and a loose deviation the sense of the translated and as it never will be again. author-a happy moderation in either case is the only possible way of preserving both. It is a great relief to me that my Miltonic labours are suspended. I am now busy in tran- Thus have I disciplined you both; and now, if scribing the alterations of Homer, having finished you please, you may both discipline me. I shall the whole revisal. I must then write a new Pre-not enter my version in my book till it has underface, which done I shall endeavour immediately to gone your strictures at least ; and should you write descant on The Four Ages. Adieu, my dear bro-to the noble critic again, you are welcome to subther. W. C. TO WILLIAM HAYLEY, ESQ. O Jove! and all ye Gods! grant this my son And may his mother's heart o'erflow with joy! mit it to his. We are three awkward fellows indeed, if we can not amongst us make a tolerably good translation of six lines of Homer. Adieu. W.C. TO WILLIAM HAYLEY, ESQ. MY DEAR HAYLEY, Weston, Jan. 5, 1794. I ROSE this morning, at six o'clock, on purpose to translate this prayer again, and to write to my close reasoning and abstruse discussion, for I rise dear brother. Here you have it, such as it is, not after ill rest, and with a frame of mind perfectly perfectly according to my own liking, but as well unsuited to the occasion. I sit too at the window as I could make it, and I think better than either for light's sake, where I am so cold, that my pen yours, or Lord Thurlow's. You with your six slips out of my fingers. First, I will give you a lines have made yourself stiff and ungraceful, and translation de novo of this untranslated prayer. It he with his seven has produced as good prose as is shaped as nearly as I could contrive to his lordheart can wish, but no poetry at all. A scrupu- ship's ideas, but I have little hope that it will salous attention to the letter has spoiled you both, tisfy him. you have neither the spirit nor the manner of HoGrant Jove, and ye Gods, that this my son Be, as myself have been, illustrious here! mer. A portion of both may be found I believe A valiant man! and let him reign in Troy; in my version, but not so much as I wish-it is May all who witness his return from fight better however than the printed one. His lord- Hereafter, say- -he far excels his sire; ship's two first lines I can not very well underAnd let him bring back gory trophies, stript stand; he seems to me to give a sense to the oriFrom foes slain by him, to his mother's joy. ginal that does not belong to it. Hector, I appre- Imlac, in Rasselas, says-I forget to whom, hend, does not say, "Grant that he may prove "You have convinced me that it is impossible to himself my son, and be eminent, &c.-but grant be a poet." In like manner, I might say to his that this my son may prove eminent"—which is a lordship, you have convinced me that it is imposmaterial difference. In the latter sense I find the sible to be a translator; to be a translator, on his simplicity of an ancient; in the former, that is to terms, at least, is I am sure impossible. On his say, in the notion of a man proving himself his terms I would defy Homer himself, were he father's son by similar merit, the finesse and dex-alive, to translate the Paradise Lost into Greek. terity of a modern. His lordship too makes the Yet Milton had Homer much in his eye when he man, who gives the young hero his commenda- composed that poem. Whereas Homer never tion, the person who returns from battle; whereas thought of me or my translation. There are miHomer makes the young hero himself that person, nutiæ in every language, which transfused into at least if Clarke is a just interpreter, which I sup- another will spoil the version. Such extreme pose is hardly to be disputed. fidelity is in fact unfaithful. Such close resemIf my old friend would look into my preface, he blance takes away all likeness. The original is would find a principle laid down there, which per- elegant, easy, natural; the copy is clumsy, conhaps it would not be easy to invalidate, and which strained, unnatural: To what is this owing? To properly attended to would equally secure a trans- the adoption of terms not congenial to your purlation from stiffness and from wildness. The pose, and of a context, such as no man writing an principle I mean is this "Close, but not so close original work would make use of. Homer is every as to be servile! free, but not so free as to be licen- thing that a poet should be. A translation of Ho trio, remain Yours ever, W.C. mer, so made, will be every thing that a transla- I have not had time to criticise his lordship's tion of Homer should not be. Because it will be other version. You know how little time I have written in no language under Heaven. It will be for any thing, and can tell him so. English, and it will be Greek, and therefore it will Adieu! my dear brother. I have now tired both be neither. He is the man, whoever he be (I do you and myself; and with the love of the whole not pretend to be that man myself,) he is the man best qualified as a translator of Homer, who was drenched, and steeped, and soaked himself in the Reading his lordship's sentiments over again, I effusions of his genius till he has imbibed their am inclined to think that in all I have said, I have colour to the bone; and who, when he is thus only given him back the same in other terms. He dyed through and through, distinguishing between disallows both the absolute free, and the absolute what is essentially Greek, and what may be habit-close-so do I; and, if I understand myself, have ed in English, rejects the former, and is faithful to said so in my Preface He wishes to recommend the latter, as far as the purpose of fine poetry will a medium, though he will not call it so; so do I; permit, and no further; this I think, may be easily only we express it differently. What is it then proved. Homer is every where remarkable either we dispute about? My head is not good enough for ease, dignity, or energy of expression; for to-day to discover. grandeur of conception, and a majestic flow of numbers. If we copy him so closely as to make every one of these excellent properties of his absolutely unattainable, which will certainly be the effect of too close a copy, instead of translating, we murder him. Therefore, after all that his lordship has said, I still hold freedom to be indispensable. Freedom, I mean with respect to the expression: freedom so limited, as never to leave behind the matter: but at the same time indulged with a sufficient scope to secure the spirit, and as much as possible of the manner. I say as much as possible, because an English manner must differ from a Greek one, in order to be graceful, and for this there is no remedy. Can an ungraceful, awkward translation of Homer be a good one? No. But a graceful, easy, natural, faithful version of him, will In one day, in one minute, I should rather have not that be a good one? Yes. Allow me but this, said, she became an universal blank to me; and and I insist upon it, that such an one may be pro- though from a different cause, yet with an effect duced on my principles, and can be produced on as difficult to remove, as blindness itself. no other. TO LADY HESKETH. DEAR COUSIN, THE END OF COWPER'S WORKS. Contents. The articles marked with an asterisk have never before appeared in any edition of Thomson's Poems, and some of them are printed for the first time from the Author's MS. Memoir of James Thomson. "Tutored by thee, sweet Poetry exalts THE biography of a man whose life was passed ment on the opinions of superior understandings, in his study, and who is known to the world by without reflecting that none are exempt from his writings alone, can present few facts to render caprice even if they be so from errors; and though it popular, unless it was chequered by events that the statements of an author may be generally excite interest, or marked by traits which lessen just, cases occur in which he is prejudiced or esteem. If a Poet has been vicious, the account misinformed. It is scarcely necessary to say, of the misfortunes which vice never fails to bring, that the Life of Thomson by Dr. Johnson is and of its effects on himself, is read with atten- alluded to; and few need be told that this is not tion; but the career of him who was uniformly the first time his account of the Poet has been virtuous, who experienced no remarkable vicissi- charged with injustice. The inquiries necessary tudes of fortune, and who was only eminent from for this article have tended to confirm the suspithe genius which his writings display, must yield in variety of incident to that of a pirate or cour tesan. cion that the colossus of literature was influenced by some extraordinary bias against the author of "The Seasons," for not a single notice of him, There is nevertheless much that will gratify a reflecting upon his character, has been found reader whose taste is not so vitiated as to require which is not traceable to Johnson. His Life is the excitement of romance, in tracing the progress sneering and satirical, and he rarely admits Thomof a distinguished literary person; and he who is son to have possessed a merit without accompanot desirous of knowing the history of a writer nying it by an ungenerous remark. The cause whose name is associated with his earliest recol- of this conduct must be sought in vain; but the lections must be void of every spark of curiosity. temper of Johnson and his violent political feelA favourite author possesses claims upon our re-ings are sufficiently notorious to render the pagard similar to those of friendship; and the tale, triotic sentiments which Thomson every where which would be dull and tiresome if it concerned any other person, is read, or listened to, with the liveliest pleasure. inculcates a sufficient explanation of his hostility, whilst his country may have been another ground for his dislike. Before dismissing Dr. Johnson's Thomson's life must be indebted for whatever Life it is material to state, that his assertions regratification it may afford to the sympathy of his specting Thomson are entitled to little credit when admirers, since it is destitute of all other attrac- opposed by other testimony; for it can be proved tions. Little has been preserved concerning him, that he knew little about him, and that he was perhaps because very little was deserving of being too negligent to avail himself of the information recorded; and these notices are so scattered that which he sought. It must be remembered, too, it has required some labour to form the present that Johnson never saw him; and that whatever memoir. He did less for his own history than he may have learned from others avails nothing almost any other poet of the time, as his works in comparison with the account of his personal contain few egotisms, and his great dislike to cor- and intimate friends whose esteem is in itself amrespondence prevented the existence of those fa- ple evidence of his virtues. miliar letters which form the most delightful materials for biography. JAMES THOMSON was the son of the Reverend The task of preparing this memoir has, how-Mr. Thomson, of Ednam, in the shire of Roxever, been a grateful one. A writer can not be burgh, at which place the Poet was born on the 'ndifferent to the pleasure of rendering justice to 11th of September, 1700. Less has been said of merit which has been traduced, and of placing his parents than they merit, and from the slight an amiable and unblemished character in its true manner in which they have been noticed the idea light. Mankind are too apt to form their judg-may have arisen that he was of obscure origin. |