 | The first epistle of the second book of Horace, imitated |  |
“
Yet surely, surely, these were famous men!
“What Boy but hears the sayings of old Ben?
“In all debates where Criticks bear a part,
“Not one but nods, and talks of Johnson's Art,
“Of Shakespear's Nature, and of Cowley's Wit;
“How Beaumont's Judgment check'd what Fletcher writ;
“How Shadwell hasty, Wycherly was slow;
“But, for the Passions, Southern sure and Rowe.
“These, only these, support the crouded stage,
“From eldest Heywood down to Cibber's age.
“What Boy but hears the sayings of old Ben?
“In all debates where Criticks bear a part,
“Not one but nods, and talks of Johnson's Art,
6
“How Beaumont's Judgment check'd what Fletcher writ;
“How Shadwell hasty, Wycherly was slow;
“But, for the Passions, Southern sure and Rowe.
“These, only these, support the crouded stage,
“From eldest Heywood down to Cibber's age.
Nothing was less true than this particular: But this Paragraph has a mixture of Irony, and must not altogether be taken for Horace's own Judgment, only the common Chatt of the pretenders to Criticism; in some things right, in others wrong: as he tells us in his answer,
Interdum vulgus rectum videt, est ubi peccat.
| The first epistle of the second book of Horace, imitated | |